PF> Why bother using a multiple instance pipe,  if each pipe is distinct? 

Peter,

I would appreciate an advise on the subject, maybe of more general interest:

I have a situation where multiple threads in one process have to send data
to another process (there is no or hardly data flow back). Would it make
much difference (in complexity and/or performance) to use the queue in the
first or the second process?

Option 1:  

  process A                                   process B   
  =========                                   =========  
  thread A1  --->  named pipe instance 1 ---> thread B1  -\
  thread A2  --->  named pipe instance 2 ---> thread B2  ---\ 
    ...                                                  -----> queue
    ...                                                  ---/ 
  thread An  --->  named pipe instance n ---> thread Bn  -/          


Option 2:

  thread A1  -\            
  thread A2  ---\   
    ...      -----> queue ---> single instance named pipe ---> process B
    ...      ---/         
  thread An  -/            

I am interested in which case I obtain best performance OF PROCESS A (I am
less intersted in the perfomance of process B).
With option 2 process A has both queue and pipe processing. So I expect the
process more resource consuming. But queue processing might be lighter than
multiple-instance pipes. Any idea?

Please consider in your answer that the processes may run on the same or 
different systems. 

Thanks, Rob


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