Enhanced Mechanisms for Granting Access to Shared Resources

A computer program product comprising a computer readable storage medium having a computer readable program stored therein, wherein the computer readable program, when executed in a sender node of a data processing system, causes the sender node to:

• send an access request for requesting access to the critical section of code, wherein the critical section of code is a portion of code that accesses a shared resource;
• receive, from a plurality of receiver nodes in the data processing system, responses to the access request, wherein each response in the responses includes a number of active nodes perceived by a corresponding receiver node that transmitted the response;
• and
• control access to the critical section of code based on the number of active nodes identified in each of the responses received from the receiver nodes.

An apparatus comprising:

• a processor;
• and
• a memory coupled to the processor, wherein the memory comprises instructions which, when executed by the processor, cause the processor to:
• send an access request for requesting access to the critical section of code, wherein the critical section of code is a portion of code that accesses a shared resource;
• receive, from a plurality of receiver nodes in a data processing system, responses to the access request, wherein each response in the responses includes a number of active nodes perceived by a corresponding receiver node that transmitted the response;
• and
• control access to the critical section of code based on the number of active nodes identified in each of the responses received from the receiver nodes.