What is the difference between deadlock prevention and deadlock avoidance?

The key difference between deadlock prevention and deadlock avoidance lies in their approaches to handling deadlock situations in operating systems. Deadlock prevention focuses on proactively avoiding deadlock by implementing resource allocation strategies and system design techniques that eliminate the possibility of deadlock occurrence. On the other hand, deadlock avoidance aims to reactively resolve deadlock situations after they occur by detecting them and taking appropriate actions, such as preempting resources or terminating processes to break the deadlock. While prevention aims to stop deadlock from happening in the first place, avoidance deals with managing deadlocks if they occur, making them complementary strategies in ensuring system stability and resource utilization efficiency.