Why STRACE shows EAGAIN (Resource temporarily unavailable)

Question

Following is the sequence I am getting

socket(PF_INET, SOCK_STREAM, IPPROTO_IP) = 7

    setsockopt(7, SOL_TCP, TCP_NODELAY, [1], 4) = 0
    setsockopt(7, SOL_SOCKET, SO_SNDBUF, [32120], 4) = 0
    getsockopt(7, SOL_SOCKET, SO_SNDBUF, [30064835312], [4]) = 0
    setsockopt(7, SOL_SOCKET, SO_SNDBUF, [64240], 4) = 0
    getsockopt(7, SOL_SOCKET, SO_SNDBUF, [30064899552], [4]) = 0
    stat("/etc/localtime", {st_dev=makedev(8, 1), st_ino=229001, st_mode=S_IFREG|0644, st_nlink=1, st_uid=0, st_gid=0, st_blksize=4096, st_blocks=8, st_size=265, st_atime=2013/07/15-06:30:03, st_mtime=2012/06/25-23:46:43, st_ctime=2012/06/25-23:46:43}) = 0
    write(1, "[info 2013/07/16 05:53:24.622210"..., 114) = 114
    setsockopt(7, SOL_SOCKET, SO_RCVBUF, [32120], 4) = 0
    getsockopt(7, SOL_SOCKET, SO_RCVBUF, [30064835312], [4]) = 0
    setsockopt(7, SOL_SOCKET, SO_RCVBUF, [64240], 4) = 0
    getsockopt(7, SOL_SOCKET, SO_RCVBUF, [30064899552], [4]) = 0
    fcntl(7, F_GETFL)                       = 0x2 (flags O_RDWR)
    fcntl(7, F_SETFL, O_RDWR|O_NONBLOCK)    = 0
    rt_sigaction(SIGPIPE, {SIG_IGN, [PIPE], SA_RESTORER|SA_RESTART, 0x33b3632920}, {SIG_DFL, [], 0}, 8) = 0
    fcntl(7, F_GETFL)                       = 0x802 (flags O_RDWR|O_NONBLOCK)
    fcntl(7, F_SETFL, O_RDWR|O_NONBLOCK)    = 0
    connect(7, {sa_family=AF_INET, sin_port=htons(50505), sin_addr=inet_addr("1.2.3.4")}, 16) = -1 EINPROGRESS (Operation now in progress)
    poll([{fd=7, events=POLLIN|POLLOUT}], 1, 59000) = 1 ([{fd=7, revents=POLLOUT}])
    fcntl(7, F_GETFL)                       = 0x802 (flags O_RDWR|O_NONBLOCK)
    fcntl(7, F_SETFL, O_RDWR)               = 0
    getsockname(7, {sa_family=AF_INET, sin_port=htons(33220), sin_addr=inet_addr("10.112.204.215")}, [16]) = 0
    fcntl(7, F_GETFL)                       = 0x2 (flags O_RDWR)
    fcntl(7, F_GETFL)                       = 0x2 (flags O_RDWR)
    fcntl(7, F_SETFL, O_RDWR|O_NONBLOCK)    = 0
    write(7, "d\23;\177\377\330\357\1&W\1\\\4\np\314\327\0\0\0\2W\0\rpnq-gst-"..., 103) = 103
    fcntl(7, F_GETFL)                       = 0x802 (flags O_RDWR|O_NONBLOCK)
    fcntl(7, F_SETFL, O_RDWR)               = 0
    fcntl(7, F_GETFL)                       = 0x2 (flags O_RDWR)
    fcntl(7, F_GETFL)                       = 0x2 (flags O_RDWR)
    fcntl(7, F_SETFL, O_RDWR|O_NONBLOCK)    = 0
    read(7, 0x9d9f90, 1)                    = -1 EAGAIN (Resource temporarily unavailable)

Why this read is getting called, I assume that poll should wake up only when there is data to read

Answer 1

poll woke up with revents = POLLOUT, which means that the socket is ready to write, not ready to read. The code is apparently not checking this flag, and trying to read anyway.

This might be intentional. Even though poll didn't say the socket is ready to read, it might have become ready while it was writing. So it calls ready just in case something has shown up. If not, it will go back into poll to wait again. This allows it to process incoming data more quickly, since it can get it in one call rather than two.