RE: FW: Java Vs RPG on iSeries

["David Morris" <David.Morris@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

I read something that made me think that declaring a variable as
volatile
forces private variables to be reconciled on access, thereby getting
around
the weakly consistent hardware issue. I also read something that makes

me wonder if volatile is even implemented in all JVMs. It would seem
that
if volatile were implemented you could use that fact to force hardware

consistency. Or is this just another trap?

David Morris

>>> kulack@us.ibm.com 09/23/02 09:05AM >>>
I downloaded the source for this and looked at it. I believe that on a
weakly
consistent hardware platform, using the fast path may open you up to
possible
problems.

NOTE: I don't believe there is a problem that I can identify in this
code
today
because you're all probably running on strongly consistent hardware.
i.e. Below, where the code in the put() method FIRST stores the
object,
THEN stores the
map variable. When thread 2 loads the map variable, you can be sure
that
the variables modified previous to the map variable were stored.

Eventually, you'll be on weakly consistent hardware (not just iSeries,
but
other platforms too), and in my mind, its better to do it right and
not
focus on
which hardware platform you're on....