Why the grass may not be greener on the other side: a comparison of locking vs. transactional memory

  • Authors:
  • Paul E. McKenney;Maged M. Michael;Jonathan Walpole

  • Affiliations:
  • IBM Beaverton;IBM Thomas J. Watson Research Center;Portland State University

  • Venue:
  • Proceedings of the 4th workshop on Programming languages and operating systems
  • Year:
  • 2007

Quantified Score

Hi-index 0.00

Visualization

Abstract

The advent of multi-core and multi-threaded processor architectures highlights the need to address the well-known shortcomings of the ubiquitous lock-based synchronization mechanisms. The emerging transactional-memory synchronization mechanism is viewed as a promising alternative to locking for high-concurrency environments, including operating systems. This paper presents a constructive critique of locking and transactional memory: their strengths, weaknesses, and challenges