Question

I want to translate some Java code into C++. One of the Java classes extends the Thread class and contains the following method:

 public static synchronized String createUniqueID() {
    //some code here
}

How can I synchronize (in the Java sense of the word) class methods in C++ using Boost? I have read about using boost::mutex for synchronizing access to shared data, but I am not sure how to apply this to C++ class methods.

Answer 1

The following is equivalent to a Java synchronized method in C++. In fact, it is exactly equivalent, with the obvious exceptions that it is written in a different language and a different threading library.

class Thing {
  public:
    static std::string createUniqueId () {
        boost::unique_lock<boost::mutex> synchronized(mutex_);
        // ... generate a unique id here.
    }

  protected:
    static boost::mutex mutex_;
};

Note that the mutex is protected, not private, allowing you to use the same mutex (as you should) in subclasses.