Java Semaphore - permit granted without prior release - java

I'm writing this question because we faced an scenario in one of the qa environments where it seems like the semaphore failed.
We have only one semaphore:
private Semaphore lock = new Semaphore(1);
It happened that one thread (Quartz job) was running, holding the lock acquired, and then, another job was triggered and got in the middle of the execution.
Both jobs acquire and then release the lock, so if the first one gets delayed, the latter has to wait for the lock to be released by the first one.
The weird part is that the latter didn't wait, it just passed through the lock.acquire()
Scenario it's not complex at all, and the code has been working since the very beginning. We weren't able to recreate it so far, I'm clueless. A glitch maybe?
I'm wondering if someone knows if there is a kind of known incompatibility between Quartz and Java Semaphores, or if Java semaphores could fail under certain scenarios
EDIT
One more detail, it's an app built on Deltaspike CDI framework
This is the Singleton for handling the lock:
import java.util.concurrent.Semaphore;
public class Lock {
private Lock() {}
private static class SingletonHolder {
public static final Lock INSTANCE = new Lock();
}
/**
* Use this method to get a reference to the singleton instance of
* {#link Lock}
*
* #return the singleton instance
*/
public static Lock getInstance() {
return SingletonHolder.INSTANCE;
}
/**
* we allow only one thread at at time
*/
private Semaphore lock = new Semaphore(1);
public void getLock() throws InterruptedException {
lock.acquire();
}
public void releaseLock() {
lock.release();
}
}
This is the first job:
#Scheduled(cronExpression = "{cronExp1}")
public class Job1 implements Job {
#Override
public void execute(JobExecutionContext jobExecutionContext) throws JobExecutionException {
method1();
}
public void method1(){
long threadId = Thread.currentThread().getId();
try{
logger.debug("Thread # " + threadId + "Requesting lock...");
Lock.getInstance().getLock();
logger.debug("Thread # " + threadId + "Lock acquired.");
//...some logic
}catch (PersistenceException e) {
//.. handling exception
}catch (Exception e) {
//.. handling exception
}finally {
Lock.getInstance().releaseLock();
logger.debug("Thread # " + threadId + "Lock released.");
}
}
}
This is the second job:
#Scheduled(cronExpression = "{cronExp2}")
public class Job2 implements Job {
#Override
public void execute(JobExecutionContext jobExecutionContext) throws JobExecutionException {
long threadId = Thread.currentThread().getId();
try{
logger.debug("Thread # " + threadId + "Requesting lock...");
Lock.getInstance().getLock();
logger.debug("Thread # " + threadId + "Lock acquired.");
//...some logic
}catch (PersistenceException e) {
//.. handling exception
}catch (Exception e) {
//.. handling exception
}finally {
Lock.getInstance().releaseLock();
logger.debug("Thread # " + threadId + "Lock released.");
}
}
}
As you can see, the only difference between the jobs (other than the logic), is that Job1 enters the critical zone inside method1, while Job2 does in inside the execute method

Related

Spring controller how to serve only 1 request each time, and discard other requests received for the same method until first request has finished

So as the title describes I want to achieve the following
#Controller
public class ImportController {
#RequestMapping(value = "/{File}", method = RequestMethod.GET)
#LogAware
public String import(#PathVariable(value = "File") String excel, Model model) {
try {
synchronized (this) {
//code...
}
}
}
}
I want the code to be executed only for 1 request that comes at a time. The execution of the code inside the synchronized block can last about 1 hour. In the mean time I would like each other request that arrives to that method to be cancelled. Is there any way to achieve that?
Just to clarify:
As it is right now the first request will be served and when it finishes the next request that was waiting for the lock will be served and then the next that was waiting.
What I want is to not allow other requests which are already waiting to be served after the first request finishes. If the requests came during the execution of the first request I want to return bad request or something else to the user and to cancel their request.
Approach 1:
Use a single permit Semaphore
Here's a sample code:
import java.util.concurrent.Semaphore;
public class Test {
Semaphore s = new Semaphore(1); // Single permit.
public void nonBlockingMethod() throws InterruptedException {
// A thread tries to acquire a permit, returns immediately if cannot
if (s.tryAcquire()) {
// No. of permits = 0
try {
System.out.println(Thread.currentThread().getName() + " begins execution..");
// long running task
Thread.sleep(4000);
System.out.println(Thread.currentThread().getName() + " exiting..");
} finally {
s.release(); // Release permit. No. of permits = 1
}
} else {
System.out.println(Thread.currentThread().getName() + " cannot run as another thread is already running..");
}
}
}
Approach 2:
Use a ReentrantLock
Sample Code:
import java.util.concurrent.locks.Lock;
import java.util.concurrent.locks.ReentrantLock;
public class Test {
Lock s = new ReentrantLock();
public void nonBlockingMethod() throws InterruptedException {
if (s.tryLock()) {
try {
System.out.println(Thread.currentThread().getName() + " begins execution..");
// long running task
Thread.sleep(4000);
System.out.println(Thread.currentThread().getName() + " exiting..");
} finally {
s.unlock();
}
} else {
System.out.println(Thread.currentThread().getName() + " cannot run as another thread is already running..");
}
}
}
Driver:
public static void main(String[] args) throws InterruptedException {
Test t = new Test();
Runnable r = () -> {
try {
t.nonBlockingMethod();
} catch (InterruptedException e) {
e.printStackTrace();
}
};
for (int i = 0; i < 3; i++) {
new Thread(r, "Loop-1-Thread-" + i).start();
}
Thread.sleep(3999);
// one of the threads in this iteration may get to run the task
for (int i = 3; i < 8; i++) {
new Thread(r, "Loop-2-Thread-" + i).start();
}
}
(one of the) Output (s):
Loop-1-Thread-2 cannot run as another thread is already running..
Loop-1-Thread-1 cannot run as another thread is already running..
Loop-1-Thread-0 begins execution..
Loop-2-Thread-3 cannot run as another thread is already running..
Loop-2-Thread-4 cannot run as another thread is already running..
Loop-2-Thread-5 cannot run as another thread is already running..
Loop-1-Thread-0 exiting..
Loop-2-Thread-6 begins execution..
Loop-2-Thread-7 cannot run as another thread is already running..
Loop-2-Thread-6 exiting..
This is an approach that you can consider. This uses a global state in an AtomicBoolean which is safe (?) to use in your use case, hopefully!
See this SO When do I need to use AtomicBoolean in Java?
static AtomicBoolean atomicBoolean = new AtomicBoolean(false);
//controller definition
if(atomicBoolean.compareAndSet(false, true)) {
// your logic
atomicBoolean.compareAndSet(true, false);
}
// rest of the controller logic
But, do consider an option of queueing the requests and processing them as a background task or so. Keeping the socket and HTTP open for longer times is not recommended in most cases.

Can different threads access different independent methods of the same object at the same time in java?

Let's say we have 2 threads, and one object with 2 methods.
Thread 1 uses method1.
While method1 used by thread 1 is still running, can thread 2 use method2?
All of this assuming the object was not built with multithreading in mind (no synchronize or similar), and the methods do not access the same variables.
this code suggests that it is possible:
import java.io.IOException;
import java.util.logging.Level;
import java.util.logging.Logger;
public class multithreadaccess {
/**
* #param args
* the command line arguments
*/
public static void main(String[] args) throws IOException {
TestClass tc = new TestClass();
// invokes not sync method
FirstThreadRunnable ftr = new FirstThreadRunnable(tc);
Thread t1 = new Thread(ftr);
// invokes the sync method
SecondThreadRunnable str = new SecondThreadRunnable(tc);
Thread t2 = new Thread(str);
t1.start();
t2.start();
System.in.read();
}
public static class TestClass {
private int callCount = 0;
public void secondmethod() {
System.out.println("second method activated! Call number:" + " [" + callCount++ + "] from thread: "
+ Thread.currentThread().getId());
}
public void firstmethod() throws InterruptedException {
// Test with the sleep
System.out.println("starting first slow method from thread: " + Thread.currentThread().getId());
Thread.sleep(1000); // hold the monitor for 5sec
System.out.println("stopping first slow method! Call number:" + " [" + callCount++ + "] from thread: "
+ Thread.currentThread().getId());
// Test with spinning
/*
* System.out.println("MAKE IT SPIN! from thread: " +
* Thread.currentThread().getId()); boolean spin = true;
* while(spin){
*
* } System.out.println("IT STOPPED SPINNING! from thread: " +
* Thread.currentThread().getId()); }
*/
}
}
// invokes the not sync method
public static class FirstThreadRunnable implements Runnable {
TestClass tester = null;
public FirstThreadRunnable(TestClass tester) {
this.tester = tester;
}
#Override
public void run() {
try {
tester.firstmethod();
} catch (InterruptedException e) {
// TODO Auto-generated catch block
e.printStackTrace();
}
}
}
// invokes the sync method
public static class SecondThreadRunnable implements Runnable {
TestClass tester = null;
public SecondThreadRunnable(TestClass tester) {
this.tester = tester;
}
#Override
public void run() {
tester.secondmethod();
}
}
}
modified code from here
I do not understand how this is possible, though. I was always thinking an object is linear code. But this suggests that linear is only the code within the methods(As long as no variables are used by multiple methods)?
The problem of your code is the 2 methods firstmethod and secondmethod are not as "independent" as you thought, because both have callCount++.
This may create race condition, because both thread are updating that variable. You need to use AtomicInteger instead of int, then the code will work.
Edit:
In general, synchronization mechanism ("automatic blocking") is not enabled by default, because these operations are expensive and slow down the program. That's why Java provides synchronized keyword as well as threadsafe classes such has AtomicInteger to ensure proper access to shared variables and critical sections.

waiting Thread never wakes up

I have a ThreadManager with two Threads. One for gui-relevant requests and one for measurement-relevant requests. The are both running and checking their queue of requests, if there is any, they are processing the request. One can add requests at any time, using the static ThreadManager.addGuiRequest(eGuiRequest) and ThreadManager.addMeasRequest(eMeasRequest) methods. Now both of those need to be initialized which is done by adding a INIT request to the corresponding queue. But the initialization of the measurement is depending on the fact that the gui is already initialized. I tried to solve this using wait()/notify(), but I can not get it working.
Here is a SSCCE. At startup, both queues have a INIT request added and are then started. The measurement initialization detects that the gui is not yet initialized and perfomrs a wait(). The gui initializes (simulated by sleeping for 5s). This all works fine.
After the gui initialized, it tries to wake up the measurement thread, but the measurement thread does not wake up... I based my wait()/notify() code on this article. What is going wrong here?
import java.util.LinkedList;
import java.util.NoSuchElementException;
public class ThreadManager {
public static void main(String[] args) {
new ThreadManager();
ThreadManager.addMeasRequest(eMeasRequest.OTHER_STUFF);
}
public enum eGuiRequest { INIT, OTHER_STUFF; }
public enum eMeasRequest { INIT, OTHER_STUFF; }
private static LinkedList<eGuiRequest> guiQueue = new LinkedList<eGuiRequest>();
private static LinkedList<eMeasRequest> measQueue = new LinkedList<eMeasRequest>();
private static Thread guiThread, measThread;
protected boolean initialized = false;
public ThreadManager() {
final int waitMs = 200;
guiThread = new Thread(new Runnable() {
#Override
public void run() {
while (true) {
try {
if (guiQueue.isEmpty()) sleepMs(waitMs);
else {
eGuiRequest req = guiQueue.getFirst();
processGuiRequest(req);
guiQueue.removeFirst();
}
} catch (NoSuchElementException e) {}
}
}
private void processGuiRequest(eGuiRequest req) {
System.out.println("T: " + "Processing Gui request: " + req);
switch (req) {
case INIT:
// do some initializiation here - replaced by a wait:
sleepMs(5000);
System.out.println("I: " + "guiThread finished, waking up measThread");
synchronized (measThread) {
initialized = true;
measThread.notify();
}
break;
case OTHER_STUFF:
// do other stuff
break;
}
}
});
measThread = new Thread(new Runnable() {
#Override
public void run() {
while (true) {
try {
if (measQueue.isEmpty()) sleepMs(waitMs);
else {
eMeasRequest req = measQueue.getFirst();
processMeasurementRequest(req);
measQueue.removeFirst();
}
} catch (NoSuchElementException e) {}
}
}
private void processMeasurementRequest(eMeasRequest req) {
if (req == eMeasRequest.INIT) { // if init, wait until GUI is initialized
synchronized (this) {
while (!initialized) {
System.out.println("I: " + "measThread waits for guiThread to finish initializiation");
try {
wait();
} catch (Exception e) {}
System.out.println("I: " + "measThread awakes");
}
}
}
System.out.println("T: " + "Processing Measurement request: " + req);
// process request here:
sleepMs(5000);
}
});
addGuiRequest(eGuiRequest.INIT);
addMeasRequest(eMeasRequest.INIT);
guiThread.start();
measThread.start();
}
public static void sleepMs(int ms) {
try {
Thread.sleep(ms);
} catch (InterruptedException ee) {}
}
public static void addGuiRequest(eGuiRequest req) {
guiQueue.add(req);
}
public static void addMeasRequest(eMeasRequest req) {
measQueue.add(req);
}
}
The GUI thread calls notify() on measThread (of type Thread), and the processMeasurementRequest() method calls wait() on this, which is the Runnable instance used by measThread.
I would advise using a specific object, shared by both threads to wait and notify:
private static final Object GUI_INITIALIZATION_MONITOR = new Object();
Also, instead of using a LinkedList and sleeping an aritrary time between requests, I would use a BlockingQueue: this would allow the consuming thread to handle a request as soon as there is one, and would avoid unnecessary wakeups from the sleeping state.
Also, instead of the low-level wait/notify, you could use a CountDownLatch initialized to 1. The GUI thread would countDown() the latch when it's initialized, and the mesurement thread would await() the latch until the GUI thread has called countDown(). This would delegate complex synchronization and notification stuff to a more high-level, well-tested object.
The main problem is that you call notify() on measThread, but wait() is called on an anonymous class. The easiest way to fix this is to create a special object for synchronization. For example, you create a field:
private static final Object LOCK = new Object();
Then you write synchronized blocks using this object and call its methods like this:
synchronized (LOCK) {
while (!initialized) LOCK.wait();
}
Also I have to say that this piece of code doesn't use any synchronization at all for the fields accessed from different threads, which means that it can break at any time. Both queues are accessed outside the threads created by you, this means that you should either access them with a lock held all the time, or you can make them thread safe by using a built-in synchronized list:
quiQueue = Collections.synchronizedList(new LinkedList<eGuiRequest>());
initialized is accessed from synchronized blocks, but right now they synchronize on different locks (I have described this problem at the start of my answer). If you fix this problem, initialized will also be working as it should.
Just do not sent init request to measurment at startup. Sent it from processGuiRequest() after execution of init gui request. Then no wait/notify stuff is needed.

Thread.interrupt() and java.io.InterruptedIOException

I'm running Java 1.5 on Solaris 10.
My program is a standalone java program, using java concurrency package and log4j-1.2.12.jar to log certain information. primary logic is as below
ExecutorService executor = new AppThreadPoolExecutor(10, 10, 0L, TimeUnit.MILLISECONDS, new LinkedBlockingQueue<Runnable>(Integer.MAX_VALUE), new AppThreadFactory("BSRT", true), new ThreadPoolExecutor.CallerRunsPolicy());
CompletionService<Integer> completionService = new ExecutorCompletionService<Integer>(executor);
for (final Integer id : taskList) {
Callable<Integer> c = new Callable<Integer>() {
public Integer call() throws Exception {
int newId = DB operation(id);
return newId;
}
};
completionService.submit(c);
}
logger.debug("Start retrievie result");
for (Integer id : taskList) {
try {
Future<Integer> future = completionService.poll(1, TimeUnit.SECONDS);
Integer taskId=null;
if (future != null) {
logger.debug("future is obtained.");
taskId = future.get();
} else {
logger.error("wait too long and get nothing!");
break;
}
if (taskId != null) {
taskIdList.add(taskId);
}
} catch (ExecutionException ignore) {
// log the cause and ignore this aborted task,coninue with
// next available task.
logger.warn(ignore.getCause());
} catch (InterruptedException e) {
logger.warn("interrupted...");
// Re-assert the thread’s interrupted status
Thread.currentThread().interrupt();
}
}executor.shutdown();
During the execution of my program, Sometimes (not always) I'm getting this error ...
executor.shutdown();
will not be able to interrupt AppThread after return from the call super.run();
because the woker is already removed from workers set used internally by ThreadPoolExecutor, executor does not have reference to AppThread from that point of time.
btw: the log file is accessible and size is big enough.
log4j:ERROR Failed to flush writer,
java.io.InterruptedIOException
at java.io.FileOutputStream.writeBytes(Native Method)
at java.io.FileOutputStream.write(FileOutputStream.java:260)
at sun.nio.cs.StreamEncoder$CharsetSE.writeBytes(StreamEncoder.java:336)
at sun.nio.cs.StreamEncoder$CharsetSE.implFlushBuffer(StreamEncoder.java:404)
at sun.nio.cs.StreamEncoder$CharsetSE.implFlush(StreamEncoder.java:408)
at sun.nio.cs.StreamEncoder.flush(StreamEncoder.java:152)
at java.io.OutputStreamWriter.flush(OutputStreamWriter.java:213)
at org.apache.log4j.helpers.QuietWriter.flush(QuietWriter.java:57)
at org.apache.log4j.WriterAppender.subAppend(WriterAppender.java:315)
at org.apache.log4j.DailyRollingFileAppender.subAppend(DailyRollingFileAppender.java:358)
at org.apache.log4j.WriterAppender.append(WriterAppender.java:159)
at org.apache.log4j.AppenderSkeleton.doAppend(AppenderSkeleton.java:230)
at org.apache.log4j.helpers.AppenderAttachableImpl.appendLoopOnAppenders(AppenderAttachableImpl.java:65)
at org.apache.log4j.Category.callAppenders(Category.java:203)
at org.apache.log4j.Category.forcedLog(Category.java:388)
at org.apache.log4j.Category.debug(Category.java:257)
at AppThread.run( AppThread.java: 33)
33 is the line: if (debug)
logger.info("Exiting " + getName());
import java.util.concurrent.atomic.AtomicInteger;
import org.apache.log4j.Logger;
public class AppThread extends Thread {
public static final String DEFAULT_NAME = "MyAppThread";
private static volatile boolean debugLifecycle = false;
private static final AtomicInteger created = new AtomicInteger();
private static final AtomicInteger alive = new AtomicInteger();
private static final Logger logger = Logger.getLogger(AppThread.class);
private boolean dump = false;
public AppThread(Runnable r) {
this(r, DEFAULT_NAME);
}
public AppThread(Runnable runnable, String name) {
super(runnable, name + "-" + created.incrementAndGet());
logger.debug(name + "'s constructor running");
}
public void interrupt() {
if (!dump) {
super.interrupt();
}
if (dump) {
logger.debug("interrupt : " + getName() + " <<<");
Thread.dumpStack();
logger.debug("interrupt : " + getName() + " >>>");
}
}
public void run() {
boolean debug = debugLifecycle;
if (debug)
logger.info("Created " + getName());
try {
alive.incrementAndGet();
super.run();
logger.debug("running!");
} finally {
alive.decrementAndGet();
dump = true;
try {
Thread.sleep(100000);
} catch (InterruptedException e) {
logger.debug(e);
}
if (debug)
logger.info("Exiting " + getName());
}
}
public static int getThreadsCreated() {
return created.get();
}
public static int getThreadsAlive() {
return alive.get();
}
public static boolean getDebug() {
return debugLifecycle;
}
public static void setDebug(boolean b) {
debugLifecycle = b;
}
}
Another problem is that in order to debug the cause of java.io.InterruptedIOException , I added
try {
Thread.sleep(100000);
} catch (InterruptedException e) {
logger.debug(e);
}
in finally clause in the run method for AppThread. when InterruptedException is catched in the finally clause, the override interrupt() method is never called. so who interrupt AppThread? is the same guy cause java.io.InterruptedIOException?
Yes:
shutdownNow
Attempts to stop all actively executing tasks, halts the processing of waiting tasks, and returns a list of the tasks that were awaiting execution.
There are no guarantees beyond best-effort attempts to stop processing actively executing tasks. For example, typical implementations will cancel via Thread.interrupt(), so any task that fails to respond to interrupts may never terminate.
JavaDoc.
Simply use shutdown() instead of shutdownNow(). When you are forcibly calling shutdownNow() this is what you should expect - JVM gracefully interrupts I/O and shuts down the thread as fast as possible.
However I would make sure that logging isn't the bottleneck in your application. Simply make few thread dumps during the execution of your program and see how often threads are writing or waiting for I/O. Poor man's profiling.
Interrupting the worker threads is actually a feature of the Executor framework to allow worker threads to gracefully shut down when asked to do so through interrupt(). It's documented behavior for shutdownNow().
If you don't want this, call shutdown() -- it won't interrupt() your worker threads, the Executor will just stop accepting new tasks.
I have similar problems.
My research went so far that Thread.interrupt() sets the interrupt flag. This leads to an interrupted IO operation deep in the Java Stack. But the IO methods are typically not declared to throw an InterruptedException.
Instead an InterruptedIOException is thrown and the interrupted state of the Thread is cleared!. If you wrote a Worker that expects (catches) IOExceptions, you have to catch the InterruptedIOException separately and call Thead.currentThread().interrupt() in the catch clause.

How to timeout a thread

I want to run a thread for some fixed amount of time. If it is not completed within that time, I want to either kill it, throw some exception, or handle it in some way. How can it be done?
One way of doing it as I figured out from this thread
is to use a TimerTask inside the run() method of the Thread.
Are there any better solutions for this?
EDIT: Adding a bounty as I needed a clearer answer. The ExecutorService code given below does not address my problem. Why should I sleep() after executing (some code - I have no handle over this piece of code)? If the code is completed and the sleep() is interrupted, how can that be a timeOut?
The task that needs to be executed is not in my control. It can be any piece of code. The problem is this piece of code might run into an infinite loop. I don't want that to happen. So, I just want to run that task in a separate thread. The parent thread has to wait till that thread finishes and needs to know the status of the task (i.e whether it timed out or some exception occured or if its a success). If the task goes into an infinite loop, my parent thread keeps on waiting indefinitely, which is not an ideal situation.
Indeed rather use ExecutorService instead of Timer, here's an SSCCE:
package com.stackoverflow.q2275443;
import java.util.concurrent.Callable;
import java.util.concurrent.ExecutorService;
import java.util.concurrent.Executors;
import java.util.concurrent.Future;
import java.util.concurrent.TimeUnit;
import java.util.concurrent.TimeoutException;
public class Test {
public static void main(String[] args) throws Exception {
ExecutorService executor = Executors.newSingleThreadExecutor();
Future<String> future = executor.submit(new Task());
try {
System.out.println("Started..");
System.out.println(future.get(3, TimeUnit.SECONDS));
System.out.println("Finished!");
} catch (TimeoutException e) {
future.cancel(true);
System.out.println("Terminated!");
}
executor.shutdownNow();
}
}
class Task implements Callable<String> {
#Override
public String call() throws Exception {
Thread.sleep(4000); // Just to demo a long running task of 4 seconds.
return "Ready!";
}
}
Play a bit with the timeout argument in Future#get() method, e.g. increase it to 5 and you'll see that the thread finishes. You can intercept the timeout in the catch (TimeoutException e) block.
Update: to clarify a conceptual misunderstanding, the sleep() is not required. It is just used for SSCCE/demonstration purposes. Just do your long running task right there in place of sleep(). Inside your long running task, you should be checking if the thread is not interrupted as follows:
while (!Thread.interrupted()) {
// Do your long running task here.
}
There isn't a 100% reliable way to do this for any old task. The task has to be written with this ability in mind.
Core Java libraries like ExecutorService cancel asynchronous tasks with interrupt() calls on the worker thread. So, for example, if the task contains some sort of loop, you should be checking its interrupt status on each iteration. If the task is doing I/O operations, they should be interruptible too—and setting that up can be tricky. In any case, keep in mind that code has to actively check for interrupts; setting an interrupt doesn't necessarily do anything.
Of course, if your task is some simple loop, you can just check the current time at each iteration and give up when a specified timeout has elapsed. A worker thread isn't needed in that case.
Consider using an instance of ExecutorService. Both invokeAll() and invokeAny() methods are available with a timeout parameter.
The current thread will block until the method completes (not sure if this is desirable) either because the task(s) completed normally or the timeout was reached. You can inspect the returned Future(s) to determine what happened.
Assuming the thread code is out of your control:
From the Java documentation mentioned above:
What if a thread doesn't respond to Thread.interrupt?
In some cases, you can use application specific tricks. For example,
if a thread is waiting on a known socket, you can close the socket to
cause the thread to return immediately. Unfortunately, there really
isn't any technique that works in general. It should be noted that in
all situations where a waiting thread doesn't respond to
Thread.interrupt, it wouldn't respond to Thread.stop either. Such
cases include deliberate denial-of-service attacks, and I/O operations
for which thread.stop and thread.interrupt do not work properly.
Bottom Line:
Make sure all threads can be interrupted, or else you need specific knowledge of the thread - like having a flag to set. Maybe you can require that the task be given to you along with the code needed to stop it - define an interface with a stop() method. You can also warn when you failed to stop a task.
BalusC said:
Update: to clarify a conceptual misunderstanding, the sleep() is not required. It is just used for SSCCE/demonstration purposes. Just do your long running task right there in place of sleep().
But if you replace Thread.sleep(4000); with for (int i = 0; i < 5E8; i++) {} then it doesn't compile, because the empty loop doesn't throw an InterruptedException.
And for the thread to be interruptible, it needs to throw an InterruptedException.
This seems like a serious problem to me. I can't see how to adapt this answer to work with a general long-running task.
Edited to add: I reasked this as a new question: [ interrupting a thread after fixed time, does it have to throw InterruptedException? ]
I created a helper class just for this some time ago. Works great:
import java.util.concurrent.BrokenBarrierException;
import java.util.concurrent.CyclicBarrier;
/**
* TimeOut class - used for stopping a thread that is taking too long
* #author Peter Goransson
*
*/
public class TimeOut {
Thread interrupter;
Thread target;
long timeout;
boolean success;
boolean forceStop;
CyclicBarrier barrier;
/**
*
* #param target The Runnable target to be executed
* #param timeout The time in milliseconds before target will be interrupted or stopped
* #param forceStop If true, will Thread.stop() this target instead of just interrupt()
*/
public TimeOut(Runnable target, long timeout, boolean forceStop) {
this.timeout = timeout;
this.forceStop = forceStop;
this.target = new Thread(target);
this.interrupter = new Thread(new Interrupter());
barrier = new CyclicBarrier(2); // There will always be just 2 threads waiting on this barrier
}
public boolean execute() throws InterruptedException {
// Start target and interrupter
target.start();
interrupter.start();
// Wait for target to finish or be interrupted by interrupter
target.join();
interrupter.interrupt(); // stop the interrupter
try {
barrier.await(); // Need to wait on this barrier to make sure status is set
} catch (BrokenBarrierException e) {
// Something horrible happened, assume we failed
success = false;
}
return success; // status is set in the Interrupter inner class
}
private class Interrupter implements Runnable {
Interrupter() {}
public void run() {
try {
Thread.sleep(timeout); // Wait for timeout period and then kill this target
if (forceStop) {
target.stop(); // Need to use stop instead of interrupt since we're trying to kill this thread
}
else {
target.interrupt(); // Gracefully interrupt the waiting thread
}
System.out.println("done");
success = false;
} catch (InterruptedException e) {
success = true;
}
try {
barrier.await(); // Need to wait on this barrier
} catch (InterruptedException e) {
// If the Child and Interrupter finish at the exact same millisecond we'll get here
// In this weird case assume it failed
success = false;
}
catch (BrokenBarrierException e) {
// Something horrible happened, assume we failed
success = false;
}
}
}
}
It is called like this:
long timeout = 10000; // number of milliseconds before timeout
TimeOut t = new TimeOut(new PhotoProcessor(filePath, params), timeout, true);
try {
boolean sucess = t.execute(); // Will return false if this times out
if (!sucess) {
// This thread timed out
}
else {
// This thread ran completely and did not timeout
}
} catch (InterruptedException e) {}
I think you should take a look at proper concurrency handling mechanisms (threads running into infinite loops doesn't sound good per se, btw). Make sure you read a little about the "killing" or "stopping" Threads topic.
What you are describing,sound very much like a "rendezvous", so you may want to take a look at the CyclicBarrier.
There may be other constructs (like using CountDownLatch for example) that can resolve your problem (one thread waiting with a timeout for the latch, the other should count down the latch if it has done it's work, which would release your first thread either after a timeout or when the latch countdown is invoked).
I usually recommend two books in this area: Concurrent Programming in Java and Java Concurrency in Practice.
In the solution given by BalusC, the main thread will stay blocked for the timeout period. If you have a thread pool with more than one thread, you will need the same number of additional thread that will be using Future.get(long timeout,TimeUnit unit) blocking call to wait and close the thread if it exceeds the timeout period.
A generic solution to this problem is to create a ThreadPoolExecutor Decorator that can add the timeout functionality. This Decorator class should create as many threads as ThreadPoolExecutor has, and all these threads should be used only to wait and close the ThreadPoolExecutor.
The generic class should be implemented like below:
import java.util.List;
import java.util.concurrent.*;
public class TimeoutThreadPoolDecorator extends ThreadPoolExecutor {
private final ThreadPoolExecutor commandThreadpool;
private final long timeout;
private final TimeUnit unit;
public TimeoutThreadPoolDecorator(ThreadPoolExecutor threadpool,
long timeout,
TimeUnit unit ){
super( threadpool.getCorePoolSize(),
threadpool.getMaximumPoolSize(),
threadpool.getKeepAliveTime(TimeUnit.MILLISECONDS),
TimeUnit.MILLISECONDS,
threadpool.getQueue());
this.commandThreadpool = threadpool;
this.timeout=timeout;
this.unit=unit;
}
#Override
public void execute(Runnable command) {
super.execute(() -> {
Future<?> future = commandThreadpool.submit(command);
try {
future.get(timeout, unit);
} catch (InterruptedException e) {
Thread.currentThread().interrupt();
} catch (ExecutionException | TimeoutException e) {
throw new RejectedExecutionException(e);
} finally {
future.cancel(true);
}
});
}
#Override
public void setCorePoolSize(int corePoolSize) {
super.setCorePoolSize(corePoolSize);
commandThreadpool.setCorePoolSize(corePoolSize);
}
#Override
public void setThreadFactory(ThreadFactory threadFactory) {
super.setThreadFactory(threadFactory);
commandThreadpool.setThreadFactory(threadFactory);
}
#Override
public void setMaximumPoolSize(int maximumPoolSize) {
super.setMaximumPoolSize(maximumPoolSize);
commandThreadpool.setMaximumPoolSize(maximumPoolSize);
}
#Override
public void setKeepAliveTime(long time, TimeUnit unit) {
super.setKeepAliveTime(time, unit);
commandThreadpool.setKeepAliveTime(time, unit);
}
#Override
public void setRejectedExecutionHandler(RejectedExecutionHandler handler) {
super.setRejectedExecutionHandler(handler);
commandThreadpool.setRejectedExecutionHandler(handler);
}
#Override
public List<Runnable> shutdownNow() {
List<Runnable> taskList = super.shutdownNow();
taskList.addAll(commandThreadpool.shutdownNow());
return taskList;
}
#Override
public void shutdown() {
super.shutdown();
commandThreadpool.shutdown();
}
}
The above decorator can be used as below:
import java.util.concurrent.SynchronousQueue;
import java.util.concurrent.ThreadPoolExecutor;
import java.util.concurrent.TimeUnit;
public class Main {
public static void main(String[] args){
long timeout = 2000;
ThreadPoolExecutor threadPool = new ThreadPoolExecutor(3, 10, 0, TimeUnit.MILLISECONDS, new SynchronousQueue<>(true));
threadPool = new TimeoutThreadPoolDecorator( threadPool ,
timeout,
TimeUnit.MILLISECONDS);
threadPool.execute(command(1000));
threadPool.execute(command(1500));
threadPool.execute(command(2100));
threadPool.execute(command(2001));
while(threadPool.getActiveCount()>0);
threadPool.shutdown();
}
private static Runnable command(int i) {
return () -> {
System.out.println("Running Thread:"+Thread.currentThread().getName());
System.out.println("Starting command with sleep:"+i);
try {
Thread.sleep(i);
} catch (InterruptedException e) {
System.out.println("Thread "+Thread.currentThread().getName()+" with sleep of "+i+" is Interrupted!!!");
return;
}
System.out.println("Completing Thread "+Thread.currentThread().getName()+" after sleep of "+i);
};
}
}
I post you a piece of code which show a way how to solve the problem.
As exemple I'm reading a file.
You could use this method for another operation, but you need to implements the kill() method so that the main operation will be interrupted.
hope it helps
import java.io.File;
import java.io.FileInputStream;
import java.io.FileNotFoundException;
import java.io.IOException;
import java.io.InputStream;
/**
* Main class
*
* #author el
*
*/
public class Main {
/**
* Thread which perform the task which should be timed out.
*
* #author el
*
*/
public static class MainThread extends Thread {
/**
* For example reading a file. File to read.
*/
final private File fileToRead;
/**
* InputStream from the file.
*/
final private InputStream myInputStream;
/**
* Thread for timeout.
*/
final private TimeOutThread timeOutThread;
/**
* true if the thread has not ended.
*/
boolean isRunning = true;
/**
* true if all tasks where done.
*/
boolean everythingDone = false;
/**
* if every thing could not be done, an {#link Exception} may have
* Happens.
*/
Throwable endedWithException = null;
/**
* Constructor.
*
* #param file
* #throws FileNotFoundException
*/
MainThread(File file) throws FileNotFoundException {
setDaemon(false);
fileToRead = file;
// open the file stream.
myInputStream = new FileInputStream(fileToRead);
// Instantiate the timeout thread.
timeOutThread = new TimeOutThread(10000, this);
}
/**
* Used by the {#link TimeOutThread}.
*/
public void kill() {
if (isRunning) {
isRunning = false;
if (myInputStream != null) {
try {
// close the stream, it may be the problem.
myInputStream.close();
} catch (IOException e) {
// Not interesting
System.out.println(e.toString());
}
}
synchronized (this) {
notify();
}
}
}
/**
* The task which should be timed out.
*/
#Override
public void run() {
timeOutThread.start();
int bytes = 0;
try {
// do something
while (myInputStream.read() >= 0) {
// may block the thread.
myInputStream.read();
bytes++;
// simulate a slow stream.
synchronized (this) {
wait(10);
}
}
everythingDone = true;
} catch (IOException e) {
endedWithException = e;
} catch (InterruptedException e) {
endedWithException = e;
} finally {
timeOutThread.kill();
System.out.println("-->read " + bytes + " bytes.");
isRunning = false;
synchronized (this) {
notifyAll();
}
}
}
}
/**
* Timeout Thread. Kill the main task if necessary.
*
* #author el
*
*/
public static class TimeOutThread extends Thread {
final long timeout;
final MainThread controlledObj;
TimeOutThread(long timeout, MainThread controlledObj) {
setDaemon(true);
this.timeout = timeout;
this.controlledObj = controlledObj;
}
boolean isRunning = true;
/**
* If we done need the {#link TimeOutThread} thread, we may kill it.
*/
public void kill() {
isRunning = false;
synchronized (this) {
notify();
}
}
/**
*
*/
#Override
public void run() {
long deltaT = 0l;
try {
long start = System.currentTimeMillis();
while (isRunning && deltaT < timeout) {
synchronized (this) {
wait(Math.max(100, timeout - deltaT));
}
deltaT = System.currentTimeMillis() - start;
}
} catch (InterruptedException e) {
// If the thread is interrupted,
// you may not want to kill the main thread,
// but probably yes.
} finally {
isRunning = false;
}
controlledObj.kill();
}
}
/**
* Start the main task and wait for the end.
*
* #param args
* #throws FileNotFoundException
*/
public static void main(String[] args) throws FileNotFoundException {
long start = System.currentTimeMillis();
MainThread main = new MainThread(new File(args[0]));
main.start();
try {
while (main.isRunning) {
synchronized (main) {
main.wait(1000);
}
}
long stop = System.currentTimeMillis();
if (main.everythingDone)
System.out.println("all done in " + (stop - start) + " ms.");
else {
System.out.println("could not do everything in "
+ (stop - start) + " ms.");
if (main.endedWithException != null)
main.endedWithException.printStackTrace();
}
} catch (InterruptedException e) {
System.out.println("You've killed me!");
}
}
}
Regards
Here is my really simple to use helper class to run or call piece of Java code :-)
This is based on the excellent answer from BalusC
package com.mycompany.util.concurrent;
import java.util.concurrent.Callable;
import java.util.concurrent.ExecutionException;
import java.util.concurrent.ExecutorService;
import java.util.concurrent.Executors;
import java.util.concurrent.Future;
import java.util.concurrent.TimeUnit;
import java.util.concurrent.TimeoutException;
/**
* Calling {#link Callable#call()} or Running {#link Runnable#run()} code
* with a timeout based on {#link Future#get(long, TimeUnit))}
* #author pascaldalfarra
*
*/
public class CallableHelper
{
private CallableHelper()
{
}
public static final void run(final Runnable runnable, int timeoutInSeconds)
{
run(runnable, null, timeoutInSeconds);
}
public static final void run(final Runnable runnable, Runnable timeoutCallback, int timeoutInSeconds)
{
call(new Callable<Void>()
{
#Override
public Void call() throws Exception
{
runnable.run();
return null;
}
}, timeoutCallback, timeoutInSeconds);
}
public static final <T> T call(final Callable<T> callable, int timeoutInSeconds)
{
return call(callable, null, timeoutInSeconds);
}
public static final <T> T call(final Callable<T> callable, Runnable timeoutCallback, int timeoutInSeconds)
{
ExecutorService executor = Executors.newSingleThreadExecutor();
try
{
Future<T> future = executor.submit(callable);
T result = future.get(timeoutInSeconds, TimeUnit.SECONDS);
System.out.println("CallableHelper - Finished!");
return result;
}
catch (TimeoutException e)
{
System.out.println("CallableHelper - TimeoutException!");
if(timeoutCallback != null)
{
timeoutCallback.run();
}
}
catch (InterruptedException e)
{
e.printStackTrace();
}
catch (ExecutionException e)
{
e.printStackTrace();
}
finally
{
executor.shutdownNow();
executor = null;
}
return null;
}
}
The following snippet will start an operation in a separate thread, then wait for up to 10 seconds for the operation to complete. If the operation does not complete in time, the code will attempt to cancel the operation, then continue on its merry way. Even if the operation cannot be cancelled easily, the parent thread will not wait for the child thread to terminate.
ExecutorService executorService = getExecutorService();
Future<SomeClass> future = executorService.submit(new Callable<SomeClass>() {
public SomeClass call() {
// Perform long-running task, return result. The code should check
// interrupt status regularly, to facilitate cancellation.
}
});
try {
// Real life code should define the timeout as a constant or
// retrieve it from configuration
SomeClass result = future.get(10, TimeUnit.SECONDS);
// Do something with the result
} catch (TimeoutException e) {
future.cancel(true);
// Perform other error handling, e.g. logging, throwing an exception
}
The getExecutorService() method can be implemented in a number of ways. If you do not have any particular requirements, you can simply call Executors.newCachedThreadPool() for thread pooling with no upper limit on the number of threads.
One thing that I've not seen mentioned is that killing threads is generally a Bad Idea. There are techniques for making threaded methods cleanly abortable, but that's different to just killing a thread after a timeout.
The risk with what you're suggesting is that you probably don't know what state the thread will be in when you kill it - so you risk introducing instability. A better solution is to make sure your threaded code either doesn't hang itself, or will respond nicely to an abort request.
Great answer by BalusC's:
but Just to add that the timeout itself does not interrupt the thread itself. even if you are checking with while(!Thread.interrupted()) in your task. if you want to make sure thread is stopped you should also make sure future.cancel() is invoked when timeout exception is catch.
package com.stackoverflow.q2275443;
import java.util.concurrent.Callable;
import java.util.concurrent.ExecutorService;
import java.util.concurrent.Executors;
import java.util.concurrent.Future;
import java.util.concurrent.TimeUnit;
import java.util.concurrent.TimeoutException;
public class Test {
public static void main(String[] args) throws Exception {
ExecutorService executor = Executors.newSingleThreadExecutor();
Future<String> future = executor.submit(new Task());
try {
System.out.println("Started..");
System.out.println(future.get(3, TimeUnit.SECONDS));
System.out.println("Finished!");
} catch (TimeoutException e) {
//Without the below cancel the thread will continue to live
// even though the timeout exception thrown.
future.cancel();
System.out.println("Terminated!");
}
executor.shutdownNow();
}
}
class Task implements Callable<String> {
#Override
public String call() throws Exception {
while(!Thread.currentThread.isInterrupted()){
System.out.println("Im still running baby!!");
}
}
}
I think the answer mainly depends on the task itself.
Is it doing one task over and over again?
Is it necessary that the timeout interrupts a currently running task immediately after it expires?
If the first answer is yes and the second is no, you could keep it as simple as this:
public class Main {
private static final class TimeoutTask extends Thread {
private final long _timeoutMs;
private Runnable _runnable;
private TimeoutTask(long timeoutMs, Runnable runnable) {
_timeoutMs = timeoutMs;
_runnable = runnable;
}
#Override
public void run() {
long start = System.currentTimeMillis();
while (System.currentTimeMillis() < (start + _timeoutMs)) {
_runnable.run();
}
System.out.println("execution took " + (System.currentTimeMillis() - start) +" ms");
}
}
public static void main(String[] args) throws Exception {
new TimeoutTask(2000L, new Runnable() {
#Override
public void run() {
System.out.println("doing something ...");
try {
// pretend it's taking somewhat longer than it really does
Thread.sleep(100);
} catch (InterruptedException e) {
throw new RuntimeException(e);
}
}
}).start();
}
}
If this isn't an option, please narrow your requirements - or show some code.
I was looking for an ExecutorService that can interrupt all timed out Runnables executed by it, but found none. After a few hours I created one as below. This class can be modified to enhance robustness.
public class TimedExecutorService extends ThreadPoolExecutor {
long timeout;
public TimedExecutorService(int numThreads, long timeout, TimeUnit unit) {
super(numThreads, numThreads, 0L, TimeUnit.MILLISECONDS, new ArrayBlockingQueue<Runnable>(numThreads + 1));
this.timeout = unit.toMillis(timeout);
}
#Override
protected void beforeExecute(Thread thread, Runnable runnable) {
Thread interruptionThread = new Thread(new Runnable() {
#Override
public void run() {
try {
// Wait until timeout and interrupt this thread
Thread.sleep(timeout);
System.out.println("The runnable times out.");
thread.interrupt();
} catch (InterruptedException e) {
e.printStackTrace();
}
}
});
interruptionThread.start();
}
}
Usage:
public static void main(String[] args) {
Runnable abcdRunnable = new Runnable() {
#Override
public void run() {
System.out.println("abcdRunnable started");
try {
Thread.sleep(20000);
} catch (InterruptedException e) {
// logger.info("The runnable times out.");
}
System.out.println("abcdRunnable ended");
}
};
Runnable xyzwRunnable = new Runnable() {
#Override
public void run() {
System.out.println("xyzwRunnable started");
try {
Thread.sleep(20000);
} catch (InterruptedException e) {
// logger.info("The runnable times out.");
}
System.out.println("xyzwRunnable ended");
}
};
int numThreads = 2, timeout = 5;
ExecutorService timedExecutor = new TimedExecutorService(numThreads, timeout, TimeUnit.SECONDS);
timedExecutor.execute(abcdRunnable);
timedExecutor.execute(xyzwRunnable);
timedExecutor.shutdown();
}
Now , l meet a issue like this. It happens to decode picture. The process of decode takes too much time that the screen keep black. l add a time controler: when the time is too long, then pop up from the current Thread.
The following is the diff:
ExecutorService executor = Executors.newSingleThreadExecutor();
Future<Bitmap> future = executor.submit(new Callable<Bitmap>() {
#Override
public Bitmap call() throws Exception {
Bitmap bitmap = decodeAndScaleBitmapFromStream(context, inputUri);// do some time consuming operation
return null;
}
});
try {
Bitmap result = future.get(1, TimeUnit.SECONDS);
} catch (TimeoutException e){
future.cancel(true);
}
executor.shutdown();
return (bitmap!= null);
I had the same problem. So i came up with a simple solution like this.
public class TimeoutBlock {
private final long timeoutMilliSeconds;
private long timeoutInteval=100;
public TimeoutBlock(long timeoutMilliSeconds){
this.timeoutMilliSeconds=timeoutMilliSeconds;
}
public void addBlock(Runnable runnable) throws Throwable{
long collectIntervals=0;
Thread timeoutWorker=new Thread(runnable);
timeoutWorker.start();
do{
if(collectIntervals>=this.timeoutMilliSeconds){
timeoutWorker.stop();
throw new Exception("<<<<<<<<<<****>>>>>>>>>>> Timeout Block Execution Time Exceeded In "+timeoutMilliSeconds+" Milli Seconds. Thread Block Terminated.");
}
collectIntervals+=timeoutInteval;
Thread.sleep(timeoutInteval);
}while(timeoutWorker.isAlive());
System.out.println("<<<<<<<<<<####>>>>>>>>>>> Timeout Block Executed Within "+collectIntervals+" Milli Seconds.");
}
/**
* #return the timeoutInteval
*/
public long getTimeoutInteval() {
return timeoutInteval;
}
/**
* #param timeoutInteval the timeoutInteval to set
*/
public void setTimeoutInteval(long timeoutInteval) {
this.timeoutInteval = timeoutInteval;
}
}
Guarantees that if block didn't execute within the time limit. the process will terminate and throws an exception.
example :
try {
TimeoutBlock timeoutBlock = new TimeoutBlock(10 * 60 * 1000);//set timeout in milliseconds
Runnable block=new Runnable() {
#Override
public void run() {
//TO DO write block of code
}
};
timeoutBlock.addBlock(block);// execute the runnable block
} catch (Throwable e) {
//catch the exception here . Which is block didn't execute within the time limit
}

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