[Gllug] A programming question. long.

[Paul Brazier]

I guess the root of the problem is that a SELECT doesn't lock the table
for other SELECTs so two people could select the same top row. You could
lock the whole table for each SELECT but I guess this would be
inefficient. You can't do a row lock because you need access to all rows
to get the top (max) row.

How about having an extra field in the table called LockedBy or
something.
Then instead of SELECTing the top row, INSERT some sort of connection ID
into this field. (because INSERTing does use a row lock)
Then someone else can INSERT into the max row WHERE LockedBy is empty. 

Then the connection can SELECT and DELETE the row (referencing by the
connection ID) without worrying about other users also using it.

You'll also be able to easily see which connections are working on which
rows at any time.

The only problem you might have is if the connection is ended unusually
in which case you might have to do some housekeeping to avoid
half-processed rows from staying around. 

-----Original Message-----
From: co2cool at yahoo.com 
Sent: 05 July 2001 12:59
To: linux.co.uk.gllug; yahoo.com;.co2cool
Subject: [Gllug] A programming question. long.


I was talking to Bruce last night about the small
prediciment I am in - I have a database with about 3
million rows in the main table.  Theres about 100-150
users accessing this data,  they want to copy the top
row off the table and into the application and mark it
as dealt with.

open connection
 select the top 1 * from the table where the date they
should be called by is in the past.
copy data
delete row
close connection

then if for example we need to call them again, we
just insert the row back in with a suitable date, for
example in a weeks time.

What i need to do is make sure that nobody gets the
same row, this can only happen if somebody accesses
the table with a select statement before the row the
previous user deletes the row from the table.

so we need some sort of locking. Enter the spin lock.

We can use a bit of code that locks or waits.

so...

if Locked_Database(username:password) 
{
  select
  delete
  unlock
  do stuff
}
else
 grump "databases wont lock"
end if

locked_database:

my_connection = open_database_connection
locked=false
whilst not_locked and not_timed_out
  try to lock data
  set variables accordingly
end while
return the database connection to the application.


Now, heres the tricky bit we only want to lock the
table, and we only really want it for select
statements.

Its ugly and it could be nicer, that is hellishly
nasty code but it would work. I would like to know how
to do that in perl. Or a nicer way to do it which I
know for a fact there is.

Any help appreciated.

Ta 


David


=====
"Artificial Intelligence is no match for human stupitity!"


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