Chapter 7: Deadlocks

„ System Model
„ Deadlock Characterization
„ Methods for Handling Deadlocks
„ Deadlock Prevention
„ Deadlock Avoidance
„ Deadlock Detection
„ Recovery from Deadlock
„ Combined Approach to Deadlock Handling

Operating System Concepts 8.1 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2002

The Deadlock Problem

„ A set of blocked processes each holding a resource and

waiting to acquire a resource held by another process in
the set.
„ Example
) System has 2 tape drives.
) P1 and P2 each hold one tape drive and each needs another
one.
„ Example
) semaphores A and B, initialized to 1

P0 P1
wait (A); wait(B)
wait (B); wait(A)

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 Bridge Crossing Example

„ Traffic only in one direction.

„ Each section of a bridge can be viewed as a resource.
„ If a deadlock occurs, it can be resolved if one car backs
up (preempt resources and rollback).
„ Several cars may have to be backed up if a deadlock
occurs.
„ Starvation is possible.

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System Model

„ Resource types R1, R2, . . ., Rm

CPU cycles, memory space, I/O devices
„ Each resource type Ri has Wi instances.
„ Each process utilizes a resource as follows:
) request
) use
) release

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 Deadlock Characterization
Deadlock can arise if four conditions hold simultaneously.

„ Mutual exclusion: only one process at a time can use a

resource.
„ Hold and wait: a process holding at least one resource
is waiting to acquire additional resources held by other
processes.
„ No preemption: a resource can be released only
voluntarily by the process holding it, after that process
has completed its task.
„ Circular wait: there exists a set {P0, P1, …, P0} of waiting
processes such that P0 is waiting for a resource that is
held by P1, P1 is waiting for a resource that is held by
P2, …, Pn–1 is waiting for a resource that is held by
Pn, and P0 is waiting for a resource that is held by P0.

Operating System Concepts 8.5 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2002

Resource-Allocation Graph

A set of vertices V and a set of edges E.

„ V is partitioned into two types:
) P = {P1, P2, …, Pn}, the set consisting of all the processes in
the system.

) R = {R1, R2, …, Rm}, the set consisting of all resource types

in the system.
„ request edge – directed edge P1 → Rj
„ assignment edge – directed edge Rj → Pi

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 Resource-Allocation Graph (Cont.)

„ Process

„ Resource Type with 4 instances

„ Pi requests instance of Rj
Pi
Rj
„ Pi is holding an instance of Rj

Pi
Rj

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Example of a Resource Allocation Graph

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 Resource Allocation Graph With A Deadlock

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Resource Allocation Graph With A Cycle But No Deadlock

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 Basic Facts

„ If graph contains no cycles ⇒ no deadlock.

„ If graph contains a cycle ⇒

) if only one instance per resource type, then deadlock.
) if several instances per resource type, possibility of
deadlock.

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Methods for Handling Deadlocks

„ Ensure that the system will never enter a deadlock state.

„ Allow the system to enter a deadlock state and then

recover.

„ Ignore the problem and pretend that deadlocks never

occur in the system; used by most operating systems,
including UNIX.

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 Deadlock Prevention

Restrain the ways request can be made.

„ Mutual Exclusion – not required for sharable resources;
must hold for nonsharable resources.

„ Hold and Wait – must guarantee that whenever a

process requests a resource, it does not hold any other
resources.
) Require process to request and be allocated all its
resources before it begins execution, or allow process to
request resources only when the process has none.
) Low resource utilization; starvation possible.

Operating System Concepts 8.13 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2002

Deadlock Prevention (Cont.)

„ No Preemption –
) If a process that is holding some resources requests
another resource that cannot be immediately allocated to it,
then all resources currently being held are released.
) Preempted resources are added to the list of resources for
which the process is waiting.
) Process will be restarted only when it can regain its old
resources, as well as the new ones that it is requesting.

„ Circular Wait – impose a total ordering of all resource

types, and require that each process requests resources
in an increasing order of enumeration.

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 Deadlock Avoidance

Requires that the system has some additional a priori information

available.
„ Simplest and most useful model requires that each
process declare the maximum number of resources of
each type that it may need.

„ The deadlock-avoidance algorithm dynamically examines

the resource-allocation state to ensure that there can
never be a circular-wait condition.

„ Resource-allocation state is defined by the number of

available and allocated resources, and the maximum
demands of the processes.

Operating System Concepts 8.15 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2002

Safe State
„ When a process requests an available resource, system must
decide if immediate allocation leaves the system in a safe state.

„ System is in safe state if there exists a safe sequence of all

processes.

„ Sequence <P1, P2, …, Pn> is safe if for each Pi, the resources
that Pi can still request can be satisfied by currently available
resources + resources held by all the Pj, with j<I.
) If Pi resource needs are not immediately available, then Pi can wait
until all Pj have finished.
) When Pj is finished, Pi can obtain needed resources, execute,
return allocated resources, and terminate.
) When Pi terminates, Pi+1 can obtain its needed resources, and so
on.

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 Basic Facts

„ If a system is in safe state ⇒ no deadlocks.

„ If a system is in unsafe state ⇒ possibility of deadlock.

„ Avoidance ⇒ ensure that a system will never enter an

unsafe state.

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Safe, Unsafe , Deadlock State

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 Resource-Allocation Graph Algorithm

„ Claim edge Pi → Rj indicated that process Pj may request

resource Rj; represented by a dashed line.

„ Claim edge converts to request edge when a process

requests a resource.

„ When a resource is released by a process, assignment

edge reconverts to a claim edge.

„ Resources must be claimed a priori in the system.

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Resource-Allocation Graph For Deadlock Avoidance

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 Unsafe State In Resource-Allocation Graph

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Banker’s Algorithm

„ Multiple instances.

„ Each process must a priori claim maximum use.

„ When a process requests a resource it may have to wait.

„ When a process gets all its resources it must return them

in a finite amount of time.

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 Data Structures for the Banker’s Algorithm

Let n = number of processes, and m = number of resources types.

„ Available: Vector of length m. If available [j] = k, there are

k instances of resource type Rj available.
„ Max: n x m matrix. If Max [i,j] = k, then process Pi may
request at most k instances of resource type Rj.
„ Allocation: n x m matrix. If Allocation[i,j] = k then Pi is
currently allocated k instances of Rj.
„ Need: n x m matrix. If Need[i,j] = k, then Pi may need k
more instances of Rj to complete its task.

Need [i,j] = Max[i,j] – Allocation [i,j].

Operating System Concepts 8.23 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2002

Safety Algorithm

1. Let Work and Finish be vectors of length m and n,

respectively. Initialize:
Work = Available
Finish [i] = false for i - 1,3, …, n.
2. Find and i such that both:
(a) Finish [i] = false
(b) Needi ≤ Work
If no such i exists, go to step 4.
3. Work = Work + Allocationi
Finish[i] = true
go to step 2.
4. If Finish [i] == true for all i, then the system is in a safe
state.

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 Resource-Request Algorithm for Process Pi

Request = request vector for process Pi. If Requesti [j] = k

then process Pi wants k instances of resource type Rj.
1. If Requesti ≤ Needi go to step 2. Otherwise, raise error
condition, since process has exceeded its maximum claim.
2. If Requesti ≤ Available, go to step 3. Otherwise Pi must
wait, since resources are not available.
3. Pretend to allocate requested resources to Pi by modifying
the state as follows:
Available = Available - Requesti;
Allocationi = Allocationi + Requesti;
Needi = Needi – Requesti;;
• If safe ⇒ the resources are allocated to Pi.
• If unsafe ⇒ Pi must wait, and the old resource-allocation
state is restored

Operating System Concepts 8.25 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2002

Example of Banker’s Algorithm

„ 5 processes P0 through P4; 3 resource types A

(10 instances),
B (5instances, and C (7 instances).
„ Snapshot at time T0:
Allocation Max Available
ABC ABC ABC
P0 010 753 332
P1 200 322
P2 302 902
P3 211 222
P4 002 433

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 Example (Cont.)

„ The content of the matrix. Need is defined to be Max –

Allocation.
Need
ABC
P0 743
P1 122
P2 600
P3 011
P4 431
„ The system is in a safe state since the sequence < P1, P3, P4,
P2, P0> satisfies safety criteria.

Operating System Concepts 8.27 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2002

Example P1 Request (1,0,2) (Cont.)

„ Check that Request ≤ Available (that is, (1,0,2) ≤ (3,3,2) ⇒

true.
Allocation Need Available
ABC ABC ABC
P0 0 1 0 743 230
P1 3 0 2 020
P2 3 0 1 600
P3 2 1 1 011
P4 0 0 2 431
„ Executing safety algorithm shows that sequence <P1, P3, P4,
P0, P2> satisfies safety requirement.
„ Can request for (3,3,0) by P4 be granted?
„ Can request for (0,2,0) by P0 be granted?

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 Deadlock Detection

„ Allow system to enter deadlock state

„ Detection algorithm

„ Recovery scheme

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Single Instance of Each Resource Type

„ Maintain wait-for graph

) Nodes are processes.
) Pi → Pj if Pi is waiting for Pj.

„ Periodically invoke an algorithm that searches for a cycle

in the graph.

„ An algorithm to detect a cycle in a graph requires an

order of n2 operations, where n is the number of vertices
in the graph.

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 Resource-Allocation Graph and Wait-for Graph

Resource-Allocation Graph Corresponding wait-for graph

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Several Instances of a Resource Type

„ Available: A vector of length m indicates the number of

available resources of each type.

„ Allocation: An n x m matrix defines the number of

resources of each type currently allocated to each
process.

„ Request: An n x m matrix indicates the current request

of each process. If Request [ij] = k, then process Pi is
requesting k more instances of resource type. Rj.

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 Detection Algorithm

1. Let Work and Finish be vectors of length m and n,

respectively Initialize:
(a) Work = Available
(b) For i = 1,2, …, n, if Allocationi ≠ 0, then
Finish[i] = false;otherwise, Finish[i] = true.
2. Find an index i such that both:
(a) Finish[i] == false
(b) Requesti ≤ Work

If no such i exists, go to step 4.

Operating System Concepts 8.33 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2002

Detection Algorithm (Cont.)

3. Work = Work + Allocationi

Finish[i] = true
go to step 2.

4. If Finish[i] == false, for some i, 1 ≤ i ≤ n, then the system is in

deadlock state. Moreover, if Finish[i] == false, then Pi is
deadlocked.

Algorithm requires an order of O(m x n2) operations to detect

whether the system is in deadlocked state.

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 Example of Detection Algorithm

„ Five processes P0 through P4; three resource types

A (7 instances), B (2 instances), and C (6 instances).
„ Snapshot at time T0:
Allocation Request Available
ABC ABC ABC
P0 0 1 0 000 000
P1 2 0 0 202
P2 3 0 3 000
P3 2 1 1 100
P4 0 0 2 002
„ Sequence <P0, P2, P3, P1, P4> will result in Finish[i] = true
for all i.

Operating System Concepts 8.35 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2002

Example (Cont.)

„ P2 requests an additional instance of type C.

Request
ABC
P0 0 0 0
P1 2 0 2
P2 0 0 1
P3 1 0 0
P4 0 0 2
„ State of system?
) Can reclaim resources held by process P0, but insufficient
resources to fulfill other processes; requests.
) Deadlock exists, consisting of processes P1, P2, P3, and P4.

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 Detection-Algorithm Usage

„ When, and how often, to invoke depends on:

) How often a deadlock is likely to occur?
) How many processes will need to be rolled back?
 one for each disjoint cycle

„ If detection algorithm is invoked arbitrarily, there may be

many cycles in the resource graph and so we would not
be able to tell which of the many deadlocked processes
“caused” the deadlock.

Operating System Concepts 8.37 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2002

Recovery from Deadlock: Process Termination

„ Abort all deadlocked processes.

„ Abort one process at a time until the deadlock cycle is

eliminated.

„ In which order should we choose to abort?

) Priority of the process.
) How long process has computed, and how much longer to
completion.
) Resources the process has used.
) Resources process needs to complete.
) How many processes will need to be terminated.
) Is process interactive or batch?

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 Recovery from Deadlock: Resource Preemption

„ Selecting a victim – minimize cost.

„ Rollback – return to some safe state, restart process for

that state.

„ Starvation – same process may always be picked as

victim, include number of rollback in cost factor.

Operating System Concepts 8.39 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2002

Combined Approach to Deadlock Handling

„ Combine the three basic approaches

) prevention
) avoidance
) detection
allowing the use of the optimal approach for each of
resources in the system.

„ Partition resources into hierarchically ordered classes.

„ Use most appropriate technique for handling deadlocks

within each class.

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 Traffic Deadlock

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