Serializing event handling in a threaded system with no wait states
AssigneeInternational Business Machines Corporation
InventorsWilliam S. Cadden, Patricia E. Heywood
Life of this patent
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Abstract
Event handling in multinode data processing networks, in which data structures are shared between nodes and are subject to concurrent requests for access, is facilitated through the use of a separate small data structure (bit array or linked list) which permits an event handler to hand off the task of accessing the data structure to an event handler which is already accessing data from the same data structure. This eliminates the need for locking arrangements and/or the use of special coordinating event handlers.
Claims27
A method for handling events in a data processing system in which at least two threads access the same data, said method comprising the step of handing off the task of accessing said data from a first event handler to a second event handler that is already accessing said data.
A method for handling events in a multithreaded data processing system which comprises the step of insuring that only one thread gains control at a time so that a first thread, which has an event that needs to be handled at the time that a second thread is handling said event, passes the handling of the events from the first thread to the second thread, whereby the first thread does not need to wait for the second thread to finish and whereby no thread waits for a significant amount of time for another thread to finish.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.