WeakJob

[InsanusMokrassar]

I have a feature request about WeakJobs. Currently in my practice there are tasks (Job) which are not important in context of CoroutinesScope and can be (sometimes must be) cancelled when there are no any strong Job (common Job) left in this CoroutineScope. As I remember, currently when we are calling launch/async methods on CoroutineScope we will get new Job and this Job will prohibit CoroutineScope to be completed until Job will not be completed too.

Example of syntax

val scope = CoroutineScope(Dispatchers.Default)
scope.weakLaunch {
    while (isActive) {
        println("still working")
    }
}
scope.launch {
    delay(5100L)
    println("that will be last one")
}

It is expected that the code above will print:

still working
still working
still working
still working
still working
that will be last one

[InsanusMokrassar]

Currently there is way to get the same functionality (as I understand):

val scope = CoroutineScope(Dispatchers.Default)
val subScope = CoroutineScope(scope.coroutineContext)
scope.coroutineContext.job.invokeOnCompletion { subScope.cancel() }

subScope.launch {
    while (isActive) {
        println("still working")
    }
}
scope.launch {
    delay(5100L)
    println("that will be last one")
}

[MairwunNx]

The name weak slightly violates the principle of naming objects that are weak to the garbage collector. Maybe you should choose a different name for such a function?

[InsanusMokrassar]

The name weak slightly violates the principle of naming objects that are weak to the garbage collector. Maybe you should choose a different name for such a function?

I have suggested this name exactly because of weak this scope is not direct child and should not be counted as subscope for its parent

[fvasco]

I wrote something similar here: #1065

[elizarov]

@fvasco Thanks for the link. Yes, this request is essentially a duplicate of #1065