SocketOptions

 ServerSocket.accept();
 SocketInputStream.read();
 DatagramSocket.receive();
 

IP_MULTICAST_IF

int IP_MULTICAST_IF

Set which outgoing interface on which to send multicast packets. Useful on hosts with multiple network interfaces, where applications want to use other than the system default. Takes/returns an InetAddress.

Valid for Multicast: DatagramSocketImpl

Constant Value: 16 (0x00000010)

IP_MULTICAST_IF2

int IP_MULTICAST_IF2

Same as above. This option is introduced so that the behaviour with IP_MULTICAST_IF will be kept the same as before, while this new option can support setting outgoing interfaces with either IPv4 and IPv6 addresses. NOTE: make sure there is no conflict with this

Constant Value: 31 (0x0000001f)

IP_MULTICAST_LOOP

int IP_MULTICAST_LOOP

This option enables or disables local loopback of multicast datagrams. This option is enabled by default for Multicast Sockets.

Constant Value: 18 (0x00000012)

IP_TOS

int IP_TOS

This option sets the type-of-service or traffic class field in the IP header for a TCP or UDP socket.

Constant Value: 3 (0x00000003)

SO_BINDADDR

int SO_BINDADDR

Fetch the local address binding of a socket (this option cannot be "set" only "gotten", since sockets are bound at creation time, and so the locally bound address cannot be changed). The default local address of a socket is INADDR_ANY, meaning any local address on a multi-homed host. A multi-homed host can use this option to accept connections to only one of its addresses (in the case of a ServerSocket or DatagramSocket), or to specify its return address to the peer (for a Socket or DatagramSocket). The parameter of this option is an InetAddress.

This option must be specified in the constructor.

Valid for: SocketImpl, DatagramSocketImpl

Constant Value: 15 (0x0000000f)

SO_BROADCAST

int SO_BROADCAST

Sets SO_BROADCAST for a socket. This option enables and disables the ability of the process to send broadcast messages. It is supported for only datagram sockets and only on networks that support the concept of a broadcast message (e.g. Ethernet, token ring, etc.), and it is set by default for DatagramSockets.

Constant Value: 32 (0x00000020)

SO_KEEPALIVE

int SO_KEEPALIVE

When the keepalive option is set for a TCP socket and no data has been exchanged across the socket in either direction for 2 hours (NOTE: the actual value is implementation dependent), TCP automatically sends a keepalive probe to the peer. This probe is a TCP segment to which the peer must respond. One of three responses is expected: 1. The peer responds with the expected ACK. The application is not notified (since everything is OK). TCP will send another probe following another 2 hours of inactivity. 2. The peer responds with an RST, which tells the local TCP that the peer host has crashed and rebooted. The socket is closed. 3. There is no response from the peer. The socket is closed. The purpose of this option is to detect if the peer host crashes. Valid only for TCP socket: SocketImpl

Constant Value: 8 (0x00000008)

SO_LINGER

int SO_LINGER

Specify a linger-on-close timeout. This option disables/enables immediate return from a close() of a TCP Socket. Enabling this option with a non-zero Integer timeout means that a close() will block pending the transmission and acknowledgement of all data written to the peer, at which point the socket is closed gracefully. Upon reaching the linger timeout, the socket is closed forcefully, with a TCP RST. Enabling the option with a timeout of zero does a forceful close immediately. If the specified timeout value exceeds 65,535 it will be reduced to 65,535.

Valid only for TCP: SocketImpl

Constant Value: 128 (0x00000080)

SO_OOBINLINE

int SO_OOBINLINE

When the OOBINLINE option is set, any TCP urgent data received on the socket will be received through the socket input stream. When the option is disabled (which is the default) urgent data is silently discarded.

Constant Value: 4099 (0x00001003)

SO_RCVBUF

int SO_RCVBUF

Set a hint the size of the underlying buffers used by the platform for incoming network I/O. When used in set, this is a suggestion to the kernel from the application about the size of buffers to use for the data to be received over the socket. When used in get, this must return the size of the buffer actually used by the platform when receiving in data on this socket. Valid for all sockets: SocketImpl, DatagramSocketImpl

Constant Value: 4098 (0x00001002)

SO_REUSEADDR

int SO_REUSEADDR

Sets SO_REUSEADDR for a socket. This is used only for MulticastSockets in java, and it is set by default for MulticastSockets.

Valid for: DatagramSocketImpl

Constant Value: 4 (0x00000004)

SO_SNDBUF

int SO_SNDBUF

Set a hint the size of the underlying buffers used by the platform for outgoing network I/O. When used in set, this is a suggestion to the kernel from the application about the size of buffers to use for the data to be sent over the socket. When used in get, this must return the size of the buffer actually used by the platform when sending out data on this socket. Valid for all sockets: SocketImpl, DatagramSocketImpl

Constant Value: 4097 (0x00001001)

SO_TIMEOUT

int SO_TIMEOUT

Set a timeout on blocking Socket operations:

 ServerSocket.accept();
 SocketInputStream.read();
 DatagramSocket.receive();
 

The option must be set prior to entering a blocking operation to take effect. If the timeout expires and the operation would continue to block, java.io.InterruptedIOException is raised. The Socket is not closed in this case.

Valid for all sockets: SocketImpl, DatagramSocketImpl

Constant Value: 4102 (0x00001006)

TCP_NODELAY

int TCP_NODELAY

Disable Nagle's algorithm for this connection. Written data to the network is not buffered pending acknowledgement of previously written data.

Valid for TCP only: SocketImpl.

Constant Value: 1 (0x00000001)

getOption

Object getOption (int optID)

Fetch the value of an option. Binary options will return java.lang.Boolean(true) if enabled, java.lang.Boolean(false) if disabled, e.g.:

 SocketImpl s;
 ...
 Boolean noDelay = (Boolean)(s.getOption(TCP_NODELAY));
 if (noDelay.booleanValue()) {
     // true if TCP_NODELAY is enabled...
 ...
 }
 

For options that take a particular type as a parameter, getOption(int) will return the parameter's value, else it will return java.lang.Boolean(false):

 Object o = s.getOption(SO_LINGER);
 if (o instanceof Integer) {
     System.out.print("Linger time is " + ((Integer)o).intValue());
 } else {
   // the true type of o is java.lang.Boolean(false);
 }
 

Parameters
optID	int: an int identifying the option to fetch

Returns
Object	the value of the option

Throws
SocketException	if the socket is closed
SocketException	if optID is unknown along the protocol stack (including the SocketImpl)

setOption

void setOption (int optID, 
                Object value)

Enable/disable the option specified by optID. If the option is to be enabled, and it takes an option-specific "value", this is passed in value. The actual type of value is option-specific, and it is an error to pass something that isn't of the expected type:

 SocketImpl s;
 ...
 s.setOption(SO_LINGER, new Integer(10));
    // OK - set SO_LINGER w/ timeout of 10 sec.
 s.setOption(SO_LINGER, new Double(10));
    // ERROR - expects java.lang.Integer

If the requested option is binary, it can be set using this method by a java.lang.Boolean:

 s.setOption(TCP_NODELAY, new Boolean(true));
    // OK - enables TCP_NODELAY, a binary option
 

Any option can be disabled using this method with a Boolean(false):

 s.setOption(TCP_NODELAY, new Boolean(false));
    // OK - disables TCP_NODELAY
 s.setOption(SO_LINGER, new Boolean(false));
    // OK - disables SO_LINGER
 

For an option that has a notion of on and off, and requires a non-boolean parameter, setting its value to anything other than Boolean(false) implicitly enables it.
Throws SocketException if the option is unrecognized, the socket is closed, or some low-level error occurred

Parameters
optID	int: identifies the option
value	Object: the parameter of the socket option

Throws
SocketException	if the option is unrecognized, the socket is closed, or some low-level error occurred