[Boost-users] Boost interprocess named mutexes

Subject: [Boost-users] Boost interprocess named mutexes
From: Mike Spertus (mike_at_[hidden])
Date: 2009-08-15 21:29:25

I am seeing the following problems with Boost  interprocess named 
mutexes on Windows.

1. As mentioned in my other threads, interprocess mutexes do not provide 
mutual exclusion between processes run by different users. The reason 
for this is the shared memory mappings backing the mutexes are placed in 
different directories.

2. If a process crashes while holding a mutex, no other process can 
subsequently acquire the mutex.

3. Although the documentation says that mutexes have process 
persistence, they appear to have filesystem persistence. This means that 
is a process or system crashes while the mutex is held, the mutex is 
permanently unavailable (without deleting it).

Are these accurate statements? If so, could these be addressed by having 
Boost::interprocess use Win32 named mutexes (which I understand to have 
none of these defects) like it uses pthread mutexes on Linux?

Thanks,

Mike