When a resource is available to more than one process but can only be used by one of them at a time, it is necessary for a process to use a "lock" that would prevent another process from accessing the resource simultaneously. If such a resource has...

A mechanism for securing a door or window in which the TENON of the lock can only be withdrawn from the MORTISE by means of a key. The tenon cannot be pushed back into the lock as can the type that is...

A deadlock is a situation wherein two or more competing actions are waiting for the other to finish, and thus neither ever does. It is often seen in a paradox like 'the chicken or the...

In his 1963 book, "The Deadlock of Democracy," the historian James MacGregor Burns complained of too much fragmentation in American politics. Presidents couldn't enact their programs because it was too hard to assemble congressional majorities. Party loyalties were too weak; single-minded interest groups were...

WHILE THE Clinton administration celebrates potential peace between Syria and Israel, a rather scarier threat to regional stability becomes increasingly alarming. Iraq's dictator, Saddam Hussein, is successfully staving off attempts at the United Nations to reinstate weapons inspectors in his country. One year ago,...

The Republican presidential race is so unsettled that some party officials are openly talking of a scenario that seemed almost unthinkable until now: the first contested GOP convention in 60 years.Even if Republicans choose a nominee before they convene in Minneapolis-St. Paul on Sept. 1,...

Serbian and ethnic Albanian negotiators remain deadlocked on the heart of a U.N. plan that would put the restive Serbian province of Kosovo on the road to eventual independence, a U.N. special envoy said Wednesday.Martti Ahtisaari, who drafted the proposal on the future status of...