Library Procedures - Tcl_ConditionNotify manual page

NAME

Tcl_ConditionNotify, Tcl_ConditionWait, Tcl_GetThreadData, Tcl_MutexLock, Tcl_MutexUnlock - thread synchronization support.

#include <tcl.h>
void
Tcl_ConditionNotify(condPtr)
void
Tcl_ConditionWait(condPtr, mutexPtr, timePtr)
VOID *
Tcl_GetThreadData(keyPtr, size)
void
Tcl_MutexLock(mutexPtr)
void
Tcl_MutexUnlock(mutexPtr)

ARGUMENTS

Tcl_Condition *condPtr (in): A condition variable, which must be associated with a mutex lock.
Tcl_Condition *mutexPtr (in): A mutex lock.
Tcl_Time *timePtr (in): A time limit on the condition wait. NULL to wait forever. Note that a polling value of 0 seconds doesn't make much sense.
Tcl_ThreadDataKey *keyPtr (in): This identifies a block of thread local storage. The key should be static and process-wide, yet each thread will end up associating a different block of storage with this key.
int *size (in): The size of the thread local storage block. This amount of data is allocated and initialized to zero the first time each thread calls Tcl_GetThreadData.

DESCRIPTION

A mutex is a lock that is used to serialize all threads through a piece of code by calling Tcl_MutexLock and Tcl_MutexUnlock. If one thread holds a mutex, any other thread calling Tcl_MutexLock will block until Tcl_MutexUnlock is called. A thread can deadlock on itself if it tries to lock the mutex twice. Tcl_MutexLock and Tcl_MutexUnlock procedures are defined as empty macros if not compiling with threads enabled.

A condition variable is used as a signaling mechanism: a thread can lock a mutex and then wait on a condition variable with Tcl_ConditionWait. This atomically releases the mutex lock and blocks the waiting thread until another thread calls Tcl_ConditionNotify. The caller of Tcl_ConditionNotify should have the associated mutex held by previously calling Tcl_MutexLock, but this is not enforced. Notifying the condition variable unblocks all threads waiting on the condition variable, but they do not proceed until the mutex is released with Tcl_MutexUnlock. The implementation of Tcl_ConditionWait automatically locks the mutex before returning.

The caller of Tcl_ConditionWait should be prepared for spurious notifications by calling Tcl_ConditionWait within a while loop that tests some invariant.

The Tcl_GetThreadData call returns a pointer to a block of thread-private data. Its argument is a key that is shared by all threads and a size for the block of storage. The storage is automatically allocated and initialized to all zeros the first time each thread asks for it. The storage is automatically deallocated by Tcl_FinalizeThread

INITIALIZATION

All of these synchronization objects are self initializing. They are implemented as opaque pointers that should be NULL upon first use. The mutexes and condition variables are cleaned up by process exit handlers. Thread local storage is reclaimed during Tcl_FinalizeThread.

CREATING THREADS

The API to create threads is not finalized at this time. There are private facilities to create threads that contain a new Tcl interpreter, and to send scripts among threads. Dive into tclThreadTest.c and tclThread.c for examples.

KEYWORDS

thread, mutex, condition variable, thread local storage