Re: Why multi-threading ?
Re: Why multi-threading ?
- Subject: Re: Why multi-threading ?
- From: Greg Weston <email@hidden>
- Date: Tue, 27 May 2003 08:21:28 -0400
On Tuesday, May 27, 2003, at 01:00 AM, Dennis C.De Mars wrote:
I think multi-threading is probably overused, because developers want
to use it and minimize in their minds the problems it can introduce.
The main problems are:
1) The simple presence of multiple threads greatly increases the
difficulty of writing correct code.
I don't agree with this. A different paradigm, yes. But I wouldn't say
that it increases the difficulty of writing correct code, so much as it
shifts around where the difficulty lies. And I certainly don't think it
"greatly increases" the difficulty of the task. Someone could, you
realize, make the same claim about OO. It's much harder to write
correct code when you've got all these little black boxes and you don't
_really_ know what's going on inside any of them. For that matter,
what's with all these symbol operation names? In my day, we knew an
instruction was going to use indirect addressing because bit 6 was on
in the op code...
The biggest product I've done recently is a package that supports EFT
traffic and currently handles something in the neighborhood of 150k
transactions per day. There are several distinct kinds of thread and
maybe 3 dozen alive at any given time. It runs 24x7, and never in the
4+ years it's been up has there been an issue with the threading design.
2) (and this is the kicker) Presence of multiple threads makes it
virtually impossible to verify that your code is correct.
Again, disagree. I actually find it easier, because I find code tends
to be more compartmentalized.
G
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