The Ostrich Algorithm

• Different people react to this strategy in different ways:
  • Mathematicians: find deadlock totally unacceptable, and say that it must be prevented at all costs.
  • Engineers: ask how serious it is, and do not want to pay a penalty in performance and convenience.
• The UNIX approach is just to ignore the problem on the assumption that most users would prefer an occasional deadlock, to a rule restricting user access to only one resource at a time
• The problem is that the prevention price is high, mostly in terms of putting inconvenient restrictions on processes