Optimal wait-free clock synchronization protocol on a shared-memory multi-processor system

Abstract

We consider wait-free clock synchronization protocols on an in-phase shared-memory multi-processor system. A wait-free clock synchronization protocol guarantees that, for a fixed fc, local clocks of processors which have been working consecutively for at least k pulses are synchronized. Such k is called synchronization time. The best previous result with regard to the synchronization time is O(n2), where n is the number of processors. In this paper, we present a wait-free synchronization protocol with synchronization time O(n), and also show that this synchronization time is asymptotically optimal.