Efficient Object-Based Software Transactions

Abstract

This paper proposes an efficient object-based implementation of non-blocking software transactions. We use ideas from software distributed shared memory to efficiently implement transactions with little overhead for non-transactional code. Rather than emulating a flat transactional memory, our scheme is object-based, which allows compiler optimizations to provide better performance for long-running transactions. We present empirical data on transaction properties to support the design. A model for the software transaction implementation is given in Promela, whose correctness has been mechanically verified using the Spin model checker. The design presented cooperates well with an HTM providing support for small short transactions.