Abstract
In 1965 Dijkstra posed and solved the Dining Philosophers problem. Since then the problem has become a classic test case for concurrency mechnisms and an example often discussed in operating systems courses. Two theorems prove the correctness of seatings where all philosophers always prefer to pick up a fork with a particular hand first. This note shows the subtlety required to solve the problem by showing that a recently published solution is incorrect. A correct solution is provided.
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- [4] Holt, R.C. Concurrent Euclid, The UNIX* System, and TUNIS, Addison-Wesley, 1983.Google Scholar
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- [6] Tanenbaum, A.S. Operating Systems: Design and Implementation, Prentice-Hall Inc., Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey, 1987. Google Scholar
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Dining philosophers revisited
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