Chapter 3: Process

Synchronization

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2013
 Chapter 3: Process Synchronization
 Background
 The Critical-Section Problem
 Peterson’s Solution
 Synchronization Hardware
 Mutex Locks
 Semaphores
 Classic Problems of Synchronization
 Monitors
 Synchronization Examples
 Alternative Approaches

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 5.2 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2013
 Objectives
 To present the concept of process synchronization.
 To introduce the critical-section problem, whose solutions can
be used to ensure the consistency of shared data
 To present both software and hardware solutions of the
critical-section problem
 To examine several classical process-synchronization
problems
 To explore several tools that are used to solve process
synchronization problems

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 5.3 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2013
 Critical Section Problem
 Consider system of n processes {p0, p1, … pn-1}
 Each process has critical section segment of code
 Process may be changing common variables, updating
table, writing file, etc
 When one process is in its critical section, no other
processes may be in its critical section
 Critical section problem is to design protocol to solve this
 Each process must ask permission to enter critical section in
entry section, may follow critical section with exit section,
then remainder section

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 5.4 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2013
 Critical Section

 General structure of process Pi

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 5.5 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2013
 Algorithm for Process Pi

do {

while (turn == j);

critical section
turn = j;
remainder section
} while (true);

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 5.6 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2013
 Solution to Critical-Section Problem
Solution to Critical-Section Problem must satisfy:

 1. Mutual exclusion. If process Pi is executing in its critical

section, then no other processes can be executing in their
critical sections.
 2. Progress. If no process is executing in its critical section
and some processes wish to enter their critical sections, then
only those processes that are not executing in their remainder
sections can participate in deciding which will enter its critical
section next, and this selection cannot be postponed
indefinitely.
 Bounded waiting. There exists a bound, or limit, on the
number of times that other processes are allowed to enter their
critical sections after a process has made a request to enter its
critical section and before that request is granted.

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 5.7 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2013
 Critical-Section Handling in OS
Two approaches depending on if kernel is preemptive or non-
preemptive
 Preemptive – allows preemption of process when running
in kernel mode
 Non-preemptive – runs until exits kernel mode, blocks, or
voluntarily yields CPU
Essentially free of race conditions in kernel mode

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 5.8 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2013
 Peterson’s Solution
 Good algorithmic description of solving the problem
 Two process solution
 The two processes share two variables:
 int turn;
 Boolean flag[2]

 The variable turn indicates whose turn it is to enter the critical

section
 The flag array is used to indicate if a process is ready to enter
the critical section. flag[i] = true implies that process Pi is
ready!

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 5.9 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2013
 Algorithm for Process Pi

do {
flag[i] = true;
turn = j;
while (flag[j] && turn = = j);
critical section
flag[i] = false;
remainder section
} while (true);

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 5.10 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2013
 Peterson’s Solution (Cont.)
 Provable that the three CS requirement are met:
1. Mutual exclusion is preserved
Pi enters CS only if:
either flag[j] = false or turn = i
2. Progress requirement is satisfied
3. Bounded-waiting requirement is met

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 5.11 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2013
 Synchronization Hardware
 Many systems provide hardware support for implementing the
critical section code.
 All solutions below based on idea of locking
 Protecting critical regions via locks
 Uniprocessors – could disable interrupts
 Currently running code would execute without preemption
 Generally too inefficient on multiprocessor systems
 Operating systems using this not broadly scalable
 Modern machines provide special atomic hardware instructions
 Atomic = non-interruptible
 Either test memory word and set value
 Or swap contents of two memory words

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 5.12 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2013
 Solution to Critical-section Problem Using Locks

do {
acquire lock
critical section
release lock
remainder section
} while (TRUE);

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 5.13 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2013
 test_and_set Instruction

Definition:
boolean test_and_set (boolean *target)
{
boolean rv = *target;
*target = TRUE;
return rv:
}
1. Executed atomically
2. Returns the original value of passed parameter
3. Set the new value of passed parameter to “TRUE”.

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 5.14 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2013
 Solution using test_and_set()
 Shared Boolean variable lock, initialized to FALSE
 Solution: Boolean lock=False

do {
while (test_and_set(&lock))
; /* do nothing */
P1 /* critical section */
lock = false;
/* remainder section */
} while (true);

do {
while (test_and_set(&lock))
; /* do nothing */
P2 /* critical section */
lock = false;
/* remainder section */
} while (true);

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 5.15 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2013
  Homework:

 Describe “Compare & Swap” solution

for critical section

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 SEMAPHORE

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 5.17 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2013
 Semaphore
 Synchronization tool that provides more sophisticated ways (than Mutex locks) for
process to synchronize their activities.
 Semaphores are used to solve critical section, ordering of process and resource
management
 Semaphore S – integer variable
 Can only be accessed via two indivisible (atomic) operations
 wait() and signal()
 Originally called P() and V()

Definition of the wait() operation Definition of the signal()

wait(S) { operation
while (S <= 0); // busy signal(S) {
wait S++;
S--; }
}
C
C F T
F T
S Exit
Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 5.18 Exit Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2013
 Wait(s) wait(S) { signal(S)
while (S <= 0); {
S--; S++;
} }
signal(s)

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 5.19 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2013
 Gate 2013

X=0 S=2
W X Y Z
Wait(s) Wait(s) Wait(s) Wait(s)
Read(x) Read(x) Read(x) Read(x)
x=x+1 x=x+1 x=x-2 x=x-2
Write(x) Write(x) Write(x) Write(x)
Signal(s) Signal(s) Signal(s) Signal(s)

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 5.20 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2013
 Deadlock and Starvation
 Deadlock – two or more processes are waiting indefinitely for an
event that can be caused by only one of the waiting processes
 Let S and Q be two semaphores initialized to 1
P0 P1
wait(S); wait(Q);
wait(Q); wait(S);
... ...
signal(S); signal(Q);
signal(Q); signal(S);

 Starvation – indefinite blocking

 A process may never be removed from the semaphore queue in which it is
suspended
 Priority Inversion – Scheduling problem when lower-priority process
holds a lock needed by higher-priority process
 Solved via priority-inheritance protocol

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 5.21 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2013
 Classical Problems of Synchronization
 Classical problems used to test newly-proposed synchronization
schemes
 Bounded-Buffer (Producer-Consumer) Problem
 Readers and Writers Problem
 Dining-Philosophers Problem

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 5.22 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2013
 Bounded-Buffer (Producer Consumer ) Problem

 n buffers, each can hold one item

 Semaphore mutex (S) initialized to the value 1
 Semaphore full (F) initialized to the value 0
 Semaphore empty (E)initialized to the value n

Either producer or consumer will process at a time.

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 5.23 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2013
 Bounded-Buffer (Producer Consumer )Problem

Void Producer () Void Consumer()

{ while (T) { while (T)
{ Produce() {
Wait(E) Wait(F)
Wait(S) Wait(S)
Semaphore
S=1 Append() Take()
E=n Signal(S) Signal(S)
F=0 Signal(F) Signal(E)
} Use()
} }
}

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 5.24 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2013
 Readers-Writers Problem
 A data set is shared among a number of concurrent processes
 Readers – only read the data set; they do not perform any
updates
 Writers – can both read and write
 Problem – allow multiple readers to read at the same time
 Only one single writer can access the shared data at the
same time
 Several variations of how readers and writers are considered
– all involve some form of priorities
 Shared Data
 Data set
 Semaphore rw_mutex initialized to 1
 Semaphore mutex initialized to 1
 Integer read_count initialized to 0

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 5.25 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2013
 Readers-Writers Problem (Cont.)

 The structure of a writer process

do {
wait(rw_mutex);
...
/* writing is performed */
...
signal(rw_mutex);
} while (true);

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 5.26 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2013
 Readers-Writers Problem (Cont.)
 The structure of a reader process
do {
wait(mutex);
read_count++;
if (read_count == 1)
wait(rw_mutex);
signal(mutex);
...
/* reading is performed */
...
wait(mutex);
read count--;
if (read_count == 0)
signal(rw_mutex);
signal(mutex);
} while (true);

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 5.27 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2013
 Readers-Writers Problem Variations
 First variation – no reader kept waiting unless writer has
permission to use shared object
 Second variation – once writer is ready, it performs the
write ASAP
 Both may have starvation leading to even more variations
 Problem is solved on some systems by kernel providing
reader-writer locks

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 5.28 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2013
 Dining-Philosophers Problem

 Philosophers spend their lives alternating thinking and eating

 Don’t interact with their neighbors, occasionally try to pick up 2
chopsticks (one at a time) to eat from bowl
 Need both to eat, then release both when done
 In the case of 5 philosophers
 Shared data
 Bowl of rice (data set)
 Semaphore chopstick [5] initialized to 1

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 5.29 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2013
 Dining-Philosophers Problem Algorithm
 The structure of Philosopher i:
do {
wait (chopstick[i] );
wait (chopStick[ (i + 1) % 5] );

// eat

signal (chopstick[i] );
signal (chopstick[ (i + 1) % 5] );

// think

} while (TRUE);
 What is the problem with this algorithm?

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 5.30 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2013
 Dining-Philosophers Problem Algorithm (Cont.)

 Deadlock handling
 Allow at most 4 philosophers to be sitting
simultaneously at the table.
 Allow a philosopher to pick up the forks only if
both are available (picking must be done in a
critical section.
 Use an asymmetric solution -- an odd-
numbered philosopher picks up first the left
chopstick and then the right chopstick. Even-
numbered philosopher picks up first the right
chopstick and then the left chopstick.

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 5.31 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2013
 Problem 2: starvation

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 5.32 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2013
 Solution 2

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Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 5.34 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2013
 Solution 3 - Dijkstra

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 Solution 4 - Tannenbaum

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Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 5.45 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2013
 Problems with Semaphores

 Incorrect use of semaphore operations:

 signal (mutex) …. wait (mutex)

 wait (mutex) … wait (mutex)

 Omitting of wait (mutex) or signal (mutex) (or both)

 Deadlock and starvation are possible.

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 5.46 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2013
 Monitors
 A high-level abstraction that provides a convenient and effective
mechanism for process synchronization
 Abstract data type, internal variables only accessible by code within the
procedure
 Only one process may be active within the monitor at a time
 But not powerful enough to model some synchronization schemes

monitor monitor-name
{
// shared variable declarations
procedure P1 (…) { …. }

procedure Pn (…) {……}

Initialization code (…) { … }

}
}

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 5.47 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2013
 Schematic view of a Monitor

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 5.48 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2013
 Condition Variables
 condition x, y;
 Two operations are allowed on a condition variable:
 x.wait() – a process that invokes the operation is
suspended until x.signal()
 x.signal() – resumes one of processes (if any) that
invoked x.wait()
 If no x.wait() on the variable, then it has no effect on
the variable

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 5.49 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2013
 Monitor with Condition Variables

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 5.50 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2013
 Condition Variables Choices
 If process P invokes x.signal(), and process Q is suspended in
x.wait(), what should happen next?
 Both Q and P cannot execute in paralel. If Q is resumed, then P
must wait
 Options include
 Signal and wait – P waits until Q either leaves the monitor or it
waits for another condition
 Signal and continue – Q waits until P either leaves the monitor or it
waits for another condition
 Both have pros and cons – language implementer can decide
 Monitors implemented in Concurrent Pascal compromise
 P executing signal immediately leaves the monitor, Q is
resumed
 Implemented in other languages including Mesa, C#, Java

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 5.51 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2013
 Monitor Solution to Dining Philosophers
monitor DiningPhilosophers
{
enum { THINKING; HUNGRY, EATING) state [5] ;
condition self [5];

void pickup (int i) {

state[i] = HUNGRY;
test(i);
if (state[i] != EATING) self[i].wait;
}

void putdown (int i) {

state[i] = THINKING;
// test left and right neighbors
test((i + 4) % 5);
test((i + 1) % 5);
}

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 5.52 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2013
 Solution to Dining Philosophers (Cont.)

void test (int i) {

if ((state[(i + 4) % 5] != EATING) &&
(state[i] == HUNGRY) &&
(state[(i + 1) % 5] != EATING) ) {
state[i] = EATING ;
self[i].signal () ;
}
}

initialization_code() {
for (int i = 0; i < 5; i++)
state[i] = THINKING;
}
}

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 5.53 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2013
 Solution to Dining Philosophers (Cont.)

 Each philosopher i invokes the operations pickup() and

putdown() in the following sequence:

DiningPhilosophers.pickup(i);

EAT

DiningPhilosophers.putdown(i);

 No deadlock, but starvation is possible

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 5.54 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2013
 Monitor Implementation Using Semaphores
 Variables

semaphore mutex; // (initially = 1)

semaphore next; // (initially = 0)
int next_count = 0;

 Each procedure F will be replaced by

wait(mutex);
…
body of F;
…
if (next_count > 0)
signal(next)
else
signal(mutex);

 Mutual exclusion within a monitor is ensured

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 5.55 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2013
 Monitor Implementation – Condition Variables

 For each condition variable x, we have:

semaphore x_sem; // (initially = 0)

int x_count = 0;

 The operation x.wait can be implemented as:

x_count++;
if (next_count > 0)
signal(next);
else
signal(mutex);
wait(x_sem);
x_count--;

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 5.56 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2013
 Monitor Implementation (Cont.)

 The operation x.signal can be implemented as:

if (x_count > 0) {
next_count++;
signal(x_sem);
wait(next);
next_count--;
}

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 5.57 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2013
 Resuming Processes within a Monitor

 If several processes queued on condition x, and x.signal()

executed, which should be resumed?
 FCFS frequently not adequate
 conditional-wait construct of the form x.wait(c)
 Where c is priority number
 Process with lowest number (highest priority) is
scheduled next

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 5.58 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2013
 Single Resource allocation
 Allocate a single resource among competing processes using
priority numbers that specify the maximum time a process
plans to use the resource

R.acquire(t);
...
access the resurce;
...

R.release;

 Where R is an instance of type ResourceAllocator

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 5.59 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2013
 A Monitor to Allocate Single Resource
monitor ResourceAllocator
{
boolean busy;
condition x;
void acquire(int time) {
if (busy)
x.wait(time);
busy = TRUE;
}
void release() {
busy = FALSE;
x.signal();
}
initialization code() {
busy = FALSE;
}
}

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 5.60 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2013
 Synchronization Examples

 Solaris
 Windows
 Linux
 Pthreads

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 5.61 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2013
 Solaris Synchronization
 Implements a variety of locks to support multitasking, multithreading
(including real-time threads), and multiprocessing
 Uses adaptive mutexes for efficiency when protecting data from short
code segments
 Starts as a standard semaphore spin-lock
 If lock held, and by a thread running on another CPU, spins
 If lock held by non-run-state thread, block and sleep waiting for signal of
lock being released
 Uses condition variables
 Uses readers-writers locks when longer sections of code need
access to data
 Uses turnstiles to order the list of threads waiting to acquire either an
adaptive mutex or reader-writer lock
 Turnstiles are per-lock-holding-thread, not per-object
 Priority-inheritance per-turnstile gives the running thread the highest of
the priorities of the threads in its turnstile

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 5.62 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2013
 Windows Synchronization

 Uses interrupt masks to protect access to global resources on

uniprocessor systems
 Uses spinlocks on multiprocessor systems
 Spinlocking-thread will never be preempted
 Also provides dispatcher objects user-land which may act
mutexes, semaphores, events, and timers
 Events
 An event acts much like a condition variable
 Timers notify one or more thread when time expired
 Dispatcher objects either signaled-state (object available)
or non-signaled state (thread will block)

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 5.63 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2013
 Linux Synchronization
 Linux:
 Prior to kernel Version 2.6, disables interrupts to
implement short critical sections
 Version 2.6 and later, fully preemptive
 Linux provides:
 Semaphores
 atomic integers
 spinlocks
 reader-writer versions of both
 On single-cpu system, spinlocks replaced by enabling and
disabling kernel preemption

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 5.64 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2013
 Pthreads Synchronization
 Pthreads API is OS-independent
 It provides:
 mutex locks
 condition variable
 Non-portable extensions include:
 read-write locks
 spinlocks

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 5.65 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2013
 Alternative Approaches
 Transactional Memory

 OpenMP

 Functional Programming Languages

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 5.66 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2013
 Transactional Memory
 A memory transaction is a sequence of read-write operations
to memory that are performed atomically.

void update()
{
/* read/write memory */
}

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 5.67 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2013
 OpenMP
 OpenMP is a set of compiler directives and API that support
parallel progamming.

void update(int value)

{
#pragma omp critical
{
count += value
}
}

The code contained within the #pragma omp critical directive

is treated as a critical section and performed atomically.

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 5.68 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2013
 Functional Programming Languages

 Functional programming languages offer a different paradigm

than procedural languages in that they do not maintain state.

 Variables are treated as immutable and cannot change state

once they have been assigned a value.

 There is increasing interest in functional languages such as

Erlang and Scala for their approach in handling data races.

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 5.69 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2013
 End of Chapter 5

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2013