JUCS - Journal of Universal Computer Science 16(2): 221-245, doi: 10.3217/jucs-016-02-0221
An Extensible Interpreter Framework for Software Transactional Memory
expand article infoCharlotte Herzeel‡, Pascal Costanza‡, Theo D Hondt‡
‡ Vrije Universiteit Brussel, Brussel, Belgium

Corresponding author: Charlotte Herzeel ( charlotte.herzeel@vub.ac.be )

© Charlotte Herzeel, Pascal Costanza, Theo Hondt.
This article is freely available under the J.UCS Open Content License.
Citation: Herzeel C, Costanza P, Hondt TD (2010) An Extensible Interpreter Framework for Software Transactional Memory. JUCS - Journal of Universal Computer Science 16(2): 221-245. https://doi.org/10.3217/jucs-016-02-0221
Open Access
Abstract
Software transactional memory (STM) is a new approach for coordinating concurrent threads, for which many different implementation strategies are currently being researched. In this paper we show that if a language implementation provides reflective access to explicit memory locations, it becomes straightforward to both (a) build an STM framework for this language and (b) to implement STM algorithms using this framework. A proof-of-concept implementation in the form of a Scheme interpreter (written in Common Lisp) is presented.
Keywords
software transactional memory, Lisp, memory location objects