xref: /dragonfly/lib/libc/sys/umtx.2 (revision 50c6cbc7)
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33.Dd January 15, 2015
34.Dt UMTX 2
35.Os
36.Sh NAME
37.Nm umtx_sleep ,
38.Nm umtx_wakeup
39.Nd kernel support for userland mutexes
40.Sh LIBRARY
41.Lb libc
42.Sh SYNOPSIS
43.In unistd.h
44.Ft int
45.Fn umtx_sleep "volatile const int *ptr" "int value" "int timeout"
46.Ft int
47.Fn umtx_wakeup "volatile const int *ptr" "int count"
48.Sh DESCRIPTION
49The
50.Fn umtx_sleep
51system call will put the calling process to sleep for
52.Fa timeout
53microseconds if the contents of the specified pointer matches
54the specified value.
55Specifying a timeout of 0 indicates an indefinite timeout.
56The comparison is not atomic with the sleep but is properly
57interlocked against another process calling
58.Fn umtx_wakeup .
59In particular, while it is possible for two userland threads to race, one
60going to sleep simultaneously with another releasing the mutex, this condition
61is caught when the second userland thread calls
62.Fn umtx_wakeup
63after releasing the contended mutex.
64.Pp
65The
66.Fa timeout
67has no specific limitation other than what fits in the signed integer.
68A negative timeout will return
69.Er EINVAL .
70.Pp
71WARNING! In order to properly interlock against fork(), this function will
72do an atomic read-modify-write on the underlying memory by atomically
73adding the value 0 to it.
74.Pp
75The
76.Fn umtx_wakeup
77system call will wakeup the specified number of processes sleeping
78in
79.Fn umtx_sleep
80on the specified user address.  A count of 0 will wake up all sleeping
81processes.  This function may wake up more processes then the specified
82count but will never wake up fewer processes (unless there are simply not
83that many currently sleeping on the address).  The current
84.Dx
85implementation optimized the count = 1 case but otherwise just wakes up
86all processes sleeping on the address.
87.Pp
88Kernel support for userland mutexes is based on the physical memory backing
89the user address.
90That is, the kernel will typically construct a sleep id based on the
91underlying physical memory address.
92Two userland programs may use this facility through
93.Fn mmap ,
94.Fn sysv ,
95.Fn rfork ,
96or light weight process-based shared memory.
97It is important to note that the kernel does not
98take responsibility for adjusting the contents of the mutex or for the
99userland implementation of the mutex.
100.Pp
101.Fn umtx_sleep
102does not restart in case of a signal, even if the signal specifies
103that system calls should restart.
104.Pp
105Various operating system events can cause
106.Fn umtx_sleep
107to return prematurely, with the contents of the mutex unchanged relative
108to the compare value.  Callers must be able to deal with such returns.
109.Sh RETURN VALUES
110.Fn umtx_sleep
111will return 0 if it successfully slept and was then woken up.  Otherwise
112it will return -1 and set
113.Va errno
114as shown below.
115.Pp
116.Fn umtx_wakeup
117will generally return 0 unless the address is bad.
118.Sh EXAMPLE
119.Bd -literal -compact
120
121void
122userland_get_mutex(struct umtx *mtx)
123{
124	int v;
125
126	v = mtx->lock;
127	for (;;) {
128		if (v == 0) {
129			if (atomic_fcmpset_int(&mtx->lock, &v, 1))
130				break;
131		} else if (atomic_fcmpset_int(&mtx->lock, &v, 2)) {
132			umtx_sleep(&mtx->lock, 2, 0);
133		}
134	}
135}
136
137void
138userland_rel_mutex(struct umtx *mtx)
139{
140    int v;
141
142    v = atomic_swap_int(&mtx->lock, 0);
143    if (v == 2)
144	    umtx_wakeup(&mtx->lock, 1);
145}
146.Ed
147.Sh WARNINGS
148This function can return -1 with errno set to
149.Er EWOULDBLOCK
150early and even if no timeout is specified due to the kernel failsafe
151timeout activating.
152The caller is advised to track the timeout independently using
153.Fn clock_gettime .
154.Pp
155This function can return -1 with errno set to
156.Er EINTR
157and it is up to the caller to loop if the caller's own API disallows
158returning
159.Er EINTR .
160.Pp
161This function can also return -1 with errno set to
162.Er EBUSY
163due to internal kernel effects.
164.Pp
165This function can return without error when woken up via internal
166kernel effects and not necessarily just by a
167.Fn umtx_wakeup
168call.
169.Pp
170Because the kernel will always use the underlying physical address
171for its tsleep/wakeup id (e.g. which is required to properly supported
172memory-mapped locks shared between processes), certain actions taken by
173the program and/or by the kernel can disrupt synchronization between
174.Fn umtx_sleep
175and
176.Fn umtx_wakeup .
177The kernel is responsible for handling
178.Fn fork
179actions, and will typically wakeup all blocked
180.Fn umtx_sleep
181for all threads of a process upon any thread forking.
182However, other actions such as pagein and pageout can also desynchronize
183sleeps and wakeups.
184To deal with these actions, the kernel typically implements a failsafe
185timeout of around 2 seconds for
186.Fn umtx_sleep .
187To properly resynchronize the physical address, ALL threads blocking on
188the address should perform a modifying operation on the underlying memory
189before re-entering the wait state,
190or otherwise be willing to incur the failsafe timeout as their recovery
191mechanism.
192.Sh ERRORS
193.Bl -tag -width Er
194.It Bq Er EBUSY
195The contents of
196.Fa *ptr
197possibly did not match
198.Fa value
199.It Bq Er EWOULDBLOCK
200The specified timeout occurred,
201or a kernel-defined failsafe timeout occurred,
202or the kernel requires a retry due to a copy-on-write / fork operation.
203Callers should not assume that the precise requested timeout occurred
204when this error is returned, and this error can be returned even
205when no timeout is specified.
206.It Bq Er EINTR
207The
208.Fn umtx_sleep
209call was interrupted by a signal.
210.It Bq Er EINVAL
211An invalid parameter (typically an invalid timeout) was specified.
212.El
213.Sh SEE ALSO
214.Xr tls 2
215.Sh HISTORY
216The
217.Fn umtx_sleep ,
218and
219.Fn umtx_wakeup
220function calls first appeared in
221.Dx 1.1 .
222