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The pthreads library in glibc 2.1 uses only one "next" pointer in the thread descriptor -- with the assumption that a thread will only be queued for one thing at a time. The CV (condition variable) code, however, uses a queue for threads waiting on a CV, and uses a lock for synchronizing this queue. The lock uses a queue when there is contention, so a thread can end up sitting on a CV queue, and attempting to get a lock (to remove itself from the CV queue), but queueing on the lock. The URL points to a program (swarm.c) that will duplicate the bug on 2-CPU machines (tweak the #define's for a 4-way) by creating 20 threads that keep waiting 1 second on a single CV. Every second, all 20 threads dequeue from the CV and then requeue. The URL also points to a patch (patch.glibc) for the linuxthreads library to fix this bug. It adds a second "next" pointer to the thread descriptor so that a thread can be queued for some event (like a CV) and also queue on a lock for internal synchronization. I have also emailed this patch to Ulrich Drepper <drepper> of the glibc team.
since you can't see the url in the normal bug printout (why?), i'll echo it here: http://www.lag.net/~robey/pthreads/
Fixed in glibc-2.1.2-1, available from rawhide shortly