Here are the things you need to know if you want to succeed this assignment:
• One or more philosophers sit at a round table. There is a large bowl of spaghetti in the middle of the table.
• The philosophers alternatively eat, think, or sleep. While they are eating, they are not thinking nor sleeping; while thinking, they are not eating nor sleeping; and, of course, while sleeping, they are not eating nor thinking.
• There are also forks on the table. There are as many forks as philosophers.
• Because serving and eating spaghetti with only one fork is very inconvenient, a philosopher takes their right and their left forks to eat, one in each hand.
• When a philosopher has finished eating, they put their forks back on the table and start sleeping. Once awake, they start thinking again. The simulation stops when a philosopher dies of starvation.
• Every philosopher needs to eat and should never starve.
• Philosophers don’t speak with each other.
• Philosophers don’t know if another philosopher is about to die.
• No need to say that philosophers should avoid dying!
You have to write a program for the mandatory part and another one for the bonus part (if you decide to do the bonus part). They both have to comply with the following rules:
• Global variables are forbidden!
• Your(s) program(s) should take the following arguments: number_of_philosophers time_to_die time_to_eat time_to_sleep [number_of_times_each_philosopher_must_eat]
◦ number_of_philosophers: The number of philosophers and also the number
of forks.
◦ time_to_die (in milliseconds): If a philosopher didn’t start eating time_to_die
milliseconds since the beginning of their last meal or the beginning of the simulation, they die.
◦ time_to_eat (in milliseconds): The time it takes for a philosopher to eat.
During that time, they will need to hold two forks.
◦ time_to_sleep (in milliseconds): The time a philosopher will spend sleeping.
◦ number_of_times_each_philosopher_must_eat (optional argument): If all
philosophers have eaten at least number_of_times_each_philosopher_must_eat
times, the simulation stops. If not specified, the simulation stops when a
philosopher dies.
• Each philosopher has a number ranging from 1 to number_of_philosophers.
• Philosopher number 1 sits next to philosopher number number_of_philosophers. Any other philosopher number N sits between philosopher number N - 1 and philosopher number N + 1.
Each philosopher should be a thread.
• There is one fork between each pair of philosophers. Therefore, if there are several philosophers, each philosopher has a fork on their left side and a fork on their right side. If there is only one philosopher, there should be only one fork on the table.
• To prevent philosophers from duplicating forks, you should protect the forks state with a mutex for each of them.