Open AccessTechniques for Reader-Writer Lock Synchronization
Author(s) -
B. Ramachandra Reddy,
Richard J. Fields
Publication year - 2020
Publication title -
international journal of electronics and electrical engineering
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
ISSN - 2301-380X
DOI - 10.18178/ijeee.8.4.63-73
Subject(s) - computer science , uniprocessor system , lock (firearm) , synchronization (alternating current) , resource (disambiguation) , state (computer science) , identity (music) , multiprocessing , world wide web , telecommunications , parallel computing , algorithm , computer network , aesthetics , engineering , art , mechanical engineering , channel (broadcasting)
A shared resource synchronization amongst many processes trying to acquire it is a major source of complexity in uniprocessor and multiprocessor systems. The common way of dealing with such complexity is to exclusively acquire the shared resource by a lock, work on it and then let go after the resource is no longer needed. A reader-writer lock paradigm is unique in a way that it allows multiple readers to share the resources amongst them as readers are not changing the state of the shared resource or allow a single writer exclusively to write into/or change the shared resource state from A–B. A reader-writer problem is a challenging topic and deserves its own identity. There are many reader-writer algorithms that try to solve and improve the efficiency of this synchronization. With great improvements in computer hardware and subsequently the synchronization methods in the last 2 decades, we attempt to bring all reader-writer locks together. The paper would first examine a general lock and later move on to different kinds of reader-writer locks in the literature to the best of our knowledge.