[GHC] #10840: Periodic alarm signals can cause a retry loop to get stuck

[GHC]

#10840: Periodic alarm signals can cause a retry loop to get stuck
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        Reporter:  Rufflewind        |                Owner:
            Type:  bug               |               Status:  new
        Priority:  normal            |            Milestone:
       Component:  Compiler          |              Version:  7.10.2
      Resolution:                    |             Keywords:
Operating System:  Unknown/Multiple  |         Architecture:
                                     |  Unknown/Multiple
 Type of failure:  None/Unknown      |            Test Case:
      Blocked By:                    |             Blocking:
 Related Tickets:                    |  Differential Rev(s):
       Wiki Page:                    |
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Comment (by hsyl20):

 On Mac OS, you can try to enable USE_PTHREAD_FOR_ITIMER in
 rts/posix/Itimer.c to make the RTS avoid using alarm signals. Maybe we
 should make it a flag (or the default) for the threaded RTS?

 On Linux the same problem may occur. We can use the same solution and even
 improve it by using the timerfd_* syscalls instead of usleep (cf the
 following attachment).

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Ticket URL: <http://ghc.haskell.org/trac/ghc/ticket/10840#comment:4>
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