From: "Christopher Nelson" <paradox AT gye DOT satnet DOT net>
To: <djgpp AT delorie DOT com>
Subject: Libc threading
Date: Tue, 6 Apr 1999 09:21:52 -0600
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Reply-To: djgpp AT delorie DOT com

I have decided to undertake the task of building a threading mechanism into
the libc.

This is necessary, not least of all for the X Windows project that our group
has undertaken.

My basic plan is this:

    For important variables, e.g. errno, etc. they will be replicated in a
thread structure.
    For things that CAN be made re-entrant, they will be made so.
    A set of hooks will be provided to let threaders communicate with the
thread mechanism without needing to understand it's internals.
    A simple interface allows users to spawn threads.  Forking is harder,
but i would like to TRY to support it, if not real Unix forking, then at
least a sort of pseudo-fork.

    I'm working with LWP v 2.0 to see what it needs.  I consider it a fairly
complete package, it's robust, and it works.  The hooks interface will be
built around this general idea.  We'll support:

    Semaphores
    Mutexes
    Threads
    Gateways
    Message Passing

    If anyone would like to help or offer suggestions, please let me know.

                -={C}=-