Assignment 3 _Producer - Consumer Problem

 Producer - Consumer Problem
In Section 6.6.1, we had presented a semaphore-based solution to the producer-consumer problem using a bounded buffer. In this project, we will design a programming solution to the bounded-buffer problem using the producer and consumer processes shown in Figures 6.10 and 6.11. The solution presented in Section 6.6.1 uses three semaphores: empty and full, which count the number of empty and full slots in the buffer, and mutex, which is a binary (or mutual-exclusion) semaphore that projects the actual insertion or removal of items in the buffer. For this project, standard counting semaphores will be used for empty and full, and a mutex lock, rather than a binary semaphore, will be used to represent mutex. The producer and consumer - running as separate threads - will move items to and from a buffer that is synchronized with these empty, full, and mutex structures. You can solve the problem using either Pthreads or the Win32 API.
The Buffer
Internally, the buffer will consist of a fixed-size array of type buffer_item (which will be defined using a typedef). The array of buffer_item objects will be manipulated as a circular queue. The definition of buffer_item, along with the size of the buffer, can be stored in a header file such as the following:
/* buffer.h */ typedef int buffer_item; #define BUFFER_SIZE 5
The buffer will be manipulated with two functions, insert_item() and remove_item(), which are called by the producer and consumer threads, respectively. A skeleton outlining these functions appears in Figure 6.27.
#include “buffer.h”
/* the buffer */ buffer_item buffer[BUFFER_SIZE]; int insert_item(buffer_item item) { /*insert item into buffer return 0 if successful, otherwise return -1 indicating an error condition */ }
int remove_item(buffer_item *item) { /* remove an object from buffer placing it in item return 0 if successful, otherwise return -1 indicating an error condition */ } Figure 6.27 A skeleton program.
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The insert_item() and remove_item() functions will synchronize the producer and consumer using the algorithms outlined in Figures 6.10 and 6.11. The buffer will also require an initialization function that initializes the mutual-exclusion object mutex along with the empty and full semaphores. The main() function will initialize the buffer and create the separate producer and consumer threads. Once it has created the producer and consumer threads, the main() function will sleep for a period of time and, upon awakening, will terminate the application. The main() function will be passed three parameters on the command line: a. How long to sleep before terminating b. The number of producer threads c. The number of consumer threads A skeleton for this function appears in Figure 6.28.
#include “buffer.h”
int main(int argc, char *argv[]) { /*1. Get command line arguments argv[1], argv[2], argv[3] */ /*2. Initialize buffer */ /*3. Create producer thread(s) */ /*4. Create consumer thread(s) */ /*5. Sleep */ /*6. Exit */ } Figure 6.28 A skeleton program
Producer and Consumer Threads
The producer thread will alternate between sleeping for a random period of time and inserting a random integer into the buffer. Random numbers will be produced using the rand() function, which producers random integers between 0 and RAND_MAX. The consumer will also sleep for a random period of time and, upon awakening, will attempt to remove an item from the buffer. An outline of the producer and consumer threads appears in Figure 6.29.
Pthreads Thread Creation
Creating threads using the Pthreads API is discussed in Chapter 4. Please refer to that chapter for specific instructions regarding creation of the producer and consumer using Pthreads.
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#include <stdlib.h /* required for rand() */ #include “buffer.h”
void *producer(void *param) { buffer_item item; while (TRUE) { /* sleep for a random period of time */ sleep(...); /* generate a random number */ item = rand(); if (insert_item(item)) fprintf(“report error condition”); else printf(“producer produced %d\n”, item); } }
void *consumer(void *param) { buffer_item item;
while (TRUE) { /* sleep for a random period of time */ sleep(...); if (remove_item(&item)) fprintf(“report error condition”); else printf(“consumer consumed %d\n”, item); } } Figure 6.29 An outline of the producer and consumer threads.
#include <pthread.h pthread_mutex_t mutex;
/* create the mutex lock */ pthread_mutex_init(&mutex, NULL);
/* acquire the mutex lock */ pthread_mutex_lock(&mutex);
/*** critical section ***/
/* release the mutex lock */ pthread_mutex_unlock(&mutex);
Figure 6.30 Code sample.
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Pthread Mutex Locks
The code sample depicted in Figure 6.30 illustrates how mutex locks available in the Pthread API can be used to protect a critical section. Pthread uses the pthread_mutex_t data type for mutex locks. A mutex is created with the pthread_mutex_init(&mutex, NULL) function, with the first parameter being a pointer to the mutex. By passing NULL as a second parameter, we initialize the mutex to its default attributes. The mutex is acquired and released with the pthread_mutex_lock() and pthread_mutex_unlock() functions. If the mutex lock is unavailable when pthread_mutex_lock() is invoked, the calling thread is blocked until the owner invokes pthread_mutex_unlock(). All mutex functions return a value of 0 with correct operation; if an error occurs, these functions return a nonzero error code.
Pthreads Semaphores
Pthreads provides two types of semaphores - named and unnamed. For this project, we use unnamed semaphores. The code below illustrates how a semaphore is created:
#include <semaphore.h sem_t sem;
/* Create the semaphore and initialize it to 5 */ sem_init(&sem, 0, 5);
The sem_init() creates and initializes a semaphore. This function is passed three parameters: a. A pointer to the semaphore b. A flag indicating the level of sharing c. The semaphore’s initial value
#include <semaphore.h sem_t mutex;
/* Create the semaphore */ sem_init(&mutex, 0, 1);
/* acquire the semaphore */ sem_wait(&mutex);
/*** critical section ***/
/* release the semaphore */ sem_post(&mutex); Figure 6.31 AAA5.
In this example, by passing the flag 0, we are indicating that this semaphore can only be
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shared by threads belonging to the same process that created the semaphore. A nonzero value would allow other processes to access the semaphore as well. In this example, we initialize the semaphore to value 5. In Section 6.5, we described the classical wait() and signal() semaphore operations. Pthreads names the wait() and signal() operations sem_wait() and sem_post(), respectively. The code example shown in Figure 6.31 creates a binary semaphore mutex with an initial value of 1 and illustrates its use in protecting in a critical section.