Using Tcl interpreters in multiple threads

[Valtcho Valtchev]

Hi - I am considering using Tcl interpreters in a multithreaded program.
The main process starts a number of identical threads which at some
point need to execute a Tcl script. Thus each thread has it's own Tcl
interpreter, however, no communication takes place between the different
threads. The multithreaded structure is imposed by an underlying
thread-safe API which interfaces to a multi-channel hardware device.
Which version of TCl should I use - 8.0.3 or 8.1? I have had a brief
look at the Tcl 8.0 sources and they do appear to contain static
variables in including the memory allocation modules. On the other hand
I am not sure if Tcl 8.1 is stable enough at present to employ reliably
in my system (Tcl 8.1 does appear to use thread safety primitives when
compiled with TCL_THREADS). I don't need the ability to start threads
from Tcl, and the separate running threads do not communicate with each
other.

Any help/suggestions will be greatly appreciated.

Regards

Valtcho Valtchev

[Alan L. Folsom, Jr.]

Valtcho Valtchev wrote:

Use Tcl8.1a2. I have found it to be thread safe for applications as you
describe,
and am currently using it in a similar application. Be aware that you may
run into
problems using Tk, although Tcl itself works fine. By the way, I've worked
out a
couple tricks for inter-thread communications, so that is possible also.

Cheers,

Al Folsom

[Lee F Bernhard]

I'm doing some work to add thread-safety to Tk 8.1. I would appreciate
reports of any difficulties in using Tcl 8.1 with multiple threads.

Thanks,
Lee

______________________________________________________
Lee F. Bernhard lee.be...@scriptics.com
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Scriptics Corporation http://www.scriptics.com

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