From: thomas.lynch@...
Date: 2014-04-17T10:48:15+00:00
Subject: [ruby-core:62075] [ruby-trunk - Bug #9754] [Open] Ruby refuses to run source with Mutex locks though there is no hazard..

Issue #9754 has been reported by Thomas Lynch.

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Bug #9754: Ruby refuses to run source with Mutex locks though there is no hazard..
https://bugs.ruby-lang.org/issues/9754

* Author: Thomas Lynch
* Status: Open
* Priority: Normal
* Assignee: 
* Category: 
* Target version: 
* ruby -v: ruby 2.0.0p353 (2013-11-22 revision 43784) [x86_64-linux]
* Backport: 2.0.0: UNKNOWN, 2.1: UNKNOWN
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I put this up on a forum for a week in case there was something I didn't know about Ruby Mutexes ..
but no one commented. So apologies in advance if some discussion is needed.

In this code, the locks are used as latches, so there is no hazard.  There may be a hazard if they toggled, though locking and unlocking in itself is not a hazard. This latch form is useful for multiple threads performing separate searches while blocking processing until something is found.  Any thread can flip the go latch.

(The second mutex is not needed but I didn't want to get into a discussion about that, so I added it to keep things clean. ... any thread could call .unlock and let the latch open, a second coming and doing the same just reconfirms the unlock.)

> ./mutex_brokenq.rb
two threads are searching ..
<internal:prelude>:8:in `lock': deadlock; recursive locking
(ThreadError)
  from <internal:prelude>:8:in `synchronize'
  from ./mutex_brokenq.rb:33:in `<main>'

------------

here is the code:
#!/bin/ruby
#

  puts "two threads are searching .."

    wait_for_finish = Mutex.new
    wait_for_finish.lock

    wait_for_finish_mutex = Mutex.new

    thread_one = Thread.new {
      puts "thread_one working!"
      count=0
      while( count < 10000)
        count += 1
      end
      wait_for_finish_mutex.synchronize do
        if wait_for_finish.locked? then wait_for_finish.unlock end
      end
    }

    thread_two = Thread.new {
      puts "thread_two working!"
      count=0
      while( count < 9000)
        count += 1
      end
      wait_for_finish_mutex.synchronize do
        if wait_for_finish.locked? then wait_for_finish.unlock end
      end
    }

   wait_for_finish.synchronize do
     puts "Eureka!"
   end





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