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Atomic Operations Provided in The sync/atomic Standard Package

Atomic operations are more primitive than other synchronization techniques. They are lockless and generally implemented directly at hardware level. In fact, they are often used in implementing other synchronization techniques.

Please note, many examples below are not concurrent programs. They are just for demonstration and explanation purposes, to show how to use the atomic functions provided in the sync/atomic standard package.

Overview of Atomic Operations Provided Before Go 1.19-

The sync/atomic standard package provides the following five atomic functions for an integer type T, where T must be any of int32, int64, uint32, uint64 and uintptr.
func AddT(addr *T, delta T)(new T)
func LoadT(addr *T) (val T)
func StoreT(addr *T, val T)
func SwapT(addr *T, new T) (old T)
func CompareAndSwapT(addr *T, old, new T) (swapped bool)
For example, the following five functions are provided for type int32.
func AddInt32(addr *int32, delta int32)(new int32)
func LoadInt32(addr *int32) (val int32)
func StoreInt32(addr *int32, val int32)
func SwapInt32(addr *int32, new int32) (old int32)
func CompareAndSwapInt32(addr *int32,
				old, new int32) (swapped bool)

The following four atomic functions are provided for (safe) pointer types. When these functions were introduced into the standard library, Go didn't support custom generics, so these functions are implemented through the unsafe pointer type unsafe.Pointer (the Go counterpart of C void*).
func LoadPointer(addr *unsafe.Pointer) (val unsafe.Pointer)
func StorePointer(addr *unsafe.Pointer, val unsafe.Pointer)
func SwapPointer(addr *unsafe.Pointer, new unsafe.Pointer,
				) (old unsafe.Pointer)
func CompareAndSwapPointer(addr *unsafe.Pointer,
				old, new unsafe.Pointer) (swapped bool)

There is not an AddPointer function for pointers, as Go (safe) pointers don't support arithmetic operations.

The sync/atomic standard package also provides a type Value, which corresponding pointer type *Value has four methods (listed below, the later two were introduced by Go 1.17). We may use these methods to do atomic operations for values of any type.
func (*Value) Load() (x interface{})
func (*Value) Store(x interface{})
func (*Value) Swap(new interface{}) (old interface{})
func (*Value) CompareAndSwap(old, new interface{}) (swapped bool)

Overview of New Atomic Operations Provided Since Go 1.19

Go 1.19 introduced several types, each of which owns a set of atomic operation methods, to achieve the same effects made by the package-level functions listed in the last section.

Among these types, Int32, Int64, Uint32, Uint64 and Uintptr are for integer atomic operations. The methods of the atomic.Int32 type are listed below. The methods of the other four types present in the similar way.

func (*Int32) Add(delta int32) (new int32)
func (*Int32) Load() int32
func (*Int32) Store(val int32)
func (*Int32) Swap(new int32) (old int32)
func (*Int32) CompareAndSwap(old, new int32) (swapped bool)

Since Go 1.18, Go has already supported custom generics. And some standard packages started to adopt custom generics since Go 1.19. The sync/atomic package is one of these packages. The Pointer[T any] type introudced in this package by Go 1.19 is a generic type. Its methods are listed below.

(*Pointer[T]) Load() *T
(*Pointer[T]) Store(val *T)
(*Pointer[T]) Swap(new *T) (old *T)
(*Pointer[T]) CompareAndSwap(old, new *T) (swapped bool)

Go 1.19 also introduced a Bool type to do boolean atomic operations.

Atomic Operations for Integers

The remaining of this article shows some examples on how to use the atomic operations provided in Go.

The following example shows how to do the Add atomic operation on an int32 value by using the AddInt32 function. In this example, 1000 new concurrent goroutines are created by the main goroutine. Each of the new created goroutine increases the integer n by one. Atomic operations guarantee that there are no data races among these goroutines. In the end, 1000 is guaranteed to be printed.
package main

import (
	"fmt"
	"sync"
	"sync/atomic"
)

func main() {
	var n int32
	var wg sync.WaitGroup
	for i := 0; i < 1000; i++ {
		wg.Add(1)
		go func() {
			atomic.AddInt32(&n, 1)
			wg.Done()
		}()
	}
	wg.Wait()

	fmt.Println(atomic.LoadInt32(&n)) // 1000
}

If the statement atomic.AddInt32(&n, 1) is replaced with n++, then the output might be not 1000.

The following code re-implements the above program by using the atomic.Int32 type and its methods (since Go 1.19). This code looks a bit tidier.
package main

import (
	"fmt"
	"sync"
	"sync/atomic"
)

func main() {
	var n atomic.Int32
	var wg sync.WaitGroup
	for i := 0; i < 1000; i++ {
		wg.Add(1)
		go func() {
			n.Add(1)
			wg.Done()
		}()
	}
	wg.Wait()

	fmt.Println(n.Load()) // 1000
}

The StoreT and LoadT atomic functions/methods are often used to implement the setter and getter methods of (the corresponding pointer type of) a type if the values of the type need to be used concurrently. For example, the function version:
type Page struct {
	views uint32
}

func (page *Page) SetViews(n uint32) {
	atomic.StoreUint32(&page.views, n)
}

func (page *Page) Views() uint32 {
	return atomic.LoadUint32(&page.views)
}
And the type+methods version (since Go 1.19):
type Page struct {
	views atomic.Uint32
}

func (page *Page) SetViews(n uint32) {
	page.views.Store(n)
}

func (page *Page) Views() uint32 {
	return page.views.Load()
}

For a signed integer type T (int32 or int64), the second argument for a call to the AddT function can be a negative value, to do an atomic decrease operation. But how to do atomic decrease operations for values of an unsigned type T, such as uint32, uint64 and uintptr? There are two circumstances for the second unsigned arguments.
  1. For an unsigned variable v of type T, -v is legal in Go. So we can just pass -v as the second argument of an AddT call.
  2. For a positive constant integer c, -c is illegal to be used as the second argument of an AddT call (where T denotes an unsigned integer type). We can used ^T(c-1) as the second argument instead.

This ^T(v-1) trick also works for an unsigned variable v, but ^T(v-1) is less efficient than T(-v).

In the trick ^T(c-1), if c is a typed value and its type is exactly T, then the form can shortened as ^(c-1).

Example:
package main

import (
	"fmt"
	"sync/atomic"
)

func main() {
	var (
		n uint64 = 97
		m uint64 = 1
		k int    = 2
	)
	const (
		a        = 3
		b uint64 = 4
		c uint32 = 5
		d int    = 6
	)

	show := fmt.Println
	atomic.AddUint64(&n, -m)
	show(n) // 96 (97 - 1)
	atomic.AddUint64(&n, -uint64(k))
	show(n) // 94 (96 - 2)
	atomic.AddUint64(&n, ^uint64(a - 1))
	show(n) // 91 (94 - 3)
	atomic.AddUint64(&n, ^(b - 1))
	show(n) // 87 (91 - 4)
	atomic.AddUint64(&n, ^uint64(c - 1))
	show(n) // 82 (87 - 5)
	atomic.AddUint64(&n, ^uint64(d - 1))
	show(n) // 76 (82 - 6)
	x := b; atomic.AddUint64(&n, -x)
	show(n) // 72 (76 - 4)
	atomic.AddUint64(&n, ^(m - 1))
	show(n) // 71 (72 - 1)
	atomic.AddUint64(&n, ^uint64(k - 1))
	show(n) // 69 (71 - 2)
}

A SwapT function call is like a StoreT function call, but returns the old value.

A CompareAndSwapT function call only applies the store operation when the current value matches the passed old value. The bool return result of the CompareAndSwapT function call indicates whether or not the store operation is applied.

Example:
package main

import (
	"fmt"
	"sync/atomic"
)

func main() {
	var n int64 = 123
	var old = atomic.SwapInt64(&n, 789)
	fmt.Println(n, old) // 789 123
	swapped := atomic.CompareAndSwapInt64(&n, 123, 456)
	fmt.Println(swapped) // false
	fmt.Println(n)       // 789
	swapped = atomic.CompareAndSwapInt64(&n, 789, 456)
	fmt.Println(swapped) // true
	fmt.Println(n)       // 456
}
The following is the corresponding type+methods version (since Go 1.19):
package main

import (
	"fmt"
	"sync/atomic"
)

func main() {
	var n atomic.Int64
	n.Store(123)
	var old = n.Swap(789)
	fmt.Println(n.Load(), old) // 789 123
	swapped := n.CompareAndSwap(123, 456)
	fmt.Println(swapped)  // false
	fmt.Println(n.Load()) // 789
	swapped = n.CompareAndSwap(789, 456)
	fmt.Println(swapped)  // true
	fmt.Println(n.Load()) // 456
}

Please note, up to now (Go 1.23), atomic operations for 64-bit words, a.k.a. int64 and uint64 values, require the 64-bit words must be 8-byte aligned in memory. For Go 1.19 introduced atomic method operations, this requirement is always satisfied, either on 32-bit or 64-bit architectures, but this is not true for atomic function operations on 32-bit architectures. Please read memory layout for details.

Atomic Operations for Pointers

Above has mentioned that there are four functions provided in the sync/atomic standard package to do atomic pointer operations, with the help of unsafe pointers.

From the article type-unsafe pointers, we learn that, in Go, values of any pointer type can be explicitly converted to unsafe.Pointer, and vice versa. So values of *unsafe.Pointer type can also be explicitly converted to unsafe.Pointer, and vice versa.

The following example is not a concurrent program. It just shows how to do atomic pointer operations. In this example, T can be an arbitrary type.
package main

import (
	"fmt"
	"sync/atomic"
	"unsafe"
)

type T struct {x int}

func main() {
	var pT *T
	var unsafePPT = (*unsafe.Pointer)(unsafe.Pointer(&pT))
	var ta, tb = T{1}, T{2}
	// store
	atomic.StorePointer(
		unsafePPT, unsafe.Pointer(&ta))
	fmt.Println(pT) // &{1}
	// load
	pa1 := (*T)(atomic.LoadPointer(unsafePPT))
	fmt.Println(pa1 == &ta) // true
	// swap
	pa2 := atomic.SwapPointer(
		unsafePPT, unsafe.Pointer(&tb))
	fmt.Println((*T)(pa2) == &ta) // true
	fmt.Println(pT) // &{2}
	// compare and swap
	b := atomic.CompareAndSwapPointer(
		unsafePPT, pa2, unsafe.Pointer(&tb))
	fmt.Println(b) // false
	b = atomic.CompareAndSwapPointer(
		unsafePPT, unsafe.Pointer(&tb), pa2)
	fmt.Println(b) // true
}

Yes, it is quite verbose to use the pointer atomic functions. In fact, not only are the uses verbose, they are also not protected by Go 1 compatibility guidelines, for these uses require to import the unsafe standard package.

On the contrary, the code will be much simpler and cleaner if we use the Go 1.19 introduced generic Pointer type and its methods to do atomic pointer operations, as the following code shows.

package main

import (
	"fmt"
	"sync/atomic"
)

type T struct {x int}

func main() {
	var pT atomic.Pointer[T]
	var ta, tb = T{1}, T{2}
	// store
	pT.Store(&ta)
	fmt.Println(pT.Load()) // &{1}
	// load
	pa1 := pT.Load()
	fmt.Println(pa1 == &ta) // true
	// swap
	pa2 := pT.Swap(&tb)
	fmt.Println(pa2 == &ta) // true
	fmt.Println(pT.Load())  // &{2}
	// compare and swap
	b := pT.CompareAndSwap(&ta, &tb)
	fmt.Println(b) // false
	b = pT.CompareAndSwap(&tb, &ta)
	fmt.Println(b) // true
}

More importantly, the implementation using the generic Pointer type is protected by Go 1 compatibility guidelines.

Atomic Operations for Values of Arbitrary Types

The Value type provided in the sync/atomic standard package can be used to atomically load and store values of any type.

Type *Value has several methods: Load, Store, Swap and CompareAndSwap (The latter two are introduced in Go 1.17). The input parameter types of these methods are all interface{}. So any value may be passed to the calls to these methods. But for an addressable Value value v, once the v.Store() (a shorthand of (&v).Store()) call has ever been called, then the subsequent method calls on value v must also take argument values with the same concrete type as the argument of the first v.Store() call, otherwise, panics will occur. A nil interface argument will also make the v.Store() call panic.

An example:
package main

import (
	"fmt"
	"sync/atomic"
)

func main() {
	type T struct {a, b, c int}
	var ta = T{1, 2, 3}
	var v atomic.Value
	v.Store(ta)
	var tb = v.Load().(T)
	fmt.Println(tb)       // {1 2 3}
	fmt.Println(ta == tb) // true

	v.Store("hello") // will panic
}
Another example (for Go 1.17+):
package main

import (
	"fmt"
	"sync/atomic"
)

func main() {
	type T struct {a, b, c int}
	var x = T{1, 2, 3}
	var y = T{4, 5, 6}
	var z = T{7, 8, 9}
	var v atomic.Value
	v.Store(x)
	fmt.Println(v) // {{1 2 3}}
	old := v.Swap(y)
	fmt.Println(v)       // {{4 5 6}}
	fmt.Println(old.(T)) // {1 2 3}
	swapped := v.CompareAndSwap(x, z)
	fmt.Println(swapped, v) // false {{4 5 6}}
	swapped = v.CompareAndSwap(y, z)
	fmt.Println(swapped, v) // true {{7 8 9}}
}

In fact, we can also use the atomic pointer functions explained in the last section to do atomic operations for values of any type, with one more level indirection. Both ways have their respective advantages and disadvantages. Which way should be used depends on the requirements in practice.

Memory Order Guarantee Made by Atomic Operations in Go

Please read Go memory model for details.


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