Hans Boehm writes:
> how about something like "provides memory visibility to" ..
Is "memory visibility" appropriate terminology for all synchronization
actions?
For example, does thread.interrupt() make anything visible in memory?
----- Original Message -----
From: "Boehm, Hans" <hans.boehm@hp.com>
To: <Victor.Luchangco@Sun.COM>; "Bill Pugh" <pugh@cs.umd.edu>
Cc: "javamemorymodel-cs.umd.edu" <javamemorymodel@cs.umd.edu>
Sent: Friday, March 26, 2004 1:43 PM
Subject: RE: JavaMemoryModel: How about "Synchronizes to" and "Synchronizes
from"
At the cost of using a longer phrase, how about something like
"provides memory visibility to" or "provides visibility to".
It seems to me that's a more accurate description.
That's similar to the Intel "made visible" terminology that Thomas Wang
pointed at, but I think it more accurately describes the Java semantics.
Hans
> -----Original Message-----
> From: owner-javamemorymodel@cs.umd.edu
> [mailto:owner-javamemorymodel@cs.umd.edu]On Behalf Of Victor Luchangco
> Sent: Friday, March 26, 2004 8:17 AM
> To: Bill Pugh
> Cc: javamemorymodel-cs.umd.edu
> Subject: Re: JavaMemoryModel: How about "Synchronizes to" and
> "Synchronizes from"
>
>
> Bill Pugh wrote:
> > We've discussed needing some phrase we can use instead of
> > "creates a happens-before edge" in places such as
> > Javadoc.
> >
> > One proposal was "Synchronizes with", but I don't like that because
> > it sound symmetric, and doesn't convey the directed nature of
> > synchronization.
> >
> > So what do you think about "synchronizes to" (and
> "synchronizes from")?
> >
> > For example,
> > starting a thread synchronizes to the run method of the thread
> > successful joining with a thread synchronizes from the
> run method of
> > the thread
> >
> > -------------------------------
> > JavaMemoryModel mailing list -
> http://www.cs.umd.edu/~pugh/java/memoryModel
>
> I dislike the use of "to" and "from" with synchronized. It sounds
> unnatural to me, and I wouldn't know what it meant. I can easily
> infer the meaning in this case, but that's no better than using
> "synchronized with", which at least sounds better.
>
> Did we decide that using "happens-before" (with hyphen) was too
> subtle and likely to be missed?
>
> starting a thread happens-before the run method of the thread
>
> (Of course, that would not give us the inverse relation without
> another definition. But we could define happens-after to be that
> inverse.)
>
> If the desire is to avoid sounding too technical, then perhaps:
>
> starting a thread must occur before the run method of the thread
> successful joining with a thread must occur after the run method...
>
> In all the above examples, I think "the run method" should really
> be replaced with a specific event, e.g., "starting a thread must
> occur before the invocation of the run method..."
>
> If retaining "synchronized" is important, then perhaps we can say
>
> starting a thread is synchronized before the invocation of ...
> successful joining with a thread is synchronized after ...
>
> The main objection I have to this last version is that "synchronized"
> implies a similarity in time, so "synchronized before/after" is an
> oxymoron of a sort. Of course, we are using the term in a technical
> sense, so we can have it mean whatever we want. But using that
> reasoning, I think we should just revert to using the technical
> happens-before relation.
>
> Victor
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