[erlang-questions] Erlang way for process-as-library?

[Robert Virding]

Torbjorn Tornkvist wrote:
> Either let the users of the library start it with
> a start function or you could let every function
> do it automatically. Example:
> 
> start() ->
>   case whereis(my_service) of
>     Pid when pid(Pid) -> Pid
>     _ -> spawn(my_mod, my_server, [])
>   end.

That start function is not safe, especially on an SMP system. You could 
get two rocesses running start simultaneously both not finding the 
server and both trying to start it.

Robert