What Is Peterson's Algorithm?

Although Peterson's Algorithm sounds like a magic trick or a code, it is genuinely a well-known computer science algorithm used to avoid deadlocks. To visualize a deadlock, imagine two people attempting to cross a narrow bridge from opposite sides. A deadlock occurs when two people attempt to cross an intersection simultaneously and cannot do so because they are blocking each other. Imagine now that we installed traffic lights at both ends of the bridge, regulating when people were allowed to pass at specific times. Peterson's Algorithm accomplishes this by allowing multiple processes to access the same shared resource mutually and exclusively. This eliminates the possibility of deadlocks. Gary Peterson's Algorithm uses a flag and a turn to decide which process should have access to the shared resource at any given moment; the algorithm is named after its creator. Each process that needs to use the resource will set a flag variable to "1" to signal that it needs to use it. After that, consulting the turn variable determines the time to use the resource. If not, it will join a loop and wait for its turn. This process waits for its turn and executes the critical section (the code that uses the shared resource) before setting the turn variable to signify completion. Last but not least, it clears an indicator variable to say it no longer requires the resource. Due to this, deadlocks are avoided by Peterson's Algorithm, which limits access to the shared resource to a single task at a time. Peterson's Algorithm is still widely used, particularly in operating systems and other low-level software, even though many different algorithms and techniques are used in computer science to prevent deadlocks. Peterson's Algorithm is a clever approach to a common issue in computer science that, at first glance, may seem complex and mysterious. It helps keep our software running efficiently by allowing multiple processes to access the same shared resources mutually and exclusively.