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sjoyner

Test-and-set allows you to load the address and set the address to a different value in one instruction. This way we can load the lock value and simultaneously set it to one. This will prevent someone else from thinking they can also grab the lock, since the lock value will be 1 as soon as we grab it.

unihorn

Test-and-set is one kind of the basis for the synchronization.

As an instruction, it can support the atomicity of the conditional operations on some variable. Because it ensures the consecutive happen of LOAD-TEST-STORE, it can master the value of an variable.

Based on the master of specified variable, lock can be implemented to manage some memory. Furthermore, lock is the basis for advanced synchronization strategy, such as read-write lock.

ToBeContinued

In the lecture, somebody asked what we are testing here and professor did not quite answer the question. I did some search but still remain uncertain. My guess is that the term come from the X86 "test" instruction, which sets the zero flag based on the argument. Apparently here we are also setting the zero flag of the processor.

briandecost

@ToBeContinued: as I understand it, you're testing the lock flag variable in this manner: read the lock flag (mem[addr]) and write 1 to mem[addr] atomically. Then you test the lock flag which was read before you wrote that 1 -- if it was zero, you've got the lock. If it was 1, some other thread has the lock, and the 1 your test-and-set wrote had no effect.