How to set Java NIO AsynchronousSocketChannel connect timeout - java

Looking at JDK 1.7 API. I cannot seem to be able to set a connection timeout on an AsynchonousSocketChannel. Is there anyway I can setup a connection timeout on such a channel?
Thanks.

The answer is: you can't.
The first thing to understand is how a TCP connect works. The kernel is sending SYN packets, backing off the time between each retry. This can be tuned via kernel parameters. An article covering this in detail (for linux) can be found here
To give you an idea of what's involved to implement your own shorter timeout for a socket connect is to put the socket in nonblocking mode, throw it in a select() with a timeout, then use getsockopt() to see what happened. This StackOverflow answer shows how this works.
With NIO.2, the connection process is handled for you using threads that you don't have access to. Unfortunately there's no way to tell it you want a shorter timeout on connects; it just calls your completion handler / notifies the Future when the connection either succeeds of fails (including timing out).
You do have the option of calling get(timeout, unit) on the returned Future, then cancelling the Futureif it times out ... but that means if you want the connect to be async you have to add another layer of threading / callbacks and may as well just implement your own async thing with nio.
One last thing worth mentioning since you're looking at async network stuff is that Netty does give this to you (using Nio):
Bootstrap bootstrap = new Bootstrap()
.group(new NioEventLoopGroup())
.channel(NioSocketChannel.class)
.remoteAddress(new InetSocketAddress(remoteAddress, port))
.option(ChannelOption.CONNECT_TIMEOUT_MILLIS, connectionTimeout);
ChannelFuture f = bootstrap.connect();
And you can register a listener with that ChannelFuture for a callback.

Related

Multiple Socket Servers in single netty server

I am trying to develop a socket server supporting TCP sockets and WebSockets. I created two ServerBootsraps with their channels and handlers. I started them with different ports with (skipping unnecessary code parts because they are working ok)
...
ChannelFuture channelFuture = serverBootstrap.bind(port);
...
...
ChannelFuture channelFutureWebsocket = serverBootstrapWebSocket.bind(webSocketPort);
In the tutorials I've seen, they were all ending with serverBootstrap.bind(port).sync(); But If I end with sync, the server stops and waits for packets and I cannot start the other server (as expected). If I don't end with sync, the server runs ok but I am doubtful if it will cause an error in the future.
If my method, skipping sync(), is wrong, how can I run 2 different servers simultaneously?
The javadoc on the Future.sync says: "Waits for this future until it is done, and rethrows the cause of the failure if this future failed."
So what you want to do is get both futures and wait on them both instead of waiting on the 1st future before you've even had a chance to bind the 2nd server.
A simple way to wait on 2 futures is to use a while loop and check both futures using non-blocking methods
ChannelFuture bindFuture1 = bootstrap1.bind(port);
ChannelFuture bindFuture2 = bootstrap2.bind(port);
while (!bindFuture1.isDone() && !bindFuture2.isDone()) Thread.Sleep(INTERVAL);
//Evaluate both futures to see if there were any errors, wait for the other future to be done or do whatever else you need to based on your requirements.
I suggest you read up on futures to understand what the sync method does and why it's necessary. Also have a look here: Waiting on a list of Future

Why adding socket read timeout doesn't help for socketread0 [duplicate]

Performing millions of HTTP requests with different Java libraries gives me threads hanged on:
java.net.SocketInputStream.socketRead0()
Which is native function.
I tried to set up Apche Http Client and RequestConfig to have timeouts on (I hope) everythig that is possible but still, I have (probably infinite) hangs on socketRead0. How to get rid of them?
Hung ratio is about ~1 per 10000 requests (to 10000 different hosts) and it can last probably forever (I've confirmed thread hung as still valid after 10 hours).
JDK 1.8 on Windows 7.
My HttpClient factory:
SocketConfig socketConfig = SocketConfig.custom()
.setSoKeepAlive(false)
.setSoLinger(1)
.setSoReuseAddress(true)
.setSoTimeout(5000)
.setTcpNoDelay(true).build();
HttpClientBuilder builder = HttpClientBuilder.create();
builder.disableAutomaticRetries();
builder.disableContentCompression();
builder.disableCookieManagement();
builder.disableRedirectHandling();
builder.setConnectionReuseStrategy(new NoConnectionReuseStrategy());
builder.setDefaultSocketConfig(socketConfig);
return HttpClientBuilder.create().build();
My RequestConfig factory:
HttpGet request = new HttpGet(url);
RequestConfig config = RequestConfig.custom()
.setCircularRedirectsAllowed(false)
.setConnectionRequestTimeout(8000)
.setConnectTimeout(4000)
.setMaxRedirects(1)
.setRedirectsEnabled(true)
.setSocketTimeout(5000)
.setStaleConnectionCheckEnabled(true).build();
request.setConfig(config);
return new HttpGet(url);
OpenJDK socketRead0 source
Note: Actually I have some "trick" - I can schedule .getConnectionManager().shutdown() in other Thread with cancellation of Future if request finished properly, but it is depracated and also it kills whole HttpClient, not only that single request.
Though this question mentions Windows, I have the same problem on Linux. It appears there is a flaw in the way the JVM implements blocking socket timeouts:
https://bugs.openjdk.java.net/browse/JDK-8049846
https://bugs.openjdk.java.net/browse/JDK-8075484
To summarize, timeout for blocking sockets is implemented by calling poll on Linux (and select on Windows) to determine that data is available before calling recv. However, at least on Linux, both methods can spuriously indicate that data is available when it is not, leading to recv blocking indefinitely.
From poll(2) man page BUGS section:
See the discussion of spurious readiness notifications under the BUGS section of select(2).
From select(2) man page BUGS section:
Under Linux, select() may report a socket file descriptor as "ready
for reading", while nevertheless a subsequent read blocks. This could
for example happen when data has arrived but upon examination has
wrong checksum and is discarded. There may be other circumstances
in which a file descriptor is spuriously reported as ready. Thus it
may be safer to use O_NONBLOCK on sockets that should not block.
The Apache HTTP Client code is a bit hard to follow, but it appears that connection expiration is only set for HTTP keep-alive connections (which you've disabled) and is indefinite unless the server specifies otherwise. Therefore, as pointed out by oleg, the Connection eviction policy approach won't work in your case and can't be relied upon in general.
As Clint said, you should consider a Non-blocking HTTP client, or (seeing that you are using the Apache Httpclient) implement a Multithreaded request execution to prevent possible hangs of the main application thread (this not solve the problem but is better than restart your app because is freezed). Anyway, you set the setStaleConnectionCheckEnabled property but the stale connection check is not 100% reliable, from the Apache Httpclient tutorial:
One of the major shortcomings of the classic blocking I/O model is
that the network socket can react to I/O events only when blocked in
an I/O operation. When a connection is released back to the manager,
it can be kept alive however it is unable to monitor the status of the
socket and react to any I/O events. If the connection gets closed on
the server side, the client side connection is unable to detect the
change in the connection state (and react appropriately by closing the
socket on its end).
HttpClient tries to mitigate the problem by testing whether the
connection is 'stale', that is no longer valid because it was closed
on the server side, prior to using the connection for executing an
HTTP request. The stale connection check is not 100% reliable and adds
10 to 30 ms overhead to each request execution.
The Apache HttpComponents crew recommends the implementation of a Connection eviction policy
The only feasible solution that does not involve a one thread per
socket model for idle connections is a dedicated monitor thread used
to evict connections that are considered expired due to a long period
of inactivity. The monitor thread can periodically call
ClientConnectionManager#closeExpiredConnections() method to close all
expired connections and evict closed connections from the pool. It can
also optionally call ClientConnectionManager#closeIdleConnections()
method to close all connections that have been idle over a given
period of time.
Take a look at the sample code of the Connection eviction policy section and try to implement it in your application along with the Multithread request execution, I think the implementation of both mechanisms will prevent your undesired hangs.
You should consider a Non-blocking HTTP client like Grizzly or Netty which do not have blocking operations to hang a thread.
I have more than 50 machines that make about 200k requests/day/machine. They are running Amazon Linux AMI 2017.03. I previously had jdk1.8.0_102, now I have jdk1.8.0_131. I am using both apacheHttpClient and OKHttp as scraping libraries.
Each machine was running 50 threads, and sometimes, the threads get lost. After profiling with Youkit java profiler I got
ScraperThread42 State: RUNNABLE CPU usage on sample: 0ms
java.net.SocketInputStream.socketRead0(FileDescriptor, byte[], int, int, int) SocketInputStream.java (native)
java.net.SocketInputStream.socketRead(FileDescriptor, byte[], int, int, int) SocketInputStream.java:116
java.net.SocketInputStream.read(byte[], int, int, int) SocketInputStream.java:171
java.net.SocketInputStream.read(byte[], int, int) SocketInputStream.java:141
okio.Okio$2.read(Buffer, long) Okio.java:139
okio.AsyncTimeout$2.read(Buffer, long) AsyncTimeout.java:211
okio.RealBufferedSource.indexOf(byte, long) RealBufferedSource.java:306
okio.RealBufferedSource.indexOf(byte) RealBufferedSource.java:300
okio.RealBufferedSource.readUtf8LineStrict() RealBufferedSource.java:196
okhttp3.internal.http1.Http1Codec.readResponse() Http1Codec.java:191
okhttp3.internal.connection.RealConnection.createTunnel(int, int, Request, HttpUrl) RealConnection.java:303
okhttp3.internal.connection.RealConnection.buildTunneledConnection(int, int, int, ConnectionSpecSelector) RealConnection.java:156
okhttp3.internal.connection.RealConnection.connect(int, int, int, List, boolean) RealConnection.java:112
okhttp3.internal.connection.StreamAllocation.findConnection(int, int, int, boolean) StreamAllocation.java:193
okhttp3.internal.connection.StreamAllocation.findHealthyConnection(int, int, int, boolean, boolean) StreamAllocation.java:129
okhttp3.internal.connection.StreamAllocation.newStream(OkHttpClient, boolean) StreamAllocation.java:98
okhttp3.internal.connection.ConnectInterceptor.intercept(Interceptor$Chain) ConnectInterceptor.java:42
okhttp3.internal.http.RealInterceptorChain.proceed(Request, StreamAllocation, HttpCodec, Connection) RealInterceptorChain.java:92
okhttp3.internal.http.RealInterceptorChain.proceed(Request) RealInterceptorChain.java:67
okhttp3.internal.http.BridgeInterceptor.intercept(Interceptor$Chain) BridgeInterceptor.java:93
okhttp3.internal.http.RealInterceptorChain.proceed(Request, StreamAllocation, HttpCodec, Connection) RealInterceptorChain.java:92
okhttp3.internal.http.RetryAndFollowUpInterceptor.intercept(Interceptor$Chain) RetryAndFollowUpInterceptor.java:124
okhttp3.internal.http.RealInterceptorChain.proceed(Request, StreamAllocation, HttpCodec, Connection) RealInterceptorChain.java:92
okhttp3.internal.http.RealInterceptorChain.proceed(Request) RealInterceptorChain.java:67
okhttp3.RealCall.getResponseWithInterceptorChain() RealCall.java:198
okhttp3.RealCall.execute() RealCall.java:83
I found out that they have a fix for this
https://bugs.openjdk.java.net/browse/JDK-8172578
in JDK 8u152 (early access). I have installed it on one of our machines. Now I am waiting to see some good results.
Given no one else responded so far, here is my take
Your timeout setting looks perfectly OK to me. The reason why certain requests appear to be constantly blocked in a java.net.SocketInputStream#socketRead0() call is likely to be due to a combination of misbehaving servers and your local configuration. Socket timeout defines a maximum period of inactivity between two consecutive i/o read operations (or in other words two consecutive incoming packets). Your socket timeout setting is 5,000 milliseconds. As long as the opposite endpoint keeps on sending a packet every 4,999 milliseconds for a chunk encoded message the request will never time out and will end up sending most of its time blocked in java.net.SocketInputStream#socketRead0(). You can find out whether or not this is the case by running HttpClient with wire logging turned on.
For Apache HTTP Client (blocking) I found best solution is to getConnectionManager(). and shutdown it.
So in high-reliability solution I just schedule shutdown in other thread and in case request does not complete I'm shutting in down from other thread
I bumped into the same issue using apache common http client.
There's a pretty simple workaround (which doesn't require shutting the connection manager down):
In order to reproduce it, one needs to execute the request from the question in a new thread paying attention to details:
run request in separate thread, close request and release it's connection in a different thread, interrupt hanging thread
don't run EntityUtils.consumeQuietly(response.getEntity()) in finally block (because it hangs on 'dead' connection)
First, add the interface
interface RequestDisposer {
void dispose();
}
Execute an HTTP request in a new thread
final AtomicReference<RequestDisposer> requestDisposer = new AtomicReference<>(null);
final Thread thread = new Thread(() -> {
final HttpGet request = new HttpGet("http://my.url");
final RequestDisposer disposer = () -> {
request.abort();
request.releaseConnection();
};
requestDiposer.set(disposer);
try (final CloseableHttpResponse response = httpClient.execute(request))) {
...
} finally {
disposer.dispose();
}
};)
thread.start()
Call dispose() in the main thread to close hanging connection
requestDisposer.get().dispose(); // better check if it's not null first
thread.interrupt();
thread.join();
That fixed the issue for me.
My stacktrace looked like this:
java.lang.Thread.State: RUNNABLE
at java.net.SocketInputStream.socketRead0(Native Method)
at java.net.SocketInputStream.socketRead(SocketInputStream.java:116)
at java.net.SocketInputStream.read(SocketInputStream.java:171)
at java.net.SocketInputStream.read(SocketInputStream.java:141)
at org.apache.http.impl.io.SessionInputBufferImpl.streamRead(SessionInputBufferImpl.java:139)
at org.apache.http.impl.io.SessionInputBufferImpl.fillBuffer(SessionInputBufferImpl.java:155)
at org.apache.http.impl.io.SessionInputBufferImpl.readLine(SessionInputBufferImpl.java:284)
at org.apache.http.impl.io.ChunkedInputStream.getChunkSize(ChunkedInputStream.java:253)
at org.apache.http.impl.io.ChunkedInputStream.nextChunk(ChunkedInputStream.java:227)
at org.apache.http.impl.io.ChunkedInputStream.read(ChunkedInputStream.java:186)
at org.apache.http.conn.EofSensorInputStream.read(EofSensorInputStream.java:137)
at sun.nio.cs.StreamDecoder.readBytes(StreamDecoder.java:284)
at sun.nio.cs.StreamDecoder.implRead(StreamDecoder.java:326)
at sun.nio.cs.StreamDecoder.read(StreamDecoder.java:178)
To whom it might be interesting, it easily reproducable, interrupt the thread without aborting request and releasing connection (ratio is about 1/100).
Windows 10, version 10.0.
jdk8.151-x64.
I feel that all these answers are way too specific.
We have to note that this is probably a real JVM bug. It should be possible to get the file descriptor and close it. All this timeout-talk is too high level. You do not want a timeout to the extent that the connection fails, what you want is an ability to hard break this stuck thread and stop or interrupt it.
The way the JVM should implemented the SocketInputStream.socketRead function is to set some internal default timeout, which should be even as low as 1 second. Then when the timeout comes, immediately looping back to the socketRead0. While that is happening, the Thread.interrupt and Thread.stop commands can take effect.
The even better way of doing this of course is not to do any blocking wait at all, but instead use a the select(2) system call with a list of file descriptors and when any one has data available, let it perform the read operation.
Just look all over the internet all these people having trouble with threads stuck in java.net.SocketInputStream#socketRead0, it's the most popular topic about java.net.SocketInputStream hands down!
So, while the bug is not fixed, I wonder about the most dirty trick I can come up with to break up this situation. Something like connecting with the debugger interface to get to the stack frame of the socketRead call and grab the FileDescriptor and then break into that to get the int fd number and then make a native close(2) call on that fd.
Do we have a chance to do that? (Don't tell me "it's not good practice") -- if so, let's do it!
I faced the same issue today. Based on #Sergei Voitovich I've tried to make it work still using Apache Http Client.
Since I am using Java 8 its simpler to make a timeout to abort the connection.
Here's is a draft of the implementation:
private HttpResponse executeRequest(Request request){
InterruptibleRequestExecution requestExecution = new InterruptibleRequestExecution(request, executor);
ExecutorService executorService = Executors.newSingleThreadExecutor();
try {
return executorService.submit(requestExecution).get(<your timeout in milliseconds>, TimeUnit.MILLISECONDS);
} catch (TimeoutException | ExecutionException e) {
// Your request timed out, you can throw an exception here if you want
throw new UsefulExceptionForYourApplication(e);
} catch (InterruptedException e) {
// Always remember to call interrupt after catching InterruptedException
Thread.currentThread().interrupt();
throw new UsefulExceptionForYourApplication(e);
} finally {
// This method forces to stop the Thread Pool (with single thread) created by Executors.newSingleThreadExecutor() and makes the pending request to abort inside the thread. So if the request is hanging in socketRead0 it will stop and also the thread will be terminated
forceStopIdleThreadsAndRequests(requestExecution, executorService);
}
}
private void forceStopIdleThreadsAndRequests(InterruptibleRequestExecution execution,
ExecutorService executorService) {
execution.abortRequest();
executorService.shutdownNow();
}
The code above will create a new Thread to execute the request using org.apache.http.client.fluent.Executor. Timeout can be easily configured.
The execution of the thread is defined in InterruptibleRequestExecution which you can see below.
private static class InterruptibleRequestExecution implements Callable<HttpResponse> {
private final Request request;
private final Executor executor;
private final RequestDisposer disposer;
public InterruptibleRequestExecution(Request request, Executor executor) {
this.request = request;
this.executor = executor;
this.disposer = request::abort;
}
#Override
public HttpResponse call() {
try {
return executor.execute(request).returnResponse();
} catch (IOException e) {
throw new UsefulExceptionForYourApplication(e);
} finally {
disposer.dispose();
}
}
public void abortRequest() {
disposer.dispose();
}
#FunctionalInterface
interface RequestDisposer {
void dispose();
}
}
The results are really good. We've had times where some connections where hanging in sockedRead0 for 7 hours! Now, it never passes the defined timeout and its working in production with millions of requests per day without having any problems.

FTPClient Pool - Java

I am writing a Rest Service that connects to an FTP server to read some files, then do some operations over the read data to serve the service request. I am using Apache commons FTPClient.
As a temporary solution, I am creating an FTPClient object - then connecting it - and then logging in with the credentials - inside a method (the client is local to this method - doing this as FTPClient is not thread safe) in my data access layer and then disconnecting it before coming out of the methods(ie.. after reading the file). The issue is, FTPClient is taking some 3-7 seconds for logging in which is very high. So I am thinking of implementing an FTPClientPool that can provide an already prepared client in the data access method.
Do any such ClientPools already exist?
If yes, then what one should I opt for?
If no, the difficulty in implementing is once created and connected, How long does an apache FTPClient stay alive? for infinite time?? (what I mean is what is the default keep alive time for an FTPClient - idle time after which client gets disconnected - coz I see various kind of times in the java docs. :( ) And next questions is How do you keep it alive always?? (may be sending the NOOPS after regular intervals in a separate thread??) Any kind of help regarding how should I move forward is really helpful.
Thanks & Regards
Idle timeout for clients is generally determined server side.
Here's some of the more non obvious client parameters:
soTimeout - Determines how long the client blocks waiting for a message. Generally you poll a socket every so often and this determines how long you wait during a poll.
soLinger - Determines how long to keep the connection after close() has been called.
From my experience of using FTP, they normally just reconnect if the connection closes - it's not normally vital to have a constant uninterrupted connection unlike in other applications.
What are you using FTP for - it's normally not that time critical a service ...
As for ClientPools, I happened to write a demo project.
commons-pool-ftp
I am getting a little bit annoyed by the ftp protocol,
in our experience, it would meet broken pipe when testing on the client that just getting from the pool.
testOnBorrow=true
Configure
protected static ThreadLocal<FTPClient> ftpClientContainer = new
ThreadLocal<>();
Then use:
//login() will be your login method to FTP:
ftpClientContainer.set(ftpLogin());
Then in each method add:
FTPClient ftpClient = ftpClientContainer.get();
and finely when done:
//ftpDisconnect () will be your disconnect method to FTP:
ftpDisconnect(ftpClientContainer.get());

How to setup timeout for ejb lookup in websphere 7.0

I have developed a standalone Javase client which performs an EJB Lookup to a remote server and executes its method.The Server application is in EJB 3.0
Under some strange magical but rare situations my program hangs indefinetly, on looking inside the issue it seems that while looking up the ejb on the server, I never get the response from the server and it also never times out.
I would like to know if there is a property or any other way through which we can setup the lookup time in client or at the server side.
There is a very nice article that discusses ORB configuration best practices at DeveloperWorks here. I'm quoting the three different settings that can be configured at client (you, while doing a lookup and executing a method at a remote server);
Connect timeout: Before the client ORB can even send a request to a server, it needs to establish an IIOP connection (or re-use an
existing one). Under normal circumstances, the IIOP and underlying TCP
connect operations should complete very fast. However, contention on
the network or another unforeseen factor could slow this down. The
default connect timeout is indefinite, but the ORB custom property
com.ibm.CORBA.ConnectTimeout (in seconds) can be used to change the
timeout.
Locate request timeout: Once a connection has been established and a client sends an RMI request to the server, then LocateRequestTimeout
can be used to limit the time for the CORBA LocateRequest (a CORBA
“ping”) for the object. As a result, the LocateRequestTimeout should
be less than or equal to the RequestTimeout because it is a much
shorter operation in terms of data sent back and forth. Like the
RequestTimeout, the LocateRequestTimeout defaults to 180 seconds.
Request timeout: Once the client ORB has an established TCP connection to the server, it will send the request across. However, it
will not wait indefinitely for a response, by default it will wait for
180 seconds. This is the ORB request timeout interval. This can
typically be lowered, but it should be in line with the expected
application response times from the server.
You can try the following code, which performs task & then waits at most the time specified.
Future<Object> future = executorService.submit(new Callable<Object>() {
public Object call() {
return lookup(JNDI_URL);
}
});
try {
Object result = future.get(20L, TimeUnit.SECONDS); //- Waiting for at most 20 sec
} catch (ExecutionException ex) {
logger.log(LogLevel.ERROR,ex.getMessage());
return;
}
Also, the task can be cancelled by future.cancel(true).
Remote JNDI uses the ORB, so the only option available is com.ibm.CORBA.RequestTimeout, but that will have an affect on all remote calls. As described in the 7.0 InfoCenter, the default value is 180 (3 minutes).

How can I ensure that my HttpClient 4.1 does not leak sockets?

My server uses data from an internal web service to construct its response, on a per request basis. I'm using Apache HttpClient 4.1 to make the requests. Each initial request will result in about 30 requests to the web service. Of these, 4 - 8 will end up with sockets stuck in CLOSE_WAIT, which never get released. Eventually these stuck sockets exceed my ulimit and my process runs out of file descriptors.
I don't want to just raise my ulimit (1024), because that will just mask the problem.
The reason I've moved to HttpClient is that java.net.HttpUrlConnection was behaving the same way.
I have tried moving to a SingleClientConnManager per request, and calling client.getConnectionManager().shutdown() on it, but sockets still end up stuck.
Should I be trying to solve this so that I end up with 0 open sockets while there are no running requests, or should I be concentrating on request persistence and pooling?
For clarity I'm including some details which may be relevant:
OS: Ubuntu 10.10
JRE: 1.6.0_22
Language: Scala 2.8
Sample code:
val cleaner = Executors.newScheduledThreadPool(1)
private val client = {
val ssl_ctx = SSLContext.getInstance("TLS")
val managers = Array[TrustManager](TrustingTrustManager)
ssl_ctx.init(null, managers, new java.security.SecureRandom())
val sslSf = new org.apache.http.conn.ssl.SSLSocketFactory(ssl_ctx, SSLSocketFactory.ALLOW_ALL_HOSTNAME_VERIFIER)
val schemeRegistry = new SchemeRegistry()
schemeRegistry.register(new Scheme("https", 443, sslSf))
val connection = new ThreadSafeClientConnManager(schemeRegistry)
object clean extends Runnable{
override def run = {
connection.closeExpiredConnections
connection.closeIdleConnections(30, SECONDS)
}
}
cleaner.scheduleAtFixedRate(clean,10,10,SECONDS)
val httpClient = new DefaultHttpClient(connection)
httpClient.getCredentialsProvider().setCredentials(new AuthScope(AuthScope.ANY), new UsernamePasswordCredentials(username,password))
httpClient
}
val get = new HttpGet(uri)
val entity = client.execute(get).getEntity
val stream = entity.getContent
val justForTheExample = IOUtils.toString(stream)
stream.close()
Test: netstat -a | grep {myInternalWebServiceName} | grep CLOSE_WAIT
(Lists sockets for my process that are in CLOSE_WAIT state)
Post comment discussion:
This code now demonstrates correct usage.
One needs to pro-actively evict expired / idle connections from the connection pool, as in the blocking I/O model connections cannot react to I/O events unless they are being read from / written to. For details see
http://hc.apache.org/httpcomponents-client-dev/tutorial/html/connmgmt.html#d4e631
I've marked oleg's answer as correct, as it highlights an important usage point about HttpClient's connection pooling.
To answer my specific original question, though, which was "Should I be trying to solve for 0 unused sockets or trying to maximize pooling?"
Now that the pooling solution is in place and working correctly the application throughput has increased by about 150%. I attribute this to not having to renegotiate SSL and multiple handshakes, instead reusing persistent connections in accordance with HTTP 1.1.
It is definitely worth working to utilize pooling as intended, rather than trying to hack around with calling ThreadSafeClientConnManager.shutdown() after each request etcetera. If, on the other hand, you were calling arbitrary hosts and not reusing routes the way I am you might easily find that it becomes necessary to do that sort of hackery, as the JVM might surprise you with the long life of CLOSE_WAIT designated sockets if you're not garbage collecting very often.
I had the same issue and solved it using the suggesting found here: here. The author touches on some TCP basics:
When a TCP connection is about to close, its finalization is negotiated by both parties. Think of it as breaking a contract in a civilized manner. Both parties sign the paper and it’s all good. In geek talk, this is done via the FIN/ACK messages. Party A sends a FIN message to indicate it wants to close the socket. Party B sends an ACK saying it received the message and is considering the demand. Party B then cleans up and sends a FIN to Party A. Party A responds with the ACK and everyone walks away.
The problem comes in
when B doesn’t send its FIN. A is kinda stuck waiting for it. It has
initiated its finalization sequence and is waiting for the other party
to do the same.
He then mentions RFC 2616, 14.10 to suggest setting up an http header to solve this issue:
postMethod.addHeader("Connection", "close");
Honestly, I don't really know the implications of setting this header. But it did stop CLOSE_WAIT from happening on my unit tests.

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