Can Concurrent Read/Write Access to a Go Struct Avoid Race Conditions Without Locks?

Concurrent Struct Read/Write Without Lock: Performance vs. Race Conditions

Question:

Can a Go struct be concurrently read and written without synchronization mechanisms like locks? The "concurrentStruct" function seems to run successfully despite race condition warnings, while "concurrentMap" encounters a fatal error. Why is this behavior observed?

Answer:

Undefined Behavior:

Unsynchronized concurrent access to variables, especially if one or more are writes, is considered undefined behavior in Go. The outcome can be unpredictable, ranging from seemingly correct to incorrect results, crashes, or other unexpected outcomes.

"concurrentStruct"

The "concurrentStruct" function does indeed exhibit a data race, as indicated by the warnings. However, it may appear to run without crashing because race conditions are non-deterministic. Depending on the timing of concurrent operations, it may fail to manifest any errors.

"concurrentStructWithMuLock"

In contrast, "concurrentStructWithMuLock" introduces a read-write mutex (RWMutex), effectively synchronizing access to the struct. By locking before reading or writing, it ensures data consistency and eliminates data races.

"concurrentMap"

The "concurrentMap" function uses a Go map, which requires synchronization for concurrent operations. Since the function performs concurrent reads and writes without synchronization, Go's runtime detects this misuse and intentionally crashes the program. This is a safety feature to prevent potential data corruption or undefined behavior.

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