c# - Threadsafe collection without lock

Question

I am preparing myself for an interview and I came across the followign question. I tried but I could not find anything which can create a class containing thread safe collection without "lock". If know any solution then please help.

Create a C# class derived from Object and implements the following methods:

• AddString – This method should add a given string to an internal collection
• ToString – Override this method and return a single, comma-delimited string containing all the strings in the internal collection

Requirements:

• Must be thread-safe
• Must support multiple concurrent readers
• Must not use any pre-existing thread-safe collections
• Bonus: don’t use any type of lock

Answer 1

Here’s a way of achieving lock-free modification of a collection by working on a local copy and then attempting to atomically swap it with the global collection whilst checking for races:

public class NonLockingCollection
{
    private List<string> collection;

    public NonLockingCollection()
    {
        // Initialize global collection through a volatile write.
        Interlocked.CompareExchange(ref collection, new List<string>(), null);
    }

    public void AddString(string s)
    {
        while (true)
        {
            // Volatile read of global collection.
            var original = Interlocked.CompareExchange(ref collection, null, null);

            // Add new string to a local copy.
            var copy = original.ToList();
            copy.Add(s);

            // Swap local copy with global collection,
            // unless outraced by another thread.
            var result = Interlocked.CompareExchange(ref collection, copy, original);
            if (result == original)
                break;
        }
    }

    public override string ToString()
    {
        // Volatile read of global collection.
        var original = Interlocked.CompareExchange(ref collection, null, null);

        // Since content of global collection will never be modified,
        // we may read it directly.
        return string.Join(",", original);
    }
}

Edit: Since using Interlocked.CompareExchange to implicitly perform volatile reads and writes has given rise to some confusion, I’m posting below the equivalent code with Thread.MemoryBarrier calls instead.

public class NonLockingCollection
{
    private List<string> collection;

    public NonLockingCollection()
    {
        // Initialize global collection through a volatile write.
        collection = new List<string>();
        Thread.MemoryBarrier();
    }

    public void AddString(string s)
    {
        while (true)
        {
            // Fresh volatile read of global collection.
            Thread.MemoryBarrier();
            var original = collection;
            Thread.MemoryBarrier();

            // Add new string to a local copy.
            var copy = original.ToList();
            copy.Add(s);

            // Swap local copy with global collection,
            // unless outraced by another thread.
            var result = Interlocked.CompareExchange(ref collection, copy, original);
            if (result == original)
                break;
        }
    }

    public override string ToString()
    {
        // Fresh volatile read of global collection.
        Thread.MemoryBarrier();
        var original = collection;
        Thread.MemoryBarrier();

        // Since content of global collection will never be modified,
        // we may read it directly.
        return string.Join(",", original);
    }
}