DEADLOCKS

DEADLOCKS

 System Model
 Deadlock Characterization
 Methods for Handling Deadlocks
 Deadlock Prevention
 Deadlock Avoidance
 Deadlock Detection
 Recovery from Deadlock
OBJECTIVES

 To develop a description of deadlocks,

which prevent sets of concurrent
processes from completing their tasks
 To present a number of different
methods for preventing or avoiding
deadlocks in a computer system
SYSTEM MODEL

 System consists of resources

 Resource types R1, R2, . . ., Rm
CPU cycles, memory space, I/O devices
 Each resource type Ri has Wi instances.
 Each process utilizes a resource as follows:
 request
 use
 release
DEADLOCK CHARACTERIZATION
Deadlock can arise if four conditions hold simultaneously.

 Mutual exclusion: only one process at a time

can use a resource
 Hold and wait: a process holding at least one
resource is waiting to acquire additional
resources held by other processes
 No preemption: a resource can be released
only voluntarily by the process holding it, after
that process has completed its task
 Circular wait: there exists a set {P0, P1, …,
Pn} of waiting processes such that P0 is waiting
for a resource that is held by P1, P1 is waiting
for a resource that is held by P2, …, Pn–1 is
waiting for a resource that is held by Pn, and Pn
is waiting for a resource that is held by P0.
 RESOURCE-ALLOCATION GRAPH
A set of vertices V and a set of edges E.

 V is partitioned into two types:

 P = {P1, P2, …, Pn}, the set consisting of all the
processes in the system

 R = {R1, R2, …, Rm}, the set consisting of all

resource types in the system

 request edge – directed edge Pi  Rj

 assignment edge – directed edge Rj  Pi
 RESOURCE-ALLOCATION GRAPH (CONT.)

 Process

 Resource Type with 4 instances

 Pi requests instance of Rj
Pi
Rj

 Pi is holding an instance of Rj
Pi
Rj
EXAMPLE OF A RESOURCE ALLOCATION GRAPH
RESOURCE ALLOCATION GRAPH WITH A DEADLOCK
GRAPH WITH A CYCLE BUT NO DEADLOCK
BASIC FACTS

 If graph contains no cycles  no

deadlock
 If graph contains a cycle 
 if only one instance per resource type, then
deadlock
 if several instances per resource type,
possibility of deadlock
 METHODS FOR HANDLING DEADLOCKS

 Ensure that the system will never enter

a deadlock state:
 Deadlock prevention
 Deadlock avoidence

 Allow the system to enter a deadlock

state and then recover
 Ignore the problem and pretend that
deadlocks never occur in the system;
used by most operating systems,
including UNIX
DEADLOCK PREVENTION
Restrain the ways request can be made

 Mutual Exclusion – not required for

sharable resources (e.g., read-only files);
must hold for non-sharable resources
 Hold and Wait – must guarantee that
whenever a process requests a resource, it
does not hold any other resources
 Require process to request and be allocated
all its resources before it begins execution, or
allow process to request resources only when
the process has none allocated to it.
 Low resource utilization; starvation possible
DEADLOCK PREVENTION (CONT.)

 No Preemption –
 If a process that is holding some resources
requests another resource that cannot be
immediately allocated to it, then all resources
currently being held are released
 Preempted resources are added to the list of
resources for which the process is waiting
 Process will be restarted only when it can
regain its old resources, as well as the new
ones that it is requesting
 Circular Wait – impose a total ordering of
all resource types, and require that each
process requests resources in an increasing
order of enumeration
DEADLOCK AVOIDANCE
Requires that the system has some additional a priori information
available

 Simplest and most useful model requires

that each process declare the maximum
number of resources of each type that it
may need
 The deadlock-avoidance algorithm
dynamically examines the resource-
allocation state to ensure that there can
never be a circular-wait condition
 Resource-allocation state is defined by the
number of available and allocated
resources, and the maximum demands of
the processes
SAFE STATE
 When a process requests an available resource,
system must decide if immediate allocation
leaves the system in a safe state
 System is in safe state if there exists a
sequence <P1, P2, …, Pn> of ALL the processes
in the systems such that for each Pi, the
resources that Pi can still request can be
satisfied by currently available resources +
resources held by all the Pj, with j < I
 That is:
 If Pi resource needs are not immediately available,
then Pi can wait until all Pj have finished
 When Pj is finished, Pi can obtain needed resources,
execute, return allocated resources, and terminate
 When Pi terminates, Pi +1 can obtain its needed
resources, and so on
BASIC FACTS

 If a system is in safe state  no deadlocks

 If a system is in unsafe state  possibility

of deadlock

 Avoidance  ensure that a system will

never enter an unsafe state.
SAFE, UNSAFE, DEADLOCK STATE
AVOIDANCE ALGORITHMS

 Single instance of a resource type

 Use a resource-allocation graph

 Multiple instances of a resource type

 Use the banker’s algorithm
 RESOURCE-ALLOCATION GRAPH SCHEME

 Claim edge Pi  Rj indicated that process Pj

may request resource Rj; represented by a
dashed line
 Claim edge converts to request edge when a
process requests a resource
 Request edge converted to an assignment
edge when the resource is allocated to the
process
 When a resource is released by a process,
assignment edge reconverts to a claim edge
 Resources must be claimed a priori in the
system
RESOURCE-ALLOCATION GRAPH
UNSAFE STATE IN RESOURCE-ALLOCATION GRAPH
 RESOURCE-ALLOCATION GRAPH ALGORITHM

 Suppose that process Pi requests a

resource Rj
 The request can be granted only if
converting the request edge to an
assignment edge does not result in the
formation of a cycle in the resource
allocation graph
BANKER’S ALGORITHM

 Multiple instances

 Each process must a priori claim maximum

use

 When a process requests a resource it may

have to wait

 When a process gets all its resources it must

return them in a finite amount of time
 DATA STRUCTURES FOR THE BANKER’S ALGORITHM
Let n = number of processes, and m = number of resources types.
 Available: Vector of length m. If available [j] =
k, there are k instances of resource type Rj
available

 Max: n x m matrix. If Max [i,j] = k, then process

Pi may request at most k instances of resource
type Rj
 Allocation: n x m matrix. If Allocation[i,j] = k
then Pi is currently allocated k instances of Rj
 Need: n x m matrix. If Need[i,j] = k, then Pi
may need k more instances of Rj to complete its
task

Need [i,j] = Max[i,j] – Allocation [i,j]

SAFETY ALGORITHM

1.Let Work and Finish be vectors of length m and

n, respectively. Initialize:
Work = Available
Finish [i] = false for i = 0, 1, …, n- 1

2.Find an i such that both:

(a) Finish [i] = false
(b) Needi  Work
If no such i exists, go to step 4
3. Work = Work + Allocationi
Finish[i] = true
go to step 2
4.If Finish [i] == true for all i, then the system is
in a safe state
 RESOURCE-REQUEST ALGORITHM FOR PROCESS PI

Requesti = request vector for process Pi. If

Requesti [j] = k then process Pi wants k instances
of resource type Rj
1. If Requesti  Needi go to step 2. Otherwise, raise
error condition, since process has exceeded its
maximum claim
2. If Requesti  Available, go to step 3. Otherwise Pi
must wait, since resources are not available
3. Pretend to allocate requested resources to Pi by
modifying the state as follows:
Available = Available – Requesti;
Allocationi = Allocationi + Requesti;
Needi = Needi – Requesti;
 If safe  the resources are allocated to Pi
 If unsafe  Pi must wait, and the old resource-allocation
state is restored
 EXAMPLE OF BANKER’S ALGORITHM

 5 processes P0 through P4;

3 resource types:
A (10 instances), B (5instances), and C (7
instances)
 Snapshot at time T0:

Allocation Max Available

ABC ABC ABC
P0 0 1 0 753 332
P1 2 0 0 322
P2 3 0 2 902
P3 2 1 1 222
P4 0 0 2 433
EXAMPLE (CONT.)
 The content of the matrix Need is defined to be
Max – Allocation

Need
ABC
P0 743
P1 122
P2 600
P3 011
P4 431

 The system is in a safe state since the sequence <

P1, P3, P4, P2, P0> satisfies safety criteria
EXAMPLE: P1 REQUEST (1,0,2)
 Check that Request  Available (that is, (1,0,2) 
(3,3,2)  true
Allocation Need Available
ABC ABC ABC
P0 0 1 0 743 230
P1 3 0 2 020
P2 3 0 2 600
P3 2 1 1 011
P4 0 0 2 431

 Executing safety algorithm shows that sequence <

P1, P3, P4, P0, P2> satisfies safety requirement

 Can request for (3,3,0) by P4 be granted?

 Can request for (0,2,0) by P0 be granted?

 DEADLOCK DETECTION

 Allow system to enter deadlock state

 Detection algorithm

 Recovery scheme
 SINGLE INSTANCE OF EACH RESOURCE TYPE

 Maintain wait-for graph

 Nodes are processes
 Pi  Pj if Pi is waiting for Pj

 Periodically invoke an algorithm that searches for

a cycle in the graph. If there is a cycle, there exists
a deadlock

 An algorithm to detect a cycle in a graph requires

an order of n2 operations, where n is the number
of vertices in the graph
RESOURCE-ALLOCATION GRAPH AND WAIT-FOR GRAPH

Resource-Allocation Graph Corresponding wait-for graph

 SEVERAL INSTANCES OF A RESOURCE TYPE

 Available: A vector of length m indicates the

number of available resources of each type
 Allocation: An n x m matrix defines the
number of resources of each type currently
allocated to each process
 Request: An n x m matrix indicates the
current request of each process. If Request
[i][j] = k, then process Pi is requesting k
more instances of resource type Rj.
DETECTION ALGORITHM

1.Let Work and Finish be vectors of length m and n,

respectively Initialize:
(a) Work = Available
(b) For i = 1,2, …, n, if Allocationi  0, then
Finish[i] = false; otherwise, Finish[i] = true

2.Find an index i such that both:

(a) Finish[i] == false
(b) Requesti  Work

If no such i exists, go to step 4

 DETECTION ALGORITHM (CONT.)

3.Work = Work + Allocationi

Finish[i] = true
go to step 2

4.If Finish[i] == false, for some i, 1  i  n,

then the system is in deadlock state. Moreover,
if Finish[i] == false, then Pi is deadlocked
Algorithm requires an order of O(m x n2) operations to detect
whether the system is in deadlocked state
EXAMPLE OF DETECTION ALGORITHM
 Five processes P0 through P4; three resource types
A (7 instances), B (2 instances), and C (6 instances)

 Snapshot at time T0:

Allocation Request Available
ABC ABC ABC
P0 010 000 000
P1 200 202
P2 303 000
P3 211 100
P4 002 002

 Sequence <P0, P2, P3, P1, P4> will result in Finish[i]

= true for all i
EXAMPLE (CONT.)
 P2 requests an additional instance of type C
Request
ABC
P0 0 0 0
P1 2 0 2
P2 0 0 1
P3 1 0 0
P4 0 0 2

 State of system?
 Can reclaim resources held by process P0, but
insufficient resources to fulfill other processes; requests
 Deadlock exists, consisting of processes P1, P2, P3, and
P4
 DETECTION-ALGORITHM USAGE

 When, and how often, to invoke depends on:

 How often a deadlock is likely to occur?
 How many processes will be affected by deadlock
when it happens?
 If detection algorithm is invoked arbitrarily,
there may be many cycles in the resource
graph and so we would not be able to tell
which of the many deadlocked processes
“caused” the deadlock.
RECOVERY FROM DEADLOCK: PROCESS TERMINATION

 Abort all deadlocked processes

 Abort one process at a time until the deadlock cycle

is eliminated

 In which order should we choose to abort?

1. Priority of the process
2. How long process has computed, and how much
longer to completion
3. Resources the process has used
4. Resources process needs to complete
5. How many processes will need to be terminated
6. Is process interactive or batch?
 RECOVERY FROM DEADLOCK: RESOURCE PREEMPTION

 Selecting a victim – minimize cost

 Rollback – return to some safe state,

restart process for that state

 Starvation – same process may always be

picked as victim, include number of rollback
in cost factor