axiom-synchronization

You can protect shared mutable state in Swift without actors by using synchronization primitives like Mutex, OSAllocatedUnfairLock, or Atomic types to manage concurrent access with lower overhead than actors.

The best way to update a high-frequency counter concurrently in Swift is to apply Atomic types or Mutex locks, which prevent data races while offering low-latency, lock-free or fine-grained operations compared to standard actor isolation.

You should use OSAllocatedUnfairLock instead of Swift actors for performance-critical sections requiring microsecond-level operations, as actors introduce too much overhead for high-frequency updates and fine-grained locking requirements.

Yes, you can perform lock-free operations on shared state in Swift by using Atomic types, which provide safe cross-concurrency sharing and prevent data races without the scheduling overhead of actors or traditional locking mechanisms.

The limitations of using low-level synchronization primitives in Swift include increased complexity in managing fine-grained locking manually, requiring careful implementation to avoid deadlocks while ensuring safe concurrent access across shared mutable state.