Concurrent programming made easy
Rafael Ramírez, Andrew E. Santosa, Roland H. C. Yap · 2002
The task of programming concurrent systems is substantially more difficult than the task of programming sequential systems with respect to both correctness and efficiency. In this paper we describe a constraint-based methodology for writing concurrent applications. A system is modeled as: (a) a set of processes containing a sequence of "markers" denoting the processes points of interest; and (b) a constraint store. Process synchronization is specified by incrementally adding constraints on the markers execution order into the constraint store. The constraint store contains a declarative specification based on a temporal constraint logic program. The store, thus, acts as a coordination entity which on the one hand encapsulates the system synchronization requirements, and on the other hand, provides a declarative specification of the system concurrency issues. This provide great advantages in writing concurrent programs and manipulating them while preserving correctness.