Mutex.withoutLock

[clarfonthey]

I find myself doing this pattern a lot:

mutex.withLock {
    someWork()

    mutex.unlock()
    try {
        someOtherWork(channel.receive())
    } finally {
        mutex.lock()
    }

    someMoreWork()
}

In the case of a regular Lock, I'd use a condition variable, which will automatically relinquish the lock. Unfortunately, for this case, I can't do that. It'd be nice to have a mutex.withoutLock { ... } or equivalent for this case.

[elizarov]

Why are you using a Mutex in the first place? What is your use-case?

[penn5]

This would be incredibly useful to me. For example, using recursive functions. IMO this should just be an inline function equating the the code sample in the OP. AFAIK there is no better alternative than Mutex for this use case, unless a reentrant lock is added (which was previously rejected in #1686).