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In this example, all threads share a condition variable. Each thread has its own distinct condition predicate because each thread requires current_step to have a different value before proceeding. When the condition variable is signaled, any of the waiting threads can wake up. The following table illustrates a possible scenario in which the liveness property is violated. If, by chance, the notified thread is not the thread with the next step value, that thread will wait again. No additional notifications can occur, and eventually the pool of available threads will be exhausted.
Deadlock: Out-of-Sequence Step Value
Time | Thread # |
| Action |
|---|---|---|---|
0 | 3 | 0 | Thread 3 executes first time: predicate is |
1 | 2 | 0 | Thread 2 executes first time: predicate is |
2 | 4 | 0 | Thread 4 executes first time: predicate is |
3 | 0 | 0 | Thread 0 executes first time: predicate is |
4 | 1 | 1 | Thread 1 executes first time: predicate is |
5 | 3 | 2 | Thread 3 wakes up (scheduler choice): predicate is |
6 | — | — | Thread exhaustion! No more threads to run, and a conditional variable signal is needed to wake up the others |
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