What is Spinlock?
A lock that waits by repeatedly checking the lock variable in a loop. Fast for short waits, but it keeps using the CPU while waiting.
Field: Multicore & Synchronization
Spinlock in the explanations
A spinlock tries to acquire the lock with an atomic instruction and, if that fails, immediately tries again, over and over.
Which describes a spinlock?A thread waiting on a spinlock keeps using the CPU until the lock is free.
In which situation is a spinlock least suitable?
Questions that mention Spinlock (4)
- Which describes a spinlock?
- In which situation is a spinlock least suitable?
- Why does a spinlock usually wait with ordinary reads and use an atomic instruction only when the lock looks free (test-and-test-and-set), instead of retrying the atomic write directly?
- Which correctly compares a mutex (a lock that sleeps while waiting) with a spinlock?
Related terms
Atomic instruction Mutex Interrupt CPU time Context switch ABA problem Acquire-release semantics Barrier synchronization Bus snooping Compare-and-swap