Building a distributed lock manager in Go
Unix provides file locks as a mechanism for coordinating access to shared files among multiple processes. File locks are used to prevent multiple processes from concurrently modifying the same file or region of a file, ensuring data consistency and preventing race conditions.
We can use the fcntl system call to work with file locks. There are two main types of file locks:
- Advisory locks: Advisory locks are set by the processes themselves, and it’s up to the processes to cooperate and respect the locks. Processes that don’t cooperate can still access the locked resource.
- Mandatory locks: Mandatory locks are enforced by the operating system, and processes cannot override them. If a process attempts to access a file region subject to a mandatory lock, the operating system will block the access until the lock is released.
Let’s explore how we can use file locks.
First, open the file you want to apply...
