Producer-Consumer Problem

This project implements the classic Producer-Consumer synchronization problem using shared memory, semaphores, and threads in C. The producer generates items and places them on a shared table, while the consumer picks them up. The table can only hold two items at a time, requiring synchronization.

To run the producer and consumer:

./producer & ./consumer &

The producer generates a fixed set of items and places them on the shared table. The consumer picks up and consumes these items.

Testing

The project includes several test scripts located in the tests/ folder:

repeatTest.sh – Runs the producer and consumer multiple times and checks against expected output.

stressTest.sh – Tests the program under a high load.

testMultipleThreads.sh – Tests the program with multiple producer and consumer threads.

To execute tests, use:

./tests/repeatTest.sh <num_threads> ./tests/stressTest.sh ./tests/testMultipleThreads.sh

Expected Output

A successful run should produce logs similar to:

Table slot 1 empty. Produce 0xdead Table slot 2 empty. Produce 0xhell Table slot 1 full. Consume 0xisha Table slot 1 empty. Produce 0xmama Table slot 1 full. Consume 0xb0ba Table slot 1 empty. Produce 0xbaby Table slot 1 full. Consume 0xbabe ... Table slot 1 full. Consume 0xfunc Table slot 1 empty. Produce 0xmama Table slot 1 full. Consume 0xdad Table slot 1 empty. Produce 0xc0de Table slot 1 full. Consume 0xc0de Table slot 1 empty. Produce 0xface Table slot 1 full. Consume 0xtail Table slot 1 empty. Produce 0xred Table slot 1 full. Consume 0xhead Table slot 1 empty. Produce 0xcab0 Table slot 1 full. Consume 0xduzz Table slot 2 full. Consume 0xdiya

Cleanup

To remove compiled binaries and logs, use:

make clean

Contributors

Isha Gupta