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Rating: 
Summary: Concurrent programming is very risky!
Review: < One of the most insidious sources of programming problems in the RISKS archives involves concurrent programming. Synchronization, locking, message passing, and other tight-coupling mechanisms are extremely difficult to do properly. Programming languages and operating systems are not necessarily much help by themselves. Fred Schneider has put together a wonderful book on how to do concurrent programming correctly. Whereas the book is ideal for a one-semester course (and more), it is also very valuable as a reference work. It should be read by everyone deeply involved in writing critical programs. Although its focus is strongly on formal methods, I have long claimed that formal methods can be enormously helpful if you are really concerned about correctness in concurrency, for which most unproved algorithms tend to have flaws (and a few ``proved'' ones may also). Furthermore, the implementations of such algorithms are always in question, and formal methods can help significantly there as well. [From the Risks Forum, vol 19 no 51]
Rating:
Summary: Concurrent programming is very risky!
Review: < One of the most insidious sources of programming problems in the RISKS archives involves concurrent programming. Synchronization, locking, message passing, and other tight-coupling mechanisms are extremely difficult to do properly. Programming languages and operating systems are not necessarily much help by themselves.
Fred Schneider has put together a wonderful book on how to do concurrent programming correctly. Whereas the book is ideal for a one-semester course (and more), it is also very valuable as a reference work. It should be read by everyone deeply involved in writing critical programs. Although its focus is strongly on formal methods, I have long claimed that formal methods can be enormously helpful if you are really concerned about correctness in concurrency, for which most unproved algorithms tend to have flaws (and a few ``proved'' ones may also). Furthermore, the implementations of such algorithms are always in question, and formal methods can help significantly there as well. [From the Risks Forum, vol 19 no 51]
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