Paranoid Pirate queue in Python

#
## Paranoid Pirate queue
#
# Author: Daniel Lundin <dln(at)eintr(dot)org>
#

from collections import OrderedDict
import time

import zmq

HEARTBEAT_LIVENESS = 3 # 3..5 is reasonable
HEARTBEAT_INTERVAL = 1.0 # Seconds

# Paranoid Pirate Protocol constants
PPP_READY = "\x01" # Signals worker is ready
PPP_HEARTBEAT = "\x02" # Signals worker heartbeat

class Worker(object):
def __init__(self, address):
self.address = address
self.expiry = time.time() + HEARTBEAT_INTERVAL * HEARTBEAT_LIVENESS

class WorkerQueue(object):
def __init__(self):
self.queue = OrderedDict()

def ready(self, worker):
self.queue.pop(worker.address, None)
self.queue[worker.address] = worker

def purge(self):
"""Look for & kill expired workers."""
t = time.time()
expired = []
for address,worker in self.queue.iteritems():
if t < worker.expiry: # Worker is alive
break
expired.append(address)
for address in expired:
print "W: Idle worker expired: %s" % address
self.queue.pop(address, None)

def next(self):
address, worker = self.queue.popitem(False)
return address

context = zmq.Context(1)

frontend = context.socket(zmq.ROUTER) # ROUTER
backend = context.socket(zmq.ROUTER) # ROUTER
frontend.bind("tcp://*:5555") # For clients
backend.bind("tcp://*:5556") # For workers

poll_workers = zmq.Poller()
poll_workers.register(backend, zmq.POLLIN)

poll_both = zmq.Poller()
poll_both.register(frontend, zmq.POLLIN)
poll_both.register(backend, zmq.POLLIN)

workers = WorkerQueue()

heartbeat_at = time.time() + HEARTBEAT_INTERVAL

while True:
if len(workers.queue) > 0:
poller = poll_both
else:
poller = poll_workers
socks = dict(poller.poll(HEARTBEAT_INTERVAL * 1000))

# Handle worker activity on backend
if socks.get(backend) == zmq.POLLIN:
# Use worker address for LRU routing
frames = backend.recv_multipart()
if not frames:
break

address = frames[0]
workers.ready(Worker(address))

# Validate control message, or return reply to client
msg = frames[1:]
if len(msg) == 1:
if msg[0] not in (PPP_READY, PPP_HEARTBEAT):
print "E: Invalid message from worker: %s" % msg
else:
frontend.send_multipart(msg)

# Send heartbeats to idle workers if it's time
if time.time() >= heartbeat_at:
for worker in workers.queue:
msg = [worker, PPP_HEARTBEAT]
backend.send_multipart(msg)
heartbeat_at = time.time() + HEARTBEAT_INTERVAL
if socks.get(frontend) == zmq.POLLIN:
frames = frontend.recv_multipart()
if not frames:
break

frames.insert(0, workers.next())
backend.send_multipart(frames)

workers.purge()