Re: [Boost-users] Synchronization support for boost objects

From: David Abrahams (dave_at_[hidden])
Date: 2008-08-25 12:49:28

on Mon Aug 25 2008, Zach Turner <Zach.Turner-AT-r1soft.com> wrote:

> I am wondering if there are any plans, either in the near or distant future,
> to ever add synchronization support for arbitrary objects.  

None that I know of.

> The interface
> could be simple, every class takes one additional template argument, 

!!

> the class name of a locking object which defaults to some class that
> provides stub methods so that by default all classes are
> unsychronized.  Then, if I want my object to become synchronized, I
> can pass it whatever type of lock I deem appropriate.  Of course any
> object can be synchronized currently by making a class that exposes
> the same interface and acquires a lock before forwarding to the
> internal boost implementation, but this is inefficient, as the
> internal details of the object’s implementation are not always such
> that an entire method needs to be locked.  Perhaps only a single line
> of code inside a long method needs to be locked.

Not to mention which, object-level synchronization is also often
underperforming: http://www.sgi.com/tech/stl/thread_safety.html

-- 
Dave Abrahams
BoostPro Computing
http://www.boostpro.com