Problem with pthreads mutex and condition variables

Question

Hi, The problem I am seeking some help for is written in point no. 7. Before that, I describe the structure of my code.

1. From main(), two threads thread1 and thread2 are created and initialized to two functions fun1() and fun2() respectively.
2. I have a mutex named lock_mutex and condition variables named cond1, cond2, cond3 and cond4.
3. I have global boolean variables var1, var2, var3 and var4 all initialized to false.

4. fun1() is like the following:

   void fun1(){
   while(1){
   pthread_mutex_lock(&lock_mutex);
   while(var1 is false)
       pthread_cond_wait(&cond1,&lock_mutex);
   //do some work
   set var3 = true;
   pthread_cond_signal(&cond3);
   set var1=false;
   pthread_mutex_unlock(&lock_mutex);
   }
   }
   

5. fun2() is as following:

   void fun2(){
   while(1){
   pthread_mutex_lock(&lock_mutex);
   while(var2 is false)
       pthread_cond_wait(&cond2,&lock_mutex);
   //do some work
   set var4 = true;
   pthread_cond_signal(&cond4);
   set var2=false;
   pthread_mutex_unlock(&lock_mutex);
   }
   }
   

6. There are functions in my code which hold lock_mutex, do some work and signal cond1 and cond2 when appropriate, like this (each is a separate function):

function A:

    pthread_mutex_lock(&lock_mutex);
    //do some work
    set var1= true;
    pthread_cond_signal(&cond1);
    pthread_mutex_unlock(&lock_mutex);

function B:

pthread_mutex_lock(&lock_mutex);
//do some work
set var2= true;
pthread_cond_signal(&cond2);
pthread_mutex_unlock(&lock_mutex);

function C:

pthread_mutex_lock(&lock_mutex)
//do some work
while(var3 is false)
pthread_cond_wait(&cond3,&lock_mutex);
//do more work
set var3=false;
pthread_mutex_unlock(&lock_mutex);

function D:

pthread_mutex_lock(&lock_mutex)
//do some work
while(var4 is false)
pthread_cond_wait(&cond4,&lock_mutex);
//do more work
set var4= false;
pthread_mutex_unlock(&lock_mutex);

7.fun1() and fun2() are signaled repeatedly by function A and function B. I expect fun1() and fun2() to call function C and function D each time they are signaled.

But fun1() and fun2() are being woken up only for the first time. After that, they enter the while loop, acquire the lock and wait for the signal indefinitely and don't wake up despite signaling.

I am not being able to understand the cause of this problem and would be very thankful to any suggestion. If any good debugging techniques/tools for this kind of program is available, kindly refer me to them too.

With many thanks in advance.

Answer 1

BUMP

If the question was too long and boring, should I remove some parts from it?

Answer 2

It sounds like a deadlock.

If one thread acquires a mutex lock and then waits for a variable to get set, how does another thread acquire the mutex lock to set the variable?

Answer 3

The answer to Mr. Graves's question is that pthread_cond_wait automatically unlocks the mutex while blocking.