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<h1>IBM's Classes for Unicode Synchronization Issues</h1>
<h3>Introduction</h3>
<p>There are a number of functions in the IBM's Classes for Unicode that need to access or
allocate global or static data. For example, there is a global cache of Collation rules,
which ensures that we do not need to load collation data from a file each time that a new
Collator object is created. The first time a given Collator is loaded it is stored in the
cache, and subsequent accesses are extremely fast. </p>
<p>In a single-threaded environment, this is all straightforward. However, in a
multithreaded application there are synchronization issues to deal with. For example, the
collation caching mechanism needs to be protected from simultaneous access by multiple
threads; otherwise there could be problems with the data getting out of synch or with
threads performing unnecessary work. </p>
<h3>Mutexes</h3>
<p>We prevent these problems by using a Mutex object. A Mutex is a &quot;mutually
exclusive&quot; lock. Before accessing data which might be used by multiple threads,
functions instantiate a Mutex object, which acquires the exclusive lock. An other thread
that tries to access the data at the same time will also instantiate a Mutex, but the call
will block until the first thread has released its lock. </p>
<p>To save space, we use one underlying mutex implementation object for the entire
application. An individual Mutex object simply acquires and releases the lock on this this
global object. Since the implemention of a mutex is highly platform-dependent, developers
who plan to use the International Classes for Unicode in a multithreaded environment are
required to create their own mutex implementation object and register it with the system. </p>
<h3>Re-Entrancy</h3>
<p>Using a single, global lock object can, of course, cause reentrancy problems. Deadlock
could occur where the Mutex aquire is attempted twice within the same thread before it is
released. For example, Win32 critical sections are reentrant, but our testing shows that
some POSIX mutex implementations are not. POSIX would require additional code, at a
performance loss. </p>
<p>To avoid these problems, the Mutex is only aquired during a pointer assignment, where
possible. In the few cases where this is not true, care is taken to not call any other
functions inside the mutex that could possibly aquire the mutex. </p>
<p>The result of this design principle is that the mutex may be aquired more times than
necessary, however time spent inside the mutex is then minimized. </p>
<p>Developers implementing the Mutex are not required to provide reentrant-safe
implementations. </p>
<h3>Implementations</h3>
<p>On Win32 platforms, a reentrant mutex is most naturally implemented on top of a
Critical Section.<br>
On POSIX platforms, pthread_mutex provides an implementation. </p>
<p>The International Classes for Unicode are provided with reference implementations for
Win32 and POSIX. </p>
<p><b>See also:</b>
<ul>
<li><b>mutex.h </b>- Mutex API</li>
<li><b>muteximp.h</b> - The API's and instructions for providing your own mutexes.</li>
<li><b>mutex.cpp</b> - includes reference implementations for Win32 and POSIX.</li>
</ul>
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