Explain the circumstances under which os use mutexes, Operating System

Assignment Help:

Q. Give the reasons why Windows XP, Solaris and Linux implement multiple locking mechanisms. Explain the circumstances under which they use mutexes, spinlocks, semaphores, adaptive mutexes and condition variables. In every case explain why the mechanism is needed.

Answer: These operating systems offer different locking mechanisms depending on the application developers' needs. Spinlocks are helpful for multiprocessor systems where a thread can run in a busy-loop (for a short period of time) rather than incurring the overhead of being put in a sleep queue. Mutexes are valuable for locking resources. Solaris 2 utilizes adaptive mutexes meaning that the mutex is implemented with a spin lock on multiprocessor machines. Semaphores as well as condition variables are more appropriate tools for synchronization when a resource should be held for a long period of time, since spinning is inefficient for a long duration.


Related Discussions:- Explain the circumstances under which os use mutexes

Use of c and c++, One reason to learn C and C++ is simply that so much soft...

One reason to learn C and C++ is simply that so much software is written in these languages. A related, butmore fundamental reason, is that C and C++ are relatively low-level, allo

Explain fixed partitioning in memory management, FIXED PARTITIONING Us...

FIXED PARTITIONING Using fixed partitioning we are able to allocate the memory Here we are dividing the memory into a few fixed partitions.Every partition may not be of the si

How can the deadlock be prevented-bankers algorithm, How can the deadlock b...

How can the deadlock be prevented Bankers algorithm : The Resource allocation graph algorithm isn't applicable to a resource allocation system with multiple instances of every

Explain how a domain user account is authenticated, Question: a) The fo...

Question: a) The following questions pertain to User and Group accounts in Windows XP: i) Give four differences between a Power User and a Guest User account. ii) Explain h

Explain about interprocess communication, Explain about interprocess commun...

Explain about interprocess communication The cooperating processes communicate with each other via an interprocess communication facility. IPC gives a mechanism to permit proce

State the advantage of multiprocessor system, State the advantage of multip...

State the advantage of multiprocessor system? The advantages of multiprocessor system are:- a)      Enhanced throughput. b)      Economy of scale. c)       Enhanced re

Invalid page fault, Invalid page fault :If a page fault happens for a ref...

Invalid page fault :If a page fault happens for a reference to an address that's not part of the virtual address space, so that there could not be a page in memory corresponding

Merits of device controller in the kernel, Q. State three merits of placing...

Q. State three merits of placing functionality in a device controller rather than in the kernel and State three disadvantages. Answer: Three advantages: Bugs are less probabl

Define the windowsnt, Define the WindowsNT WindowsNT provides a two-lev...

Define the WindowsNT WindowsNT provides a two-level approach to resource management: process and thread. The process is the uppermost level and contains most of the application

Write Your Message!

Captcha
Free Assignment Quote

Assured A++ Grade

Get guaranteed satisfaction & time on delivery in every assignment order you paid with us! We ensure premium quality solution document along with free turntin report!

All rights reserved! Copyrights ©2019-2020 ExpertsMind IT Educational Pvt Ltd