Question

I am reading through the msdn articles about windows synchronization. It is really good & thorough material. At the same time is very time consuming. I am more interested in a quick comprehensive guide on the same topic. Any pointers?

Answer 1

This is a list of the concepts that I use in my native (unmanaged, Win32) application. I’ve added some relevant function names between parenthesis):

• CriticalSection (InitializeCriticalSection, TryEnterCriticalSection, LeaveCriticalSection, …)
• Mutex (CreateMutex, WaitForsingleObject, ReleaseMutex, CloseHandle, …)
• Semaphore (CreateSemaphore, WaitForSingleObject, ReleaseSemaphore, CloseHandle, …)
• Event (CreateEvent, SetEvent, ResetEvent, WaitForSingleObject, CloseHandle, …)

Besides these you could also use a file to implement locking (e.g. between processes running on different machines):

• Simply create the file using CreateFile, use FILE_FLAG_DELETE_ON_CLOSE, and don’t specify any of the sharing flags.
• If a process already created the file, the CreateFile will fail.
• To unlock, close the file using CloseHandle.