Queue can result in nested monitor deadlock

[Jonathan Amsterdam]

I think there's a slight design flaw in the Queue class that makes it
hard to avoid nested monitor deadlock. The problem is that the mutex
used by the Queue is not easy to change. You can then easily get
yourself into the following situation (nested monitor deadlock):

Say we have a class that contains a Queue and some other things. The
class's internals are protected by a mutex M. Initially the Queue is
empty. The only access to the queue is through this class.

Thread 1 locks M, then calls Queue.get(). It blocks. At this point the
Queue's mutex is released, but M is still held.

Thread 2 tries to put something in the Queue by calling the enclosing
class's methods, but it blocks on M. Deadlock.

The solution would be to expose the Queue's mutex via a constructor
argument and/or method, so that, to take the above example, one could
create M and give it to the Queue as its mutex. Of course this is
doable now, as the code below demonstrates. But it should be documented
and exposed.

As I'm new to the Python community, I'm not sure that this is the right
forum for this suggestion. Is it the sort of thing one would put on the
SourceForge bug list? Advice appreciated.

"Fixed" Queue class:

class LQueue(Queue.Qu eue):
"""
Fixes a problem with the standard Queue implementation: you can't
use your own mutex,
so you are subject to nested monitor deadlock. This version lets
you pass in your
own lock.
"""

def __init__(self, maxsize=0, lock=None):
"Optionally takes a lock (threading.Lock or threading.RLock ) to
use for the queue's lock."
Queue.Queue.__i nit__(self, maxsize)
if lock:
self.mutex = lock
# Re-create the condition objects with the new mutex.
self.not_empty = threading.Condi tion(self.mutex )
self.not_full = threading.Condi tion(self.mutex )

[Alex Martelli]

Jonathan Amsterdam <jb*********@gm ail.com> wrote:
...

As I'm new to the Python community, I'm not sure that this is the right
forum for this suggestion. Is it the sort of thing one would put on the
SourceForge bug list? Advice appreciated.

Posting a patch and/or bug to Sourceforge is probably the best approach.
Alex

[Paul McGuire]

"Jonathan Amsterdam" <jb*********@gm ail.com> wrote in message
news:11******** **************@ v46g2000cwv.goo glegroups.com.. .

I think there's a slight design flaw in the Queue class that makes it
hard to avoid nested monitor deadlock. The problem is that the mutex
used by the Queue is not easy to change. You can then easily get
yourself into the following situation (nested monitor deadlock):

Say we have a class that contains a Queue and some other things. The
class's internals are protected by a mutex M. Initially the Queue is
empty. The only access to the queue is through this class.

Thread 1 locks M, then calls Queue.get(). It blocks. At this point the
Queue's mutex is released, but M is still held.

Thread 2 tries to put something in the Queue by calling the enclosing
class's methods, but it blocks on M. Deadlock.

This isn't really a deadlock, it is just a blocking condition, until Thread
1 releases M.

There are 3 requirements for deadlock:
1. Multiple resources/locks
2. Multiple threads
3. Out-of-order access

You have definitely created the first two conditions, but the deadlock only
occurs if Thread 2 first acquires the Queue lock, then needs to get M before
continuing. By forcing all access to the Queue through the class's methods,
which presumably lock and unlock M as part of their implementation, then you
have successfully prevented 3. No deadlocks, just proper
blocking/synchronization .

-- Paul

[Jonathan Amsterdam]

If you don't want to call it deadlock, fine, but the program execution
I describe will make no progress to the end of time. Thread 2 can never
put anything in the queue, because Thread 1 holds M, and Thread 1 will
never release M because that can only happen if someone puts something
on the queue.

[Jack Diederich]

On Mon, Apr 17, 2006 at 09:41:37AM -0700, Jonathan Amsterdam wrote:

If you don't want to call it deadlock, fine, but the program execution
I describe will make no progress to the end of time. Thread 2 can never
put anything in the queue, because Thread 1 holds M, and Thread 1 will
never release M because that can only happen if someone puts something
on the queue.

Right, the problem isn't with Queue it is with your global lock M.
Here is the pseudo code for your program:

acquire_lock("N o_one_else_can_ do_anything")
wait_for_someon e_else_to_do_so mething() # waits forever

-Jack

[Duncan Booth]

Jonathan Amsterdam wrote:

If you don't want to call it deadlock, fine, but the program execution
I describe will make no progress to the end of time. Thread 2 can never
put anything in the queue, because Thread 1 holds M, and Thread 1 will
never release M because that can only happen if someone puts something
on the queue.

If your class is using a queue to handle the inter-thread communication why
is it also using a semaphore?

If your methods are already locked so only one thread runs at a time why
are you then using a queue to provide another layer of locking: a simple
list should suffice?

[Paul McGuire]

"Jonathan Amsterdam" <jb*********@gm ail.com> wrote in message
news:11******** **************@ e56g2000cwe.goo glegroups.com.. .

If you don't want to call it deadlock, fine, but the program execution
I describe will make no progress to the end of time. Thread 2 can never
put anything in the queue, because Thread 1 holds M, and Thread 1 will
never release M because that can only happen if someone puts something
on the queue.

Ah, I get it now, and yes as you describe it, this is a deadlock. But why
do you need both mutex M and a Queue, then? You should release M before
calling Queue.get(). Then if you need to, you should reacquire it
afterward.

-- Paul

[Terry Reedy]

"Jonathan Amsterdam" <jb*********@gm ail.com> wrote in message
news:11******** **************@ v46g2000cwv.goo glegroups.com.. .

As I'm new to the Python community, I'm not sure that this is the right
forum for this suggestion. Is it the sort of thing one would put on the
SourceForge bug list? Advice appreciated.

As a sometimes bug reviewer who has noticed that a substantial fraction of
'bug' reports do not actually report CPython bugs, I wish more people would
do as you did and post here first and get opinions from the wider variety
of readers here.

A CPython bug is a discrepancy between a reasonable interpretation of the
doc and the behavior of the CPython implementation. Your post did not even
claim such a discrepancy that I could see.

A request for a design change can be put on the RFE (request for
enhancement) list. Patches, whether to fix bugs or implement enhancements,
usually go on the patch list. Note that you do not necessarily need to
convince people that the current design is 'flawed' to demonstrate that a
change would be good.

Perhaps your recipe should be added to the oreilly online python cookbook.

Terry Jan Reedy

[Alan Morgan]

In article <11************ **********@e56g 2000cwe.googleg roups.com>,
Jonathan Amsterdam <jb*********@gm ail.com> wrote:

If you don't want to call it deadlock, fine, but the program execution
I describe will make no progress to the end of time. Thread 2 can never
put anything in the queue, because Thread 1 holds M, and Thread 1 will
never release M because that can only happen if someone puts something
on the queue.

That's not a problem in the design of the queue class, it is a problem
in how you are using it. Two possible solutions are:

1. Don't have the global lock on the object (or, at the very least,
don't have that global lock taken when you read from the queue).
2. Don't use a syncronized queue. If the only access to the queue is
through the object and the object is protected then you don't need
a synchronized queue.

Alan
--
Defendit numerus

[Jonathan Amsterdam]

This is a reply to Alan Morgan, Paul McGuire and Duncan Booth.

I need mutex M because I have other fields in my class that need to be
thread-safe.

The reason I want to use a Queue and not a list is that a Queue has
additional synchronization besides the mutex. For instance, Queue.get()
will block the caller until the queue is non-empty. Of course I could
build this behavior on top of a list, but then I'm reinventing the
wheel: Queue.Queue is the perfect thing, except for the problem I
describe.

I can't release my mutex M and then call Queue.get(). That could be a
race condition: between the time M is released and Queue's mutex is
acquired, another thread could get into my object and mess things up.
(We'd need a specific example to see this, and there may be many cases
where I could safely release M before calling Queue.get(), but in
general it won't work.)