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Re: What's the deal with deadlocks

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On Apr 18, 5:53 pm, Ian Collins <ian-n...@hotmail.com> wrote:
> On 04/19/11 08:32 AM, Alf P. Steinbach /Usenet wrote:
>
>
>
> > * Lew, on 18.04.2011 22:22:
> >>JoeSnodgrasswrote:
> >>> Here's how NASA handles race conditions.
>
> >>>http://tinyurl.com/42p2t5f
>
> >>> I searched Dr. Dobbs J, and got ten pages of matches.
>
> >> That link was worth ten times the expected maximum value for a Usenet link.
>
> >> Not least because it led tohttp://www.usingcsp.com/cspbook.pdf, /Communicating
> >> Sequential Processes/, by C. A. R. "Tony" Hoare, with foreword by Edsger W.
> >> Dijkstra.
>
> > I have that in hardcover.
>
> > Some other interesting old books:
>
> >     Parallell Programming in ANSI Standard ADA  - George W. Cherry
> >     Lucid, the Dataflow Language - William W. Wadge&  Edward A. Ashcroft
> >     OCCAM Programming Manual - INMOS Limited
>
> > OCCAM was sort of a language designed to express more or less directly Hoare's
> > concepts.
>
> Someone else who has used OCCAM in anger?  Wow I thought I was the only
> one left!

Ok, so tell me if this is how it works.

You got a concurrent programming project, let's say in C++, and you're
climbing the walls, because the results are unpredictable, the
debugger shows nothing and the code looks fine.

You say to yourself "It's gotta be a race condition, right?  I mean
I've tried everything else, and the behavior is consistent with that."

The solution is to push C++ onto the back burner, whip out your credit
card and buy a copy of Occam (or Linda, or whatever the kids are using
these days.)

Your job now becomes to interface Occam into your existing C++ code
and use the Occam features to find and fix the race condition.  Then
you go back to C++ and work on whatever the boss says he wants done
next.

But the key is to give up all hope of ever fixing the race condition
WITHOUT a language like Occam, because if you don't buy Occam, you're
gonna be twisting in the wind until you're so far behind schedule that
the boss fires you.

Am I correct that my description is a highly reliable portrayal of how
these situations develop?

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What's the deal with deadlocks Joe Snodgrass <joe.snod@yahoo.com> - 2011-04-17 09:15 -0700
  Re: What's the deal with deadlocks markspace <-@.> - 2011-04-17 09:35 -0700
    Re: What's the deal with deadlocks Lew <noone@lewscanon.com> - 2011-04-17 13:14 -0400
  Re: What's the deal with deadlocks Patricia Shanahan <pats@acm.org> - 2011-04-17 09:45 -0700
  Re: What's the deal with deadlocks Robert Klemme <shortcutter@googlemail.com> - 2011-04-17 19:30 +0200
  Re: What's the deal with deadlocks Paavo Helde <myfirstname@osa.pri.ee> - 2011-04-17 15:35 -0500
    Re: What's the deal with deadlocks Ian Collins <ian-news@hotmail.com> - 2011-04-18 08:41 +1200
    Re: What's the deal with deadlocks Joe Snodgrass <joe.snod@yahoo.com> - 2011-04-18 11:59 -0700
      Re: What's the deal with deadlocks Lew <noone@lewscanon.com> - 2011-04-18 16:22 -0400
        Re: What's the deal with deadlocks "Alf P. Steinbach /Usenet" <alf.p.steinbach+usenet@gmail.com> - 2011-04-18 22:32 +0200
          Re: What's the deal with deadlocks Ian Collins <ian-news@hotmail.com> - 2011-04-19 09:53 +1200
            Re: What's the deal with deadlocks "Alf P. Steinbach /Usenet" <alf.p.steinbach+usenet@gmail.com> - 2011-04-19 01:21 +0200
            Re: What's the deal with deadlocks Joe Snodgrass <joe.snod@yahoo.com> - 2011-04-19 14:10 -0700
              Re: What's the deal with deadlocks Lew <noone@lewscanon.com> - 2011-04-19 23:01 -0400
                Re: What's the deal with deadlocks Joe Snodgrass <joe.snod@yahoo.com> - 2011-04-20 17:00 -0700
                Re: What's the deal with deadlocks Lew <noone@lewscanon.com> - 2011-04-21 00:29 -0400
              Re: What's the deal with deadlocks Patricia Shanahan <pats@acm.org> - 2011-04-19 21:18 -0700
        Re: What's the deal with deadlocks Tom Anderson <twic@urchin.earth.li> - 2011-04-19 00:50 +0100
  Re: What's the deal with deadlocks Roedy Green <see_website@mindprod.com.invalid> - 2011-04-17 14:01 -0700
  Re: What's the deal with deadlocks Noah Roberts <dont@email.me> - 2011-04-18 16:59 -0700

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