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JW Archives: How the Java virtual machine performs thread synchronization

Understanding threads, locks, monitors and more in Java bytecode

By Bill Venners, JavaWorld.com, 06/18/12

Page 3 of 3

Two opcodes, monitorenter and monitorexit, are used for synchronization blocks within methods, as shown in the table below.

Table 1. Monitors

When monitorenter is encountered by the Java virtual machine, it acquires the lock for the object referred to by objectref on the stack. If the thread already owns the lock for that object, a count is incremented. Each time monitorexit is executed for the thread on the object, the count is decremented. When the count reaches zero, the monitor is released.

Take a look at the bytecode sequence generated by the reverseOrder() method of the KitchenSync class.

Note that a catch clause ensures the locked object will be unlocked even if an exception is thrown from within the synchronized block. No matter how the synchronized block is exited, the object lock acquired when the thread entered the block definitely will be released.

Synchronized methods

To synchronize an entire method, you just include the synchronized keyword as one of the method qualifiers, as in:

class HeatSync {
    private int[] intArray = new int[10];
    synchronized void reverseOrder() {
        int halfWay = intArray.length / 2;
        for (int i = 0; i < halfWay; ++i) {
            int upperIndex = intArray.length - 1 - i;
            int save = intArray[upperIndex];
            intArray[upperIndex] = intArray[i];
            intArray[i] = save;
        }
    }
}

The JVM does not use any special opcodes to invoke or return from synchronized methods. When the JVM resolves the symbolic reference to a method, it determines whether the method is synchronized. If it is, the JVM acquires a lock before invoking the method. For an instance method, the JVM acquires the lock associated with the object upon which the method is being invoked. For a class method, it acquires the lock associated with the class to which the method belongs. After a synchronized method completes, whether it completes by returning or by throwing an exception, the lock is released.

About the author

Read more about Core Java in JavaWorld's Core Java section.