正如这里许多人提到的，互斥锁用于保护关键代码段(又名临界段)。你将在同一个线程中获得互斥锁(lock)，进入临界区，释放互斥锁(unlock)。

在使用信号量时，您可以让一个线程(例如线程a)等待一个信号量，直到另一个线程(例如线程B)完成任何任务，然后为线程a设置信号量以停止等待，并继续其任务。

在Windows上，互斥量和二进制信号量之间有两个区别:

互斥锁只能由拥有所有权的线程释放，即之前调用Wait函数的线程(或在创建互斥锁时获得所有权的线程)。任何线程都可以释放信号量。 线程可以在互斥锁上重复调用等待函数而不会阻塞。但是，如果你在一个二进制信号量上调用了两次等待函数，而中间没有释放信号量，线程就会阻塞。

虽然二进制信号量可以用作互斥量，但互斥量是一个更具体的用例，因为只有锁定了互斥量的进程才应该解锁它。这种所有权限制使我们有可能对以下情况提供保护:

意外释放 递归死锁 任务死亡死锁

这些限制并不总是存在，因为它们降低了速度。在代码开发期间，您可以暂时启用这些检查。

例如，你可以在互斥锁中启用错误检查属性。错误检查互斥量返回EDEADLK，如果你试图锁定同一个互斥量两次，如果你解锁了一个不是你的互斥量，返回EPERM。

pthread_mutex_t mutex;
pthread_mutexattr_t attr;
pthread_mutexattr_init (&attr);
pthread_mutexattr_settype (&attr, PTHREAD_MUTEX_ERRORCHECK_NP);
pthread_mutex_init (&mutex, &attr);

一旦初始化，我们可以将这些检查放在我们的代码中，就像这样:

if(pthread_mutex_unlock(&mutex)==EPERM)
 printf("Unlock failed:Mutex not owned by this thread\n");

除了互斥对象有一个所有者之外，这两个对象还可以针对不同的用途进行优化。互斥锁被设计为只保留很短的时间;违反这一点会导致糟糕的性能和不公平的调度。例如，一个正在运行的线程可能被允许获取一个互斥量，即使另一个线程已经被阻塞在这个线程上。信号量可以提供更多的公平性，或者可以使用几个条件变量强制实现公平性。

互斥锁

Until recently, the only sleeping lock in the kernel was the semaphore. Most users of semaphores instantiated a semaphore with a count of one and treated them as a mutual exclusion lock—a sleeping version of the spin-lock. Unfortunately, semaphores are rather generic and do not impose any usage constraints. This makes them useful for managing exclusive access in obscure situations, such as complicated dances between the kernel and userspace. But it also means that simpler locking is harder to do, and the lack of enforced rules makes any sort of automated debugging or constraint enforcement impossible. Seeking a simpler sleeping lock, the kernel developers introduced the mutex.Yes, as you are now accustomed to, that is a confusing name. Let’s clarify.The term “mutex” is a generic name to refer to any sleeping lock that enforces mutual exclusion, such as a semaphore with a usage count of one. In recent Linux kernels, the proper noun “mutex” is now also a specific type of sleeping lock that implements mutual exclusion.That is, a mutex is a mutex.

互斥锁的简单性和效率来自于它在信号量要求之外强加给用户的附加约束。信号量是按照Dijkstra的原始设计来实现最基本的行为，而互斥锁则不同，它的用例更严格、更窄: n一次只能有一个任务持有互斥锁。也就是说，互斥锁的使用计数总是1。

Whoever locked a mutex must unlock it. That is, you cannot lock a mutex in one context and then unlock it in another. This means that the mutex isn’t suitable for more complicated synchronizations between kernel and user-space. Most use cases, however, cleanly lock and unlock from the same context. Recursive locks and unlocks are not allowed. That is, you cannot recursively acquire the same mutex, and you cannot unlock an unlocked mutex. A process cannot exit while holding a mutex. A mutex cannot be acquired by an interrupt handler or bottom half, even with mutex_trylock(). A mutex can be managed only via the official API: It must be initialized via the methods described in this section and cannot be copied, hand initialized, or reinitialized.

[1] Linux内核开发，第三版Robert Love

I think most of the answers here were confusing especially those saying that mutex can be released only by the process that holds it but semaphore can be signaled by ay process. The above line is kind of vague in terms of semaphore. To understand we should know that there are two kinds of semaphore one is called counting semaphore and the other is called a binary semaphore. In counting semaphore handles access to n number of resources where n can be defined before the use. Each semaphore has a count variable, which keeps the count of the number of resources in use, initially, it is set to n. Each process that wishes to uses a resource performs a wait() operation on the semaphore (thereby decrementing the count). When a process releases a resource, it performs a release() operation (incrementing the count). When the count becomes 0, all the resources are being used. After that, the process waits until the count becomes more than 0. Now here is the catch only the process that holds the resource can increase the count no other process can increase the count only the processes holding a resource can increase the count and the process waiting for the semaphore again checks and when it sees the resource available it decreases the count again. So in terms of binary semaphore, only the process holding the semaphore can increase the count, and count remains zero until it stops using the semaphore and increases the count and other process gets the chance to access the semaphore.

二进制信号量和互斥量之间的主要区别在于，信号量是一种信号机制，而互斥量是一种锁定机制，但二进制信号量的功能似乎与互斥量类似，这造成了混乱，但两者是适用于不同类型工作的不同概念。