Issue #17420 has been updated by Eregon (Benoit Daloze). @ko1 I believe this needs to be an exception until there is a better solution. It's likely possible to create a segfault with concurrent mutations of `$"` currently. And anyway `require` does not work in non-main Ractors, not just `$"` but many other problems (RubyGems' Monitor, any non-shareable constant accessed during loading in that Ractor, etc). ---------------------------------------- Bug #17420: Unsafe mutation of $" when doing non-RubyGems require in Ractor https://bugs.ruby-lang.org/issues/17420#change-101245 * Author: Eregon (Benoit Daloze) * Status: Open * Priority: Normal * Assignee: ko1 (Koichi Sasada) * ruby -v: ruby 3.0.0dev (2020-12-16T10:12:48Z master a9a7f4d8b8) [x86_64-linux] * Backport: 2.5: UNKNOWN, 2.6: UNKNOWN, 2.7: UNKNOWN ---------------------------------------- With an empty file `a.rb`: ``` $ ruby --disable-gems -e 'Ractor.new { puts $" }.take' -e:1:in `block in <main>': can not access global variables $" from non-main Ractors (RuntimeError) ``` That is expected, given the rules for global variables. ``` ruby --disable-gems -e 'Ractor.new { require "./a.rb"; }.take; p $"' [... , "/home/eregon/a.rb"] ``` Is it OK that the Ractor can do `require`, which does modify `$"`? I think it's not, and it might lead to segfaults if e.g. the main Ractor mutates `$"` in parallel to some other Ractor doing `require`. Probably `require` needs to be forbidden in non-main Ractors (it does mutate `$"`, so it's logical), or there needs to be always VM-global synchronization on any access to `$"` (otherwise, segfaults are possible). The latter doesn't seem reasonable, especially when considering the user might do `$".each { ... }`. --- Note that RubyGems' `require` does not work on non-main Ractors (pretty much expected given it depends on a lot of global state): ``` $ ruby -e 'Ractor.new { require "./a.rb"; }.take' <internal:/home/eregon/prefix/ruby-master/lib/ruby/3.0.0/rubygems/core_ext/kernel_require.rb>:37:in `require': can not access non-shareable objects in constant Kernel::RUBYGEMS_ACTIVATION_MONITOR by non-main ractor. (NameError) ``` This probably also has consequences for `autoload`. Maybe the `zeitwerk` gem can help with the mode to resolve all autoload at once. -- https://bugs.ruby-lang.org/