[erlang-questions] origin of handle_info/2

[Richard Carlsson]

It's "info" in the sense of "any other messages to this process, that are
not recognised as special OTP framework messages". When you use a function
like gen_server:call(...), the OTP libraries wrap your message in a way
that lets the receiving server process see that it is a part of the OTP
framework and redirects it to the standard callbacks like handle_call() or
handle_cast(). If you just send a message to the gen_server process with
the ! operator, it will not have the right wrapper, and will be dispatched
to handle_info(). Typical uses of info messages are timeouts and other
"note to self" style messages.


        /Richard

2017-03-16 16:33 GMT+01:00 Xavier Noria <fxn@REDACTED>:

> A curiosity,
>
> Where does the `handle_info` callback name come from? The name does not
> suggest what the method is invoked for to me.
>
> I wonder if there is a historical background behind that name, or perhaps
> "info" reflects usage in a way that I fail to see.
>
>
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