A distributed system consists of a collection of distinct processes which are spatially separated, and which com- municate with one another by exchanging messages. A network of interconnected computers, such as the ARPA Operating R. Stockton Gaines net, is a distributed system. A single computer can also Systems Editor be viewed as a distributed system in which the central control unit, the memory units, and the input-output channels are separate processes. A system is distributed Time, Clocks, and the if the message transmission delay is not negligible com- Ordering of Events in pared to the time between events in a single process. We will concern ourselves primarily with systems of spatially separated computers. However, many of our a Distributed System remarks will apply more generally. In particular, a mul- Leslie Lamport tiprocessing system on a single computer involves prob- Massachusetts Computer Associates, Inc. lems similar to those of a distributed system because of the unpredictable order in which certain events can occur. In a distributed system, it is sometimes impossible to The concept of one event happening before another say that one of two events occurred first. The relation in a distributed system is examined, and is shown to "happened before" is therefore only a partial ordering define a partial ordering of the events. A distributed of the events in the system. We have found that problems algorithm is given for synchronizing a system of logical often arise because people are not fully aware of this fact clocks which can be used to totally order the events. and its implications. The use of the total ordering is illustrated with a In this paper, we discuss the partial ordering defined method for solving synchronization problems. The by the "happened before" relation, and give a distributed algorithm is then specialized for synchronizing physical algorithm for extending it to a consistent total ordering clocks, and a bound is derived on how far out of of all the events. This algorithm can provide a useful synchrony the clocks can become. mechanism for implementing a distributed system. We Key Words and Phrases: distributed systems, illustrate its use with a simple method for solving syn- computer networks, clock synchronization, multiprocess chronization problems. Unexpected, anomalous behav- systems ior can occur if the ordering obtained by this algorithm CR Categories: 4.32, 5.29 differs from that perceived by the user. This can be avoided by introducing real, physical clocks. We describe Introduction a simple method for synchronizing these clocks, and derive an upper bound on how far out of synchrony they The concept of time is fundamental to our way of can drift. thinking. It is derived from the more basic concept of the order in which events occur. We say that something happened at 3:15 if it occurred after our clock read 3:15 The Partial Ordering and before it read 3:16. The concept of the temporal ordering of events pervades our thinking about systems. Most people would probably say that an event a For example, in an airline reservation system we specify happened before an event b if a happened at an earlier that a request for a reservation should be granted if it is time than b. They might justify this definition in terms made before the flight is filled. However, we will see that of physical theories of time. However, if a system is to this concept must be carefully reexamined when consid- meet a specification correctly, then that specification ering events in a distributed system. must be given in terms of events observable within the General permission to make fair use in teaching or research of all system. If the specification is in terms of physical time, or part of this material is granted to individual readers and to nonprofit libraries acting for them provided that ACM's copyright notice is given then the system must contain real clocks. Even if it does and that reference is made to the publication, to its date of issue, and contain real clocks, there is still the problem that such to the fact that reprinting privileges were granted by permission of the clocks are not perfectly accurate and do not keep precise Association for Computing Machinery. To otherwise reprint a figure, table, other substantial excerpt, or the entire work requires specific physical time. We will therefore define the "happened permission as does republication, or systematic or multiple reproduc- before" relation without using physical clocks. tion. We begin by defining our system more precisely. We This work was supported by the Advanced Research Projects Agency of the Department of Defense and Rome Air Development assume that the system is composed of a collection of Center. It was monitored by Rome Air Development Center under processes. Each process consists of a sequence of events. contract number F 30602-76-C-0094. Depending upon the application, the execution of a Author's address: Computer Science Laboratory, SRI Interna- tional, 333 Ravenswood Ave., Menlo Park CA 94025. subprogram on a computer could be one event, or the © 1978 ACM 0001-0782/78/0700-0558 $00.75 execution of a single machine instruction could be one
558 Communications July 1978 of Volume 21 the ACM Number 7 Fig. 1. Fig. 2. a, CY ,Y cy c~
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event. We are assuming that the events of a process form the diagram by moving forward in time along process a sequence, where a occurs before b in this sequence if and message lines. For example, we have p, --~ r4 in a happens before b. In other words, a single process is Figure 1. defined to be a set of events with an a priori total Another way of viewing the definition is to say that ordering. This seems to be what is generally meant by a a --) b means that it is possible for event a to causally process.~ It would be trivial to extend our definition to affect event b. Two events are concurrent if neither can allow a process to split into distinct subprocesses, but we causally affect the other. For example, events pa and q:~ will not bother to do so. of Figure 1 are concurrent. Even though we have drawn We assume that sending or receiving a message is an the diagram to imply that q3 occurs at an earlier physical event in a process. We can then define the "happened time than 1)3, process P cannot know what process Q did before" relation, denoted by "---~", as follows. at qa until it receives the message at p, (Before event p4, Definition. The relation "---->" on the set of events of P could at most know what Q was planning to do at q:~.) a system is the smallest relation satisfying the following This definition will appear quite natural to the reader three conditions: (1) If a and b are events in the same familiar with the invariant space-time formulation of process, and a comes before b, then a ~ b. (2) If a is the special relativity, as described for example in [1] or the sending of a message by one process and b is the receipt first chapter of [2]. In relativity, the ordering of events is of the same message by another process, then a ~ b. (3) defined in terms of messages that could be sent. However, If a ~ b and b ~ c then a ---* c. Two distinct events a we have taken the more pragmatic approach of only and b are said to be concurrent if a ~ b and b -/-* a. considering messages that actually are sent. We should We assume that a ~ a for any event a. (Systems in be able to determine if a system performed correctly by which an event can happen before itself do not seem to knowing only those events which did occur, without be physically meaningful.) This implies that ~ is an knowing which events could have occurred. irreflexive partial ordering on the set of all events in the system. It is helpful to view this definition in terms of a Logical Clocks "space-time diagram" such as Figure 1. The horizontal direction represents space, and the vertical direction We now introduce clocks into the system. We begin represents time--later times being higher than earlier with an abstract point of view in which a clock is just a ones. The dots denote events, the vertical lines denote way of assigning a number to an event, where the number processes, and the wavy lines denote messagesfl It is easy is thought of as the time at which the event occurred. to see that a ~ b means that one can go from a to b in More precisely, we define a clock Ci for each process Pi to be a function which assigns a number Ci(a) to any ' The choice of what constitutes an event affects the ordering of event a in that process. The entire system ofclbcks is events in a process. For example, the receipt of a message might denote represented by the function C which assigns to any event the setting of an interrupt bit in a computer, or the execution of a b the number C(b), where C(b) = C/(b) ifb is an event subprogram to handle that interrupt. Since interrupts need not be handled in the order that they occur, this choice will affect the order- in process Pj. For now, we make no assumption about ing of a process' message-receiving events. the relation of the numbers Ci(a) to physical time, so we 2 Observe that messages may be received out of order. We allow can think of the clocks Ci as logical rather than physical the sending of several messages to be a single event, but for convenience we will assume that the receipt of a single message does not coincide clocks. They may be implemented by counters with no with the sending or receipt of any other message. actual timing mechanism.
559 Communications July 1978 of Volume 21 the ACM Number 7 Fig. 3. condition C2 means that every message line must cross CY n¢ a tick line. From the pictorial meaning of--->, it is easy to see why these two conditions imply the Clock Con- 8 8 8 dition. c~! ~ ~iLql ~ .r 4 We can consider the tick lines to be the time coordi- nate lines of some Cartesian coordinate system on space- time. We can redraw Figure 2 to straighten these coor- dinate lines, thus obtaining Figure 3. Figure 3 is a valid alternate way of representing the same system of events as Figure 2. Without introducing the concept of physical time into the system (which requires introducing physical clocks), there is no way to decide which of these pictures is a better representation. The reader may find it helpful to visualize a two- dimensional spatial network of processes, which yields a three-dimensional space-time diagram. Processes and messages are still represented by lines, but tick lines become two-dimensional surfaces. Let us now assume that the processes are algorithms, We now consider what it means for such a system of and the events represent certain actions during their clocks to be correct. We cannot base our definition of execution. We will show how to introduce clocks into the correctness on physical time, since that would require processes which satisfy the Clock Condition. Process Pi's introducing clocks which keep physical time. Our defi- clock is represented by a register Ci, so that C~(a) is the nition must be based on the order in which events occur. value contained by C~ during the event a. The value of The strongest reasonable condition is that if an event a C~ will change between events, so changing Ci does not occurs before another event b, then a should happen at itself constitute an event. an earlier time than b. We state this condition more To guarantee that the system of clocks satisfies the formally as follows. Clock Condition, we will insure that it satisfies conditions C 1 and C2. Condition C 1 is simple; the processes need Clock Condition. For any events a, b: only obey the following implementation rule: if a---> b then C(a) < C(b). IR1. Each process P~ increments Ci between any Note that we cannot expect the converse condition to two successive events. hold as well, since that would imply that any two con- current events must occur at the same time. In Figure 1, To meet condition C2, we require that each message p2 and p.~ are both concurrent with q3, so this would m contain a timestamp Tm which equals the time at which mean that they both must occur at the same time as q.~, the message was sent. Upon receiving a message time- which would contradict the Clock Condition because p2 stamped Tin, a process must advance its clock to be later than Tin. More precisely, we have the following rule. -----> /93. It is easy to see from our definition of the relation IR2. (a) If event a is the sending of a message m "---~" that the Clock Condition is satisfied if the following by process P~, then the message m contains a timestamp two conditions hold. Tm= Ci(a). (b) Upon receiving a message m, process C 1. If a and b are events in process P~, and a comes Pi sets Ci greater than or equal to its present value and before b, then Ci(a) < Ci(b). greater than Tin. C2. If a is the sending of a message by process Pi In IR2(b) we consider the event which represents the and b is the receipt of that message by process Pi, then receipt of the message m to occur after the setting of C i. Ci(a) < Ci(b). (This is just a notational nuisance, and is irrelevant in Let us consider the clocks in terms of a space-time any actual implementation.) Obviously, IR2 insures that diagram. We imagine that a process' clock "ticks" C2 is satisfied. Hence, the simple implementation rules through every number, with the ticks occurring between IR l and IR2 imply that the Clock Condition is satisfied, the process' events. For example, if a and b are consec- so they guarantee a correct system of logical clocks. utive events in process Pi with Ci(a) = 4 and Ci(b) = 7, then clock ticks 5, 6, and 7 occur between the two events. We draw a dashed "tick line" through all the like- Ordering the Events Totally numbered ticks of the different processes. The space- time diagram of Figure 1 might then yield the picture in We can use a system of clocks satisfying the Clock Figure 2. Condition C 1 means that there must be a tick Condition to place a total ordering on the set of all line between any two events on a process line, and system events. We simply order the events by the times 560 Communications July 1978 of Volume 21 the ACM Number 7 at which they occur. To break ties, we use any arbitrary clocks with'rules IR 1 and IR2, and use them to define a total ordering < of the processes. More precisely, we total ordering ~ of all events. This provides a total define a relation ~ as follows: if a is an event in process ordering of all request and release operations. With this Pi and b is an event in process Pj, then a ~ b if and only ordering, finding a solution becomes a straightforward
if either (i) Ci{a) < Cj(b) or (ii) El(a) ----" Cj(b) and Pi exercise. It just involves making sure that each process < Py. It is easy to see that this defines a total ordering, learns about all other processes' operations. and that the Clock Condition implies that if To simplify the problem, we make some assumptions. a ----> b then a ~ b. In other words, the relation ~ is a They are not essential, but they are introduced to avoid way of completing the "happened before" partial order- distracting implementation details. We assume first of all ing to a total ordering, a that for any two processes P/and Pj, the messages sent The ordering ~ depends upon the system of clocks from Pi to Pi are received in the same order as they are Cz, and is not unique. Different choices of clocks which sent. Moreover, we assume that every message is even- satisfy the Clock Condition yield different relations ~. tually received. (These assumptions can be avoided by Given any total ordering relation ~ which extends --->, introducing message numbers and message acknowledg- there is a system of clocks satisfying the Clock Condition ment protocols.) We also assume that a process can send which yields that relation. It is only the partial ordering messages directly to every other process. which is uniquely determined by the system of events. Each process maintains its own request queue which Being able to totally order the events can be very is never seen by any other process. We assume that the useful in implementing a distributed system. In fact, the request queues initially contain the single message To:Po reason for implementing a correct system of logical requests resource, where Po is the process initially granted clocks is to obtain such a total ordering. We will illustrate the resource and To is less than the initial value of any the use of this total ordering of events by solving the clock. following version of the mutual exclusion problem. Con- The algorithm is then defined by the following five sider a system composed of a fixed collection of processes rules. For convenience, the actions defined by each rule which share a single resource. Only one process can use are assumed to form a single event. the resource at a time, so the processes must synchronize 1. To request the resource, process Pi sends the mes- themselves to avoid conflict. We wish to find an algo- sage TIn:P/requests resource to every other process, and rithm for granting the resource to a process which satis- puts that message on its request queue, where T,~ is the fies the following three conditions: (I) A process which timestamp of the message. has been granted the resource must release it before it 2. When process Pj receives the message T,~:P~ re- can be granted to another process. (II) Different requests quests resource, it places it on its request queue and sends for the resource must be granted in the order in which a (timestamped) acknowledgment message to P~.'~ they are made. (III) If every process which is granted the 3. To release the resource, process P~ removes any resource eventually releases it, then every request is Tm:Pi requests resource message from its request queue eventually granted. and sends a (timestamped) Pi releases resource message We assume that the resource is initially granted to to every other process. exactly one process. 4. When process Pj receives a Pi releases resource These are perfectly natural requirements. They pre- message, it removes any Tm:P~ requests resource message cisely specify what it means for a solution to be correct/ from its request queue. Observe how the conditions involve the ordering of 5. Process P/is granted the resource when the follow- events. Condition II says nothing about which of two ing two conditions are satisfied: (i) There is a Tm:Pi concurrently issued requests should be granted first. requests resource message in its request queue which is It is important to realize that this is a nontrivial ordered before any other request in its queue by the problem. Using a central scheduling process which grants relation ~. (To define the relation "~" for messages, requests in the order they are received will not work, we identify a message with the event of sending it.) (ii) unless additional assumptions are made. To see this, let P~ has received a message from every other process time- P0 be the scheduling process. Suppose P1 sends a request stamped later than Tin. ~ to Po and then sends a message to P2. Upon receiving the Note that conditions (i) and (ii) of rule 5 are tested latter message, Pe sends a request to Po. It is possible for locally by P~. P2's request to reach P0 before Pl's request does. Condi- It is easy to verify that the algorithm defined by these tion II is then violated if P2's request is granted first. rules satisfies conditions I-III. First of all, observe that To solve the problem, we implement a system of condition (ii) of rule 5, together with the assumption that messages are received in order, guarantees that P~ has ;~ The ordering < establishes a priority among the processes. If a "fairer" method is desired, then < can be made a function of the clock learned about all requests which preceded its current value. For example, if Ci(a) = C/b) andj < L then we can let a ~ b ifj < C~(a) mod N --< i, and b ~ a otherwise; where N is the total '~ This acknowledgment message need not be sent if Pj has already number of processes. sent a message to Pi timestamped later than T.... 4 The term "eventually" should be made precise, but that would " If P, -< Pi, then Pi need only have received a message timestamped require too long a diversion from our main topic. _> T,,, from P/. 561 Communications July 1978 of Volume 21 the ACM Number 7 request. Since rules 3 and 4 are the only ones which Anomalous Behavior delete messages from the request queue, it is then easy to see that condition I holds. Condition II follows from the Our resource scheduling algorithm ordered the re- fact that the total ordering ~ extends the partial ordering quests according to the total ordering =*. This permits ---~. Rule 2 guarantees that after Pi requests the resource, the following type of "anomalous behavior." Consider a condition (ii) of rule 5 will eventually hold. Rules 3 and nationwide system of interconnected computers. Suppose 4 imply that if each process which is granted the resource a person issues a request A on a computer A, and then eventually releases it, then condition (i) of rule 5 will telephones a friend in another city to have him issue a eventually hold, thus proving condition III. request B on a different computer B. It is quite possible This is a distributed algorithm. Each process inde- for request B to receive a lower timestamp and be ordered pendently follows these rules, and there is no central before request A. This can happen because the system synchronizing process or central storage. This approach has no way of knowing that A actually preceded B, since can be generalized to implement any desired synchroni- that precedence informatiori is based on messages exter- zation for such a distributed multiprocess system. The nal to the system. synchronization is specified in terms of a State Machine, Let us examine the source of the problem more consisting of a set C of possible commands, a set S of closely. Let O° be the set of all system events. Let us possible states, and a function e: C× S--~ S. The relation introduce a set of events which contains the events in b° e(C, S) -- S' means that executing the command C with together with all other relevant external events, such as the machine in state S causes the machine state to change the phone calls in our example. Let ~ denote the "hap- to S'. In our example, the set C consists of all the pened before" relation for ~. In our example, we had A commands Pi requests resource and P~ releases resource, B, but A-~ B. It is obvious that no algorithm based and the state consists of a queue of waiting request entirely upon events in 0 °, and which does not relate commands, where the request at the head of the queue those events in any way with the other events in~, can is the currently granted one. Executing a request com- guarantee that request A is ordered before request B. mand adds the request to the tail of the queue, and There are two possible ways to avoid such anomalous executing a release command removes a command from behavior. The first way is to explicitly introduce into the 'he queue. 7 system the necessary information about the ordering Each process independently simulates the execution --~. In our example, the person issuing request A could of the State Machine, using the commands issued by all receive the timestamp TA of that request from the system. the processes. Synchronization is achieved because all When issuing request B, his friend could specify that B processes order the commands according to their time- be given a timestamp later than TA. This gives the user stamps (using the relation ~), so each process uses the the responsibility for avoiding anomalous behavior. same sequence of commands. A process can execute a The second approach is to construct a system of command timestamped T when it has learned of all clocks which satisfies the following condition. commands issued by all other processes with timestamps Strong Clock Condition. For any events a, b in O°: less than or equal to T. The precise algorithm is straight- ifa --~ b then C(a} < C(b). forward, and we will not bother to describe it. This method allows one to implement any desired This is stronger than the ordinary Clock Condition be- form of multiprocess synchronization in a distributed cause ~ is a stronger relation than ---~. It is not in general system. However, the resulting algorithm requires the satisfied by our logical clocks. active participation of all the processes. A process must Let us identify ~ with some set of "real" events in know all the commands issued by other processes, so physical space-time, and let ~ be the partial ordering of that the failure of a single process will make it impossible events defined by special relativity. One of the mysteries for any other process to execute State Machine com- of the universe is that it is possible to construct a system mands, thereby halting the system. of physical clocks which, running quite independently of The problem of failure is a difficult one, and it is one another, will satisfy the Strong Clock Condition. We beyond the scope of this paper to discuss it in any detail. can therefore use physical clocks to eliminate anomalous We will just observe that the entire concept of failure is behavior. We now turn our attention to such clocks. only meaningful in the context of physical time. Without physical time, there is no way to distinguish a failed process from one which is just pausing between events. Physical Clocks A user can tell that a system has "crashed" only because he has been waiting too long for a response. A method Let us introduce a physical time coordinate into our which works despite the failure of individual processes space-time picture, and let Ci(t) denote the reading of the clock Ci at physical time t. 8 For mathematical con- or communication lines is described in [3]. We will assume a Newtonian space-time. If the relative motion 7 If each process does not strictly alternate request and release of the clocks or gravitational effects are not negligible, then CM) must commands, then executing a release command could delete zero, one, be deduced from the actual clock reading by transforming from proper or more than one request from the queue. time to the arbitrarily chosen time coordinate.
562 Communications July 1978 of Volume 2 l the ACM Number 7 venience, we assume that the clocks run continuously We now describe our algorithm for insuring that PC2 rather than in discrete "ticks." (A discrete clock can be holds. Let m be a message which is sent at physical time
thought of as a continuous one in which there is an error t and received at time t'. We define l,m ~- t t -- I to be the of up to ½ "tick" in reading it.) More precisely, we total delay of the message m. This delay will, of course, assume that Ci(t) is a continuous, differentiable function not be known to the process which receives m. However, of t except for isolated jump discontinuities where the we assume that the receiving process knows some mini- clock is reset. Then dCg(t)/dt represents the rate at which mum delay tzm >_ 0 such that ~£m ~ Pro. We call ~,, = I,m the clock is running at time t. -- #m the unpredictable delay of the message. In order for the clock Cg to be a true physical clock, We now specialize rules IRI and 2 for our physical it must run at approximately the correct rate. That is, we clocks as follows: must have dCi(t)/dt -~ 1 for all t. More precisely, we will IR 1'. For each i, if Pi does not receive a message at assume that the following condition is satisfied: physical time t, then C/is differentiable at t and dCg(t)/dt >0. PCI. There exists a constant x << 1 IR2'. (a) If Pg sends a message m at physical time t, such that for all i: [dCg(t)/dt - 1 [ < x. then m contains a timestamp Tm= C/(t). (b) Upon For typical crystal controlled clocks, x _< 10 -(~. receiving a message m at time t', process P/ sets C/(t') It is not enough for the clocks individually to run at equal to maximum (Cj(t' - 0), Tm + /Zm). 9 approximately the correct rate. They must be synchro- Although the rules are formally specified in terms of nized so that Cg(t) = C/(t) for all i,j, and t. More precisely, the physical time parameter, a process only needs to there must be a sufficiently small constant e so that the know its own clock reading and the timestamps of mes- following condition holds: sages it receives. For mathematical convenience, we are PC2. For all i, j: [ Ci(t) - Cy(t)[ < •. assuming that each event occurs at a precise instant of physical time, and different events in the same process If we consider vertical distance in Figure 2 to represent occur at different times. These rules are then specializa- physical time, then PC2 states that the variation in height tions of rules IR1 and IR2, so our system of clocks of a single tick line is less than E. satisfies the Clock Condition. The fact that real events Since two different clocks will never run at exactly have a finite duration causes no difficulty in implement- the same rate, they will tend to drift further and further ing the algorithm. The only real concern in the imple- apart. We must therefore devise an algorithm to insure mentation is making sure that the discrete clock ticks are that PC2 always holds. First, however, let us examine frequent enough so C 1 is maintained. how small x and • must be to prevent anomalous behav- We now show that this clock synchronizing algorithm ior. We must insure that the system 5e of relevant physical can be used to satisfy condition PC2. We assume that events satisfies the Strong Clock Condition. We assume the system of processes is described by a directed graph that our clocks satisfy the ordinary Clock Condition, so in which an arc from process Pi to process P/represents we need only require that the Strong Clock Condition a communication line over which messages are sent holds when a and b are events in 0 ° with a 4-> b. directly from Pi to P/. We say that a message is sent over Hence, we need only consider events occurring in differ- this arc every T seconds if for any t, Pi sends at least one ent processes. message to P/between physical times t and t + -r. The Let # be a number such that if event a occurs at diameter of the directed graph is the smallest number d physical time t and event b in another process satisfies such that for any pair of distinct processes P/, Pk, there a ~ b, then b occurs later than physical time t + bt. In is a path from P/to P~ having at most d arcs. other words,/~ is less than the shortest transmission time In addition to establishing PC2, the following theo- for interprocess messages. We can always choose # equal rem bounds the length of time it can take the clocks to to the shortest distance between processes divided by the become synchronized when the system is first started. speed of light. However, depending upon how messages THEOREM. Assume a strongly connected graph of in ~ are transmitted, # could be significantly larger. processes with diameter d which always obeys rules IR 1' To avoid anomalous behavior, we must make sure and IR2'. Assume that for any message m, #m --< # for that for any i, j, and t: Ci(t + #) - CAt) > 0. Combining some constant g, and that for all t > to: (a) PC 1 holds. this with PC I and 2 allows us to relate the required (b) There are constants ~" and ~ such that every ~- seconds smallness of x and ~ to the value of # as follows. We a message with an unpredictable delay less than ~ is sent assume that when a clock is reset, it is always set forward over every arc. Then PC2 is satisfied with • = d(2x~- + and never back. (Setting it back could cause C I to be ~) for all t > to + Td, where the approximations assume violated.) PCI then implies that Cg(t + #) - Cg(t) > (1 # + ~<< z. - x)#. Using PC2, it is then easy to deduce that Cg(t + The proof of this theorem is surprisingly difficult, #) - C/(t) > 0 if the following inequality holds: and is given in the Appendix. There has been a great E/(I - ~) _< ~. deal of work done on the problem of synchronizing This inequality together with PC 1 and PC2 implies that physical clocks. We refer the reader to [4] for an intro- anomalous behavior is impossible. :) C/(t' - 0) = lim C,(t' - 181).
563 Communications July 1978 of Volume 21 the ACM Number 7 duction to the subject. The methods described in the ti+l, to <-- t~, and that at time t[ process Pi sends a message literature are useful for estimating the message delays to process Pi+l which is received at time ti+l with an ktm and for adjusting the clock frequencies dCi/dt (for unpredictable delay less than 4. Then repeated applica- clocks which permit such an adjustment). However, the tion of the inequality (3) yields the following result for requirement that clocks are never set backwards seems t >_ tn+l. to distinguish our situation from ones previously studied, Ct~t(t) --> Cl(tl') + (1 - ~)(t - tl') - n~. (4) and we believe this theorem to be a new result. From PC1, IRI' and 2' we deduce that
Cl(/l') >" Cl(tl) + (1 -- K)(tl' -- /1). Conclusion Combining this with (4) and using (2), we get We have seen that the concept of "happening before" Cn+a(t) > C~(tl) + (1 - x)(t - t~) - n~ (5) defines an invariant partial ordering of the events in a distributed multiprocess system. We described an algo- for t > tn+l. rithm for extending that partial ordering to a somewhat For any two processes P and P', we can find a arbitrary total ordering, and showed how this total or- sequence of processes P -- Po, P~ ..... Pn+~ = P', n _< d, dering can be used to solve a simple synchronization with communication arcs from each Pi to Pi+~. By hy- problem. A future paper will show how this approach pothesis (b) we can find times ti, t[ with t[ - ti <- T and can be extended to solve any synchronization problem. ti+l - t" <_ v, where v = # + 4. Hence, an inequality of The total ordering defined by the algorithm is some- the form (5) holds with n <_ d whenever t >_ t~ + d('r + what arbitrary. It can produce anomalous behavior if it v). For any i, j and any t, tl with tl > to and t ___ t~ + d(z disagrees with the ordering perceived by the system's + v) we therefore have: users. This can be prevented by the use of properly Ci(t) _> Cj(ta) + (1 - x)(t - tx) - d~. (6) synchronized physical clocks. Our theorem showed how closely the clocks can be synchronized. Now let m be any message timestamped Tin, and In a distributed system, it is important to realize that suppose it is sent at time t and received at time t'. We the order in which events occur is only a partial ordering. pretend that m has a clock Cm which runs at a constant We believe that this idea is useful in understanding any rate such that C,~(t) = tm and Cm(t') = tm +/~m. Then multiprocess system. It should help one to understand #0, ___ t' - t implies that dCm/dt _< 1. Rule IR2' (b) simply the basic problems of multiprocessing independently of sets Cj(t') to maximum (Cj(t' - 0), Cm(t')). Hence, clocks the mechanisms used to solve them. are reset only by setting them equal to other clocks. For any time tx >-- to +/~/(1 - ~), let Cx be the clock Appendix having the largest value at time t~. Since all clocks run at a rate less than 1 + x, we have for all i and all t >_ tx:
Proof of the Theorem Ci(t) _< Cx(tx) + (1 + x)(t - tx). (7) For any i and t, let us define C~t to be a clock which is set equal to C~ at time t and runs at the same rate as We now consider the following two cases: (i) Cx is the Ci, but is never reset. In other words, clock Cq of process Pq. (ii) Cx is the clock Cm of a message sent at time ta by process Pq. In case (i), (7) simply becomes Cit(t ') = Ci(t) + [dCz(t)/dtldt (1) El(t) -< Cq(tx) + (1 + x)(t - tx). (8i)
In case (ii), since Cm(tx) = Cq(tl) and dCm/dt _ 1, we for all t' >_ t. Note that have Ci(t') >_ Cit(t ') for all t' >__ t. (2) Cx(tx) <_ Cq(tl) + (tx - tO. Suppose process P~ at time tl sends a message to process Pz which is received at time t2 with an unpre- Hence, (7) yields dictable delay _< ~, where to <- ta _< t2. Then for all t ___ t2 Ci(t) <-~ Cq(/1) + (1 + K)(t -- /1). (8ii) we have: Since tx >-- to + ~t/(1 -- X), we get C~(t) >_ C~(t2) + (1 - x)(t - t2) [by (1) and PCI] > Cfftl) +/~m + (1 -- x)(t -- t2) [by IR2' (b)] Cq(tx -- ~/(1 -- K)) <_ Cq(tx) - ~ [by PCI] ___ Cm(tx) -/z [by choice of m] = Cl(tl) + (1 - x)(t - tl) - [(t2 - tO - ~m] + x(t2 - t,) >-- Cl(tl) + (1 - x)(t - tl) - 4. -< Cm(tx) - (tx - tl)#m/Vm [tXm <-- r.t, tx - tl <_ v,,] =Tm [by definition of Cm] Hence, with these assumptions, for all t >_ t2 we have: = Cq(tl) [by IR2'(a)].
C~(t) _> Cl(tl) + (1 - x)(t -/1) -- 4" (3) Hence, Cq(tx -/L/(1 - x)) ___ Cq(tl), so tx - tl <-/x/(l - NOW suppose that for i = 1, ..., n we have t, _< t ~, < ~) and thus ll ~ to.
564 Communications July 1978 of Volume 21 the ACM Number 7 Letting tl = tx in case (i)~ we can combine (8i) and (8ii) to deduce that for any t, tx with t _> tx _> to + #/ (1 - x) there is a process Pq and a time tl with tx - #/ (1 - i¢) ~ tl "< tx such that for all i:
Ci(t) _< Cq(t~) + (1 + x)(t - h). (9) Programming J.J. Homing Languages Editor Choosing t and tx with t _ tx + d(r + ~,), we can combine (6) and (9) to conclude that there exists a tl and a process Shallow Binding in Pq such that for all i:
Cq(t 0 + (1 - x)(t - tl) - d~ -< Ci(t) (10) Lisp 1.5 <: Cq(tl) + (1 + tc)(t - t]) Henry G. Baker, Jr. Letting t = t~ + d(r + u), we get Massachusetts Institute of Technology d(r+p)__.t-tl_
Acknowledgment. The use of timestamps to order operations, and the concept of anomalous behavior are due to Paul Johnson and Robert Thomas.
Received March 1976; revised October 1977
References General permission to make fair use in teaching or research of all 1. Schwartz, J.T. Relativity in lllustrations. New York U. Press, New or part of this material is granted to individual readers and to nonprofit York, 1962. libraries acting for them provided that ACM's copyright notice is given 2. Taylor, E.F., and Wheeler, J.A. Space-Time Physics, W.H. and that reference is made to the publication, to its date of issue, and Freeman, San Francisco, 1966. to the fact that reprinting privileges were granted by permission of the 3. Lamport, L. The implementation of reliable distributed Association for Computing Machinery. To otherwise reprint a figure, multiprocess systems. To appear in Computer Networks. table, other substantial excerpt, or the entire work requires specific 4. Ellingson, C, and Kulpinski, R.J. Dissemination of system-time. permission as does republication, or systematic or multiple reproduc- 1EEE Trans. Comm. Com-23, 5 (May 1973), 605-624. tion. This research was supported by the Advanced Research Projects Agency of the Department of Defense and was monitored by the Office of Naval Research under contract number N00014-75-C-0522. Author's present address: Computer Science Department, Univer- sity of Rochester, Rochester, NY 14627. © 1978 ACM 0001-0782/78/0700-0565 $00.75
565 Communications July 1978 of Volume 21 the ACM Number 7