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RMLOCK(9) Kernel Developer's Manual RMLOCK(9)

NAME

rmlock, rm_init, rm_init_flags, rm_destroy, rm_rlock, rm_wlock, rm_runlock, rm_wunlock, rm_wowned, RM_SYSINITkernel reader/writer lock optimized for mostly read access patterns

SYNOPSIS

#include <sys/param.h>
#include <sys/lock.h>
#include <sys/rmlock.h>
void
rm_init(struct rmlock *rm, const char *name);
void
rm_init_flags(struct rmlock *rm, const char *name, int opts);
void
rm_destroy(struct rmlock *rm);
void
rm_rlock(struct rmlock *rm, struct rm_priotracker* tracker);
void
rm_wlock(struct rmlock *rm);
void
rm_runlock(struct rmlock *rm, struct rm_priotracker* tracker);
void
rm_wunlock(struct rmlock *rm);
int
rm_wowned(struct rmlock *rm);
#include <sys/kernel.h>
RM_SYSINIT(name, struct rmlock *rm, const char *desc, int opts);

DESCRIPTION

Mostly reader locks allow shared access to protected data by multiple threads, or exclusive access by a single thread. The threads with shared access are known as readers since they only read the protected data. A thread with exclusive access is known as a writer since it can modify protected data.
Read mostly locks are designed to be efficient for locks almost exclusively used as reader locks and as such should be used for protecting data that rarely changes. Acquiring an exclusive lock after the lock had been locked for shared access is an expensive operation.
Although reader/writer locks look very similar to sx(9) locks, their usage pattern is different. Reader/writer locks can be treated as mutexes (see mutex(9)) with shared/exclusive semantics. Unlike sx(9), an rmlock can be locked while holding a non-spin mutex, and an rmlock cannot be held while sleeping. The rmlock locks have full priority propagation like mutexes. The rm_priotracker structure argument supplied in rm_rlock() and rm_runlock() is used to keep track of the read owner(s). Another important property is that shared holders of rmlock can recurse if the lock has been initialized with the LO_RECURSABLE option, however exclusive locks are not allowed to recurse.

Macros and Functions

rm_init(struct rmlock *rm, const char *name)
Initialize structure located at rm as mostly reader lock, described by name. The name description is used solely for debugging purposes. This function must be called before any other operations on the lock.
rm_init_flags(struct rmlock *rm, const char *name, int opts)
Initialize the rm lock just like the rm_init() function, but specifying a set of optional flags to alter the behaviour of rm, through the opts argument. It contains one or more of the following flags:
RM_NOWITNESS
Instruct witness(4) to ignore this lock.
RM_RECURSE
Allow threads to recursively acquire exclusive locks for rm.
rm_rlock(struct rmlock *rm, struct rm_priotracker* tracker)
Lock rm as a reader. Using tracker to track read owners of a lock for priority propagation. This data structure is only used internally by rmlock and must persist until rm_runlock() has been called. This data structure can be allocated on the stack since rmlocks cannot be held while sleeping. If any thread holds this lock exclusively, the current thread blocks, and its priority is propagated to the exclusive holder. If the lock was initialized with the LO_RECURSABLE option the rm_rlock() function can be called when the thread has already acquired reader access on rm. This is called “recursing on a lock”.
rm_wlock(struct rmlock *rm)
Lock rm as a writer. If there are any shared owners of the lock, the current thread blocks. The rm_wlock() function cannot be called recursively.
rm_runlock(struct rmlock *rm, struct rm_priotracker* tracker)
This function releases a shared lock previously acquired by rm_rlock(). The tracker argument must match the tracker argument used for acquiring the shared lock
rm_wunlock(struct rmlock *rm)
This function releases an exclusive lock previously acquired by rm_wlock().
rm_destroy(struct rmlock *rm)
This functions destroys a lock previously initialized with rm_init(). The rm lock must be unlocked.
rm_wowned(struct rmlock *rm)
This function returns a non-zero value if the current thread owns an exclusive lock on rm.

SEE ALSO

locking(9), mutex(9), panic(9), rwlock(9), sema(9), sx(9)

HISTORY

These functions appeared in FreeBSD 7.0.

AUTHORS

The rmlock facility was written by Stephan Uphoff. This manual page was written by Gleb Smirnoff for rwlock and modified to reflect rmlock by Stephan Uphoff.

BUGS

The rmlock implementation is currently not optimized for single processor systems.
The rmlock implementation uses a single per CPU list shared by all rmlocks in the system. If rmlocks become popular, hashing to multiple per CPU queues may be needed to speed up the writer lock process.
The rmlock can currently not be used as a lock argument for condition variable wait functions.
November 10, 2007 Debian