java.util.BitSet and synchronization

[Bryce McKinlay]

The JCL supplement book says that the BitSet class is now not
synchronized, however "all boolean operations that operate on two bit
sets still properly handle the case where both bit sets are the same
object". Does anyone know what this above statement means? Does this
imply that these operations are supposed to synchronize on their
argument bitset?

The existing classpath implementation is heavily synchronized, with
multiple locks and explicit lock ordering on the boolean operation
methods.  Right now I'm inclined to go with libgcj's completely
unsynchronized implementation, given the risk of deadlocks when the
locks are unordered.

  [ bryce ]