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Mutual exclusion

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29: 97:, which two or more concurrent threads are trying to modify (where two concurrent read operations are permitted but, no two concurrent write operations or one read and one write are permitted, since it leads to data inconsistency). Mutual exclusion algorithms ensure that if a process is already performing write operation on a data object no other process/thread is allowed to access/modify the same object until the first process has finished writing upon the data object and released the object for other processes to read and write upon. 294: 548:
section to experience an unrecoverable error or otherwise be unable to continue. If such a failure occurs, conventional, non-failure-tolerant mutual exclusion algorithms may deadlock or otherwise fail key liveness properties. To deal with this problem, several solutions using crash-recovery mechanisms have been proposed.
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in the linked list during the insertion of a new node. Only one process can be successful in its CAS; all other processes attempting to add a node at the same time will have to try again. Each process can then keep a local copy of the data structure, and upon traversing the linked list, can perform
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will drift every time a critical section is executed because the timer interrupt is no longer serviced, so tracking time is impossible during the critical section. Also, if a process halts during its critical section, control will never be returned to another process, effectively halting the entire
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gives a more precise commitment than lockout-freedom. Lockout-freedom ensures every process can access the critical section eventually: it gives no guarantee about how long the wait will be. In practice, a process could be overtaken an arbitrary or unbounded number of times by other higher-priority
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If a process wishes to enter the critical section, it must first execute the trying section and wait until it acquires access to the critical section. After the process has executed its critical section and is finished with the shared resources, it needs to execute the exit section to release them
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Most algorithms for mutual exclusion are designed with the assumption that no failure occurs while a process is running inside the critical section. However, in reality such failures may be commonplace. For example, a sudden loss of power or faulty interconnect might cause a process in a critical
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on a location in shared memory, and since the operation is atomic, only one process can set the flag at a time. Any process that is unsuccessful in setting the flag can either go on to do other tasks and try again later, release the processor to another process and try again later, or continue to
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The problem which mutual exclusion addresses is a problem of resource sharing: how can a software system control multiple processes' access to a shared resource, when each process needs exclusive control of that resource while doing its work? The mutual-exclusion solution to this makes the shared
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and busy-waits by using queuing and context switches. However, if the time that is spent suspending a thread and then restoring it can be proven to be always more than the time that must be waited for a thread to become ready to run after being blocked in a particular situation, then
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register is sufficient to provide the deadlock-free solution to the mutual exclusion problem. But a solution built with a test&set register can possibly lead to the starvation of some processes which become caught in the trying section. In fact,
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waiting process be able to get access to the critical section, but does not require that every process gets a turn. If two processes continually trade a resource between them, a third process could be locked out and experience
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and swap it out with another thread that is ready to be run, or could put that processor into a low power state if there is no other thread that can be run. Therefore, most modern mutual exclusion methods attempt to reduce
282:-bounded waiting property, each process has a finite maximum wait time. This works by setting a limit to the number of times other processes can cut in line, so that no process can enter the critical section more than 212:
The term mutual exclusion is also used in reference to the simultaneous writing of a memory address by one thread while the aforementioned memory address is being manipulated or read by one or more other threads.
144:). When such a linked list is being shared between multiple threads of execution, two threads of execution may attempt to remove two different nodes simultaneously, one thread of execution changing the 471:'s multithreading library, which will take advantage of hardware solutions if possible but will use software solutions if no hardware solutions exist. For example, when the operating system's 533: 246:: if processes are trying to enter the critical section, one of them must eventually be able to do so successfully, provided no process stays in the critical section permanently. 605:, in which one process gets a semaphore, another process gets a second semaphore, and then both wait till the other semaphore to be released. Other common side-effects include 104:
in his seminal 1965 paper "Solution of a problem in concurrent programming control", which is credited as the first topic in the study of concurrent algorithms.
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Every process's program can be partitioned into four sections, resulting in four states. Program execution cycles through these four states in order:
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of four items, where the second and third are to be removed. The removal of a node that sits between two other nodes is performed by changing the
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thread of execution is already accessing said critical section, which refers to an interval of time during which a thread of execution accesses a
226:. It controls access to the shared resource by controlling each mutual execution of that part of its program where the resource would be used. 209:) can be avoided by using the requirement of mutual exclusion to ensure that simultaneous updates to the same part of the list cannot occur. 613:, in which a higher-priority thread waits for a lower-priority thread; and high latency, in which response to interrupts is not prompt. 1150: 464:
is used on the platform that executes them. Programmers have to specify strict ordering on the memory operations within a thread.
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library is used and a thread tries to acquire an already acquired lock, the operating system could suspend the thread using a
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is still possible, so this method allows the system to continue to function—even if a process halts while holding the lock.
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guarantees that any process wishing to enter the critical section will be able to do so eventually. This is distinct from
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Several other atomic operations can be used to provide mutual exclusion of data structures; most notable of these is
177:. Although both removal operations complete successfully, the desired state of the linked list is not achieved: node 411: 115: 620:. No perfect scheme is known. Blocking system calls used to sleep an entire process. Until such calls became 441: 267: 1170: 617: 363:). Although this solution is effective, it leads to many problems. If a critical section is long, then the 505: 991: 809: 677: 647: 602: 242: 446: 776: 774: 625: 305:
Operation is outside the critical section; the process is not using or requesting the shared resource.
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The process leaves the critical section and makes the shared resource available to other processes.
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where each node represents the desired operation to be performed. CAS is then used to change the
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Much research is aimed at eliminating the above effects, often with the goal of guaranteeing
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A simple example of why mutual exclusion is important in practice can be visualized using a
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The solutions explained above can be used to build the synchronization primitives below:
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In addition to hardware-supported solutions, some software solutions exist that use
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resource available only while the process is in a specific code segment called the
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distinct memory states are required to avoid lockout. To avoid unbounded waiting,
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for other processes' use. The process then returns to its non-critical section.
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Deadlock freedom can be expanded to implement one or both of these properties:
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A successful solution to this problem must have at least these two properties:
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Proceedings of the 2016 ACM Symposium on Principles of Distributed Computing
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Common threads: POSIX threads explained – The little things called mutexes
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systems, the simplest solution to achieve mutual exclusion is to disable
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It is often preferable to use synchronization facilities provided by an
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of the previous node to point to the next node (in other words, if node
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Many forms of mutual exclusion have side-effects. For example, classic
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The requirement of mutual exclusion was first identified and solved by
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In computing, restricting data to be accessible by one thread at a time
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Distributed computing: fundamentals, simulations, and advanced topics
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loop while checking the flag until it is successful in acquiring it.
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The process is allowed to access the shared resource in this section.
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system. A more elegant method for achieving mutual exclusion is the
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Burns, James E.; Paul Jackson, Nancy A. Lynch (January 1982),
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mutual exclusion for any shared data structure by creating a
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during a process's critical section. This will prevent any
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from running (effectively preventing a process from being
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Holzmann, Gerard J.; Bosnacki, Dragan (1 October 2007).
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instruction provide the mutual exclusion. A process can
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are an acceptable solution (for that situation only).
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Synchronization Algorithms and Concurrent Programming
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For the concept in logic and probability theory, see
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ACM Symposium on Principles of Distributed Computing
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Busy-waiting is effective for both uniprocessor and
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The process attempts to enter the critical section.
999:Journal of the Association for Computing Machinery 817:Journal of the Association for Computing Machinery 527: 736: 734: 1162: 1091:Thomas W. Christopher, George K. Thiruvathukal: 781:Attiya, Hagit; Welch, Jennifer (25 March 2004). 415:each operation from the list on its local copy. 162:, while another thread of execution changes the 1016:Golab, Wojciech; Ramaraju, Aditya (July 2016), 542: 427:to achieve mutual exclusion. Examples include: 43:, being removed simultaneously results in node 731: 1146:Mutual Exclusion with Locks – an Introduction 337: 780: 278:processes before it gets its turn. Under a 950:IEEE Transactions on Software Engineering 917: 714: 451:Taubenfeld's black-white bakery algorithm 379:systems. The use of shared memory and an 297:the cycle of sections of a single process 1093:High-Performance Java Platform Computing 696: 292: 27: 1079:Distributed Mutual Exclusion Algorithms 899: 807: 1163: 848: 216: 860:. Lecture Notes in Computer Science. 539:distinct memory states are required. 493:Bound on the mutual exclusion problem 418: 342: 979:from the original on 9 October 2022. 755:"PODC Influential Paper Award: 2002" 528:{\displaystyle \Omega ({\sqrt {n}})} 1151:Mutual exclusion variants in OpenMP 13: 1057: 742:"The Black-White Bakery Algorithm" 509: 402:(CAS). CAS can be used to achieve 14: 1182: 1120: 1077:Sunil R. Das, Pradip K. Srimani: 552:Types of mutual exclusion devices 184:remains in the list, because the 70:. It is the requirement that one 1156:The Black-White Bakery Algorithm 808:Lamport, Leslie (26 June 2000), 460:These algorithms do not work if 1065:Algorithms for Mutual Exclusion 1009: 900:Lamport, Leslie (August 1974). 286:times while another is waiting. 1018:"Recoverable Mutual Exclusion" 983: 934: 893: 842: 801: 787:. John Wiley & Sons, Inc. 747: 690: 522: 512: 1: 683: 543:Recoverable mutual exclusion 133:is changed to point to node 7: 849:Harris, Timothy L. (2001). 678:load-link/store-conditional 648:Dining philosophers problem 631: 122:is being removed, then the 10: 1187: 1142: (archived 2016-06-02) 1136:Mutual Exclusion Petri Net 442:Lamport's bakery algorithm 357:interrupt service routines 338:Enforcing mutual exclusion 275:k-bounded waiting property 18: 1109:, Pearson/Prentice Hall, 1081:, IEEE Computer Society, 906:Communications of the ACM 703:Communications of the ACM 658:Mutually exclusive events 93:The shared resource is a 870:10.1007/3-540-45414-4_21 697:Dijkstra, E. W. (1965). 1030:10.1145/2933057.2933087 638:Atomicity (programming) 205:This problem (called a 962:10.1109/TSE.2007.70724 529: 462:out-of-order execution 298: 261:, which requires that 51: 919:10.1145/361082.361093 858:Distributed Computing 716:10.1145/365559.365617 618:non-blocking progress 530: 447:SzymaĹ„ski's algorithm 296: 31: 567:Readers–writer locks 506: 437:Peterson's algorithm 302:Non-Critical Section 1171:Concurrency control 643:Concurrency control 455:Maekawa's algorithm 268:resource starvation 240:It must be free of 217:Problem description 72:thread of execution 64:concurrency control 1024:, pp. 65–74, 611:priority inversion 525: 432:Dekker's algorithm 419:Software solutions 343:Hardware solutions 299: 259:deadlock avoidance 233:It must implement 109:singly linked list 102:Edsger W. Dijkstra 52: 50:not being removed. 21:Mutual exclusivity 1105:Gadi Taubenfeld, 1095:, Prentice Hall, 879:978-3-540-42605-9 829:10.1145/5383.5384 794:978-0-471-45324-6 520: 170:to point to node 155:to point to node 62:is a property of 1178: 1051: 1050: 1013: 1007: 1006: 996: 987: 981: 980: 978: 947: 938: 932: 931: 921: 897: 891: 890: 888: 886: 855: 846: 840: 839: 814: 805: 799: 798: 778: 769: 768: 767: 765: 751: 745: 738: 729: 728: 718: 694: 534: 532: 531: 526: 521: 516: 469:operating system 400:compare-and-swap 318:Critical Section 235:mutual exclusion 224:critical section 201: 194: 188:pointer of node 183: 176: 169: 166:pointer of node 161: 154: 148:pointer of node 143: 139: 132: 126:pointer of node 121: 76:critical section 60:mutual exclusion 56:computer science 49: 42: 35: 1186: 1185: 1181: 1180: 1179: 1177: 1176: 1175: 1161: 1160: 1140:Wayback Machine 1123: 1063:Michel Raynal: 1060: 1058:Further reading 1055: 1054: 1040: 1014: 1010: 994: 988: 984: 976: 956:(10): 659–674. 945: 939: 935: 898: 894: 884: 882: 880: 853: 847: 843: 812: 806: 802: 795: 779: 772: 763: 761: 753: 752: 748: 739: 732: 695: 691: 686: 663:Reentrant mutex 634: 587:Message passing 572:Recursive locks 554: 545: 515: 507: 504: 503: 495: 421: 345: 340: 255:Lockout-freedom 219: 196: 195:points to node 189: 178: 171: 167: 156: 149: 141: 134: 127: 119: 84:shared resource 74:never enters a 68:race conditions 44: 37: 33: 24: 17: 12: 11: 5: 1184: 1174: 1173: 1159: 1158: 1153: 1148: 1143: 1133: 1131:Daniel Robbins 1122: 1121:External links 1119: 1118: 1117: 1103: 1089: 1075: 1059: 1056: 1053: 1052: 1038: 1008: 982: 933: 912:(8): 453–455. 892: 878: 841: 823:(2): 313–348, 800: 793: 770: 746: 730: 688: 687: 685: 682: 681: 680: 675: 670: 665: 660: 655: 650: 645: 640: 633: 630: 595: 594: 589: 584: 579: 574: 569: 564: 553: 550: 544: 541: 524: 519: 514: 511: 494: 491: 477:context switch 458: 457: 452: 449: 444: 439: 434: 420: 417: 377:multiprocessor 344: 341: 339: 336: 331: 330: 327: 323: 322: 319: 315: 314: 311: 307: 306: 303: 288: 287: 271: 248: 247: 238: 218: 215: 207:race condition 15: 9: 6: 4: 3: 2: 1183: 1172: 1169: 1168: 1166: 1157: 1154: 1152: 1149: 1147: 1144: 1141: 1137: 1134: 1132: 1128: 1125: 1124: 1116: 1115:0-13-197259-6 1112: 1108: 1104: 1102: 1101:0-13-016164-0 1098: 1094: 1090: 1088: 1087:0-8186-3380-8 1084: 1080: 1076: 1074: 1073:0-262-18119-3 1070: 1067:, MIT Press, 1066: 1062: 1061: 1049: 1045: 1041: 1039:9781450339643 1035: 1031: 1027: 1023: 1019: 1012: 1004: 1000: 993: 986: 975: 971: 967: 963: 959: 955: 951: 944: 937: 929: 925: 920: 915: 911: 907: 903: 896: 881: 875: 871: 867: 863: 859: 852: 845: 838: 834: 830: 826: 822: 818: 811: 804: 796: 790: 786: 785: 777: 775: 760: 756: 750: 743: 737: 735: 726: 722: 717: 712: 708: 704: 700: 693: 689: 679: 676: 674: 671: 669: 666: 664: 661: 659: 656: 654: 651: 649: 646: 644: 641: 639: 636: 635: 629: 627: 623: 619: 614: 612: 608: 604: 600: 593: 590: 588: 585: 583: 580: 578: 575: 573: 570: 568: 565: 562: 559: 558: 557: 549: 540: 538: 517: 500: 490: 488: 483: 478: 474: 470: 465: 463: 456: 453: 450: 448: 445: 443: 440: 438: 435: 433: 430: 429: 428: 426: 416: 413: 409: 405: 401: 396: 394: 389: 385: 382: 378: 373: 371: 366: 362: 358: 354: 350: 349:uni-processor 335: 328: 325: 324: 320: 317: 316: 312: 309: 308: 304: 301: 300: 295: 291: 285: 281: 276: 272: 269: 264: 260: 256: 253: 252: 251: 245: 244: 239: 236: 232: 231: 230: 227: 225: 214: 210: 208: 203: 199: 192: 187: 181: 174: 165: 159: 152: 147: 137: 130: 125: 117: 114: 110: 105: 103: 98: 96: 91: 89: 88:shared memory 85: 81: 77: 73: 69: 65: 61: 57: 47: 40: 30: 26: 22: 1106: 1092: 1078: 1064: 1021: 1011: 1005:(2): 313–348 1002: 998: 985: 953: 949: 936: 909: 905: 895: 883:. Retrieved 861: 857: 844: 820: 816: 803: 783: 762:, retrieved 758: 749: 740:Taubenfeld, 706: 702: 692: 653:Exclusive or 615: 596: 555: 546: 536: 499:test&set 496: 466: 459: 425:busy waiting 422: 397: 388:test-and-set 384:test-and-set 374: 365:system clock 346: 332: 289: 283: 279: 274: 262: 254: 249: 241: 234: 228: 220: 211: 206: 204: 197: 190: 185: 179: 172: 163: 157: 150: 145: 135: 128: 123: 112: 106: 99: 92: 59: 53: 45: 38: 25: 864:: 300–314. 592:Tuple space 497:One binary 408:linked list 95:data object 32:Two nodes, 885:1 December 709:(9): 569. 684:References 622:threadsafe 607:starvation 599:semaphores 577:Semaphores 393:Preemption 353:interrupts 80:concurrent 764:24 August 668:Semaphore 603:deadlocks 563:(mutexes) 510:Ω 487:spinlocks 404:wait-free 370:busy-wait 361:preempted 243:deadlocks 1165:Category 974:Archived 837:12012739 725:19357737 673:Spinlock 632:See also 582:Monitors 412:pointers 78:while a 1138:at the 1048:8621532 970:9080331 928:8736023 626:polling 601:permit 482:latency 116:pointer 1113:  1099:  1085:  1071:  1046:  1036:  968:  926:  876:  835:  791:  723:  381:atomic 310:Trying 1129:" by 1044:S2CID 995:(PDF) 977:(PDF) 966:S2CID 946:(PDF) 924:S2CID 854:(PDF) 833:S2CID 813:(PDF) 721:S2CID 561:Locks 1111:ISBN 1097:ISBN 1083:ISBN 1069:ISBN 1034:ISBN 887:2022 874:ISBN 862:2180 789:ISBN 766:2009 473:lock 326:Exit 263:some 186:next 164:next 146:next 124:next 113:next 36:and 1026:doi 958:doi 914:doi 866:doi 825:doi 711:doi 628:). 347:On 200:+ 1 193:– 1 182:+ 1 175:+ 2 160:+ 1 153:– 1 138:+ 1 131:– 1 86:or 54:In 48:+ 1 41:+ 1 1167:: 1042:, 1032:, 1020:, 1003:33 1001:, 997:, 972:. 964:. 954:33 952:. 948:. 922:. 910:17 908:. 904:. 872:. 856:. 831:, 821:33 819:, 815:, 773:^ 757:, 733:^ 719:. 705:. 701:. 372:. 273:A 202:. 90:. 58:, 1028:: 960:: 930:. 916:: 889:. 868:: 827:: 797:. 727:. 713:: 707:8 537:n 523:) 518:n 513:( 284:k 280:k 198:i 191:i 180:i 173:i 168:i 158:i 151:i 142:i 136:i 129:i 120:i 46:i 39:i 34:i 23:.

Index

Mutual exclusivity

computer science
concurrency control
race conditions
thread of execution
critical section
concurrent
shared resource
shared memory
data object
Edsger W. Dijkstra
singly linked list
pointer
critical section
deadlocks
deadlock avoidance
resource starvation

uni-processor
interrupts
interrupt service routines
preempted
system clock
busy-wait
multiprocessor
atomic
test-and-set
test-and-set
Preemption

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