Why GIL? (was Re: what's the point of rpython?)

[Paul Rubin]

Carl Banks <pavlovevidence at gmail.com> writes:
> 3. If you are going to use the low-level API on a mutable object, or
> are going to access the object structure directly, you need to acquire
> the object's mutex. Macros such as Py_LOCK(), Py_LOCK2(), Py_UNLOCK()
> would be provided.

You mean every time you access a list or dictionary or class instance,
you have to acquire a mutex?  That sounds like a horrible slowdown.