How to: Enable Thread-Tracking Mode in SpinLock
System.Threading.SpinLock is a low-level mutual exclusion lock that you can use for scenarios that have very short wait times. SpinLock is not re-entrant. After a thread enters the lock, it must exit the lock correctly before it can enter again. Typically, any attempt to re-enter the lock would cause deadlock, and deadlocks can be very difficult to debug. As an aid to development, System.Threading.SpinLock supports a thread-tracking mode that causes an exception to be thrown when a thread attempts to re-enter a lock that it already holds. This lets you more easily locate the point at which the lock was not exited correctly. You can turn on thread-tracking mode by using the SpinLock constructor that takes a Boolean input parameter, and passing in an argument of true. After you complete the development and testing phases, turn off thread-tracking mode for better performance.
Example
The following example demonstrates thread-tracking mode. The lines that correctly exit the lock are commented out to simulate a coding error that causes one of the following results:
An exception is thrown if the SpinLock was created by using an argument of true (True in Visual Basic).
Deadlock if the SpinLock was created by using an argument of false (False in Visual Basic).
Imports System.Text
Imports System.Threading
Imports System.Threading.Tasks
Module Module1
Public Class SpinTest
' True means "enable thread tracking." This will cause an
' exception to be thrown when the first thread attempts to reenter the lock.
' Specify False to cause deadlock due to coding error below.
Private Shared _spinLock = New SpinLock(True)
Public Shared Sub Main()
Parallel.Invoke(
Sub() DoWork(),
Sub() DoWork(),
Sub() DoWork(),
Sub() DoWork()
)
Console.WriteLine("Press any key.")
Console.ReadKey()
End Sub
Public Shared Sub DoWork()
Dim sb = New StringBuilder()
For i As Integer = 1 To 9999
Dim lockTaken As Boolean = False
Try
_spinLock.Enter(lockTaken)
' do work here protected by the lock
Thread.SpinWait(50000)
sb.Append(Thread.CurrentThread.ManagedThreadId)
sb.Append(" Entered-")
Catch ex As LockRecursionException
Console.WriteLine("Thread {0} attempted to reenter the lock",
Thread.CurrentThread.ManagedThreadId)
Throw
Finally
' INTENTIONAL CODING ERROR TO DEMONSTRATE THREAD TRACKING!
' UNCOMMENT THE LINES FOR CORRECT SPINLOCK BEHAVIOR
' Commenting out these lines causes the same thread
' to attempt to reenter the lock. If the SpinLock was
' created with thread tracking enabled, the exception
' is thrown. Otherwise, if the SpinLock was created with a
' parameter of false, and these lines are left commented, the spinlock deadlocks.
If (lockTaken) Then
' _spinLock.Exit()
' sb.Append("Exited ")
End If
End Try
' Output for diagnostic display.
If (i Mod 4 <> 0) Then
Console.Write(sb.ToString())
Else
Console.WriteLine(sb.ToString())
End If
sb.Clear()
Next
End Sub
End Class
End Module
using System;
using System.Collections.Generic;
using System.Collections.Concurrent;
using System.Diagnostics;
using System.Text;
using System.Threading;
using System.Threading.Tasks;
namespace SpinLockDemo
{
// C#
public class SpinLockTest
{
// Specify true to enable thread tracking. This will cause
// exception to be thrown when the first thread attempts to reenter the lock.
// Specify false to cause deadlock due to coding error below.
private static SpinLock _spinLock = new SpinLock(true);
static void Main()
{
Parallel.Invoke(
() => DoWork(),
() => DoWork(),
() => DoWork(),
() => DoWork()
);
Console.WriteLine("Press any key.");
Console.ReadKey();
}
public static void DoWork()
{
StringBuilder sb = new StringBuilder();
for (int i = 0; i < 100; i++)
{
bool lockTaken = false;
try
{
_spinLock.Enter(ref lockTaken);
// do work here protected by the lock
Thread.SpinWait(50000);
sb.Append(Thread.CurrentThread.ManagedThreadId);
sb.Append(" Entered-");
}
catch (LockRecursionException ex)
{
Console.WriteLine("Thread {0} attempted to reenter the lock",
Thread.CurrentThread.ManagedThreadId);
throw;
}
finally
{
// INTENTIONAL CODING ERROR TO DEMONSTRATE THREAD TRACKING!
// UNCOMMENT THE LINES FOR CORRECT SPINLOCK BEHAVIOR
// Commenting out these lines causes the same thread
// to attempt to reenter the lock. If the SpinLock was
// created with thread tracking enabled, the exception
// is thrown. Otherwise the spinlock deadlocks.
if (lockTaken)
{
// _spinLock.Exit(false);
// sb.Append("Exited ");
}
}
// Output for diagnostic display.
if(i % 4 != 0)
Console.Write(sb.ToString());
else
Console.WriteLine(sb.ToString());
sb.Clear();
}
}
}
}