How to create Thread Pool in Java using Executor Framework - Example Tutorial

Java 1.5 introduced a Thread pool in Java in the form of an Executor framework, which allows Java programmers to decouple submission of a task to the execution of the task. If you are doing server-side programming in Java then the Thread pool is an important concept to maintain scalability, robustness, and stability of the system. For those, who are not familiar with thread pool in Java or the concept of thread pool here is a one-liner, Thread pool in Java is a pool of worker threads, which is ready to perform any task given to them, mostly in the form of implementation of Runnable or Callable interface.

How to use Callable and Future in Java? Example Tutorial

A callable interface was added in Java 5 to complement the existing Runnable interface, which is used to wrap a task and pass it to a Thread or thread pool for asynchronous execution. Callable actually represents an asynchronous computation, whose value is available via a Future object. All the code which needs to be executed asynchronously goes into the call() method. Callable is also a single abstract method type (SAM type), so it can be used along with lambda expression on Java 8. Both Callable and Future are parametric types and can be used to wrap classes like Integer, String, or anything else.

How to use wait, notify and notifyAll in Java - Producer Consumer Example

You can use wait, notify, and notifyAll methods to communicate between threads in Java. For example, if you have two threads running in your programs like Producer and Consumer then the producer thread can communicate to the consumer that it can start consuming now because there are items to consume in the queue. Similarly, a consumer thread can tell the producer that it can also start putting items now because there is some space in the queue, which is created as a result of consumption. A thread can use the wait() method to pause and do nothing depending upon some condition. For example, in the producer-consumer problem, the producer thread should wait if the queue is full and the consumer thread should wait if the queue is empty.

How to Implement Thread in Java with Example

How to implement Thread in Java
In my opinion, Thread is one of the most important features of the Java programming language which helped it to become the most popular programming language. I remember, when I first started learning Java in one of the programming classes in India how important Thread was a portrait and how much emphasis is given on a clear understanding of multi-threading. It’s still popular and one of most sought after skills in Java programmer because writing concurrent and multi-threaded applications in Java is challenging, despite Java providing excellent support at language level using synchronized and volatile keyword.

The Ultimate Guide of Synchronization in Java - Examples

Multithreading and synchronization are a very important topic for any Java programmer. Good knowledge of multithreading, synchronization, and thread-safety can put you in front of other developers, at the same time, it's not easy to master this concept. In fact, writing correct concurrent code is one of the hardest things, even in Java, which has several inbuilt synchronization utilities. In this Java synchronization tutorial we will learn what is meaning of Synchronization in Java, Why do we need Synchronization in Java, What is java synchronized keyword, examples of using Java synchronized method and blocks, What can happen in multithreading code in absence of synchronized constructs, tips to avoid mistakes, while locking critical section in Java and some of the important points about synchronization in Java.

How to write Thread-Safe Code in Java

thread-safety or thread-safe code in Java refers to code which can safely be used or shared in concurrent or multi-threading environment and they will behave as expected. any code, class, or object which can behave differently from its contract on the concurrent environment is not thread-safe. thread-safety is one of the risks introduced by using threads in Java and I have seen java programmers and developers struggling to write thread-safe code or just understanding what is thread-safe code and what is not?

Difference between a Thread and an Executor in Java

Even though both Thread and Executor, both are used to execute some code in parallel, there are some key differences between them. The main difference between a Thread and an Executor in Java is that it later provides a thread pool in Java. Along with several concurrency utilities like CountDownLatch, CyclicBarrier, Semaphore, FutureTask, Callable interface, and Conditions, JDK 5 also introduced a built-in thread pool, which provides a set of working threads to run your code in parallel. Since creating, starting, and running a thread is a time-consuming and expensive operation, many Java applications create a spool of thread at start-up and leverage that for executing the task in parallel until Java introduced the built-in thread pool.

Can You Make an Array or ArrayList Volatile in Java?

This is one of the many interesting multi-threading questions I have shared in my post 50 multi-threading interview questions. Yes, you can make an array volatile in Java, there is no problem with that, neither compiler will flag any error not JVM will throw any exception but the tricky part is why you want to make an array volatile and what is the effect of making an array volatile in Java? In order to answer this question, you must be familiar with both volatile modifier and Java memory model, otherwise, it would be difficult to answer, and that's why it's also one of the trick questions from Java interviews.

Difference between Executor Framework and Fork Join Pool in Java?

Java 5 added Executor Framework to provide an out-of-box thread pool to Java programmers and Java 7 added ForkJoinPool an implementation of ExecutorService which specifically designed to execute ForkJoinTask. The Executor Framework provides several classes e.g. Executor, ExecutorService, and Executors for execution and creating thread pools. It also provides several built-in, ready to use thread pools like a pool of fixed threads, cached thread pool which can expand itself, spawn new threads if required due to heavy load.

Difference between ExecutorService.submit() and Executor.execute() methods in Java?

What is the difference between Executor.submit() and Executor.execute() method in Java? This is one of the good multi-threading questions for experienced Java programmers, mostly asked in Investment Banks like Barclays, Deutsche Bank, or Citibank. A main difference between the submit() and execute() method is that ExecuterService.submit()can return the result of computation because it has a return type of Future, but the execute() method cannot return anything because's return type is void. The core interface in Java 1.5's Executor framework is the Executor interface which defines the execute(Runnable task) method, whose primary purpose is to separate the task from its execution.

How to Join Multiple Threads in Java? [Thread.join() Example]

Join method from the Thread class is an important method and used to impose order on the execution of multiple Threads. The concept of joining multiple threads is very popular in a multithreading interview question. Here is one such question, “You have three threads T1, T2, and T3, How do you ensure that they finish in order T1, T2, T3 ?. This question illustrates the power of the join method on multithreaded programming. Unlike classical thread questions like the difference between the wait and sleep method or solving the producer-consumer problem in Java, This one is a bit tricky.

Top 5 Difference Between Callable and Runnable Interface in Java

The difference between Callable and Runnable is one of the most frequently asked multi-threading and concurrency interview questions in the Java world. I remember it was 2007 when I first heard about the Callable interface and that too on a telephonic interview. Till then, I was happy using Runnable to implement threads and just started paying attention to Java 1.5, as most of the applications by then using Java 1.4. That one interview question encouraged me to learn more about several other useful features introduced in Java 5 concurrency library like CountDownLatch, CyclicBarrier, Semaphore, Atomic variables, and Thread pool. This is one of the reasons I always encourage Java developers to give/take regular interviews, just to update your knowledge.

Difference between Executor, ExecutorService and Executers class in Java

All three classes Executor, ExecutorService, and Executors are part of Java's Executor framework which provides thread pool facilities to Java applications. Since the creation and management of Threads are expensive and the operating system also imposes restrictions on how many Threads an application can spawn, it's a good idea is to use a pool of threads to execute tasks in parallel, instead of creating a new thread every time a request comes in. This not only improves the response time of the application but also prevent resource exhaustion errors like "java.lang.OutOfMemoryError: unable to create new native thread".

What is CyclicBarrier Example in Java 5 – Concurrency Tutorial

What is CyclicBarrier in Java

CyclicBarrier in Java is a synchronizer introduced in JDK 5 on java.util.Concurrent package along with other concurrent utility like Counting Semaphore, BlockingQueue, ConcurrentHashMap, etc. CyclicBarrier is similar to CountDownLatch which we have seen in the last article  What is CountDownLatch in Java and allows multiple threads to wait for each other (barrier) before proceeding. The difference between CountDownLatch and CyclicBarrier is also a very popular multi-threading interview question in Java. CyclicBarrier is a natural requirement for a concurrent program because it can be used to perform the final part of the task once individual tasks are completed.

How to use Exchanger for sharing Object between Threads in Java [Example]

Hello guys, if you are working in a concurrent Java application then you might have heard about the Exchanger class of java.util.concurrent package. The Exchanger in Java is another concurrency or synchronization utility introduced in Java 1.5 along with CountDownLatch, CyclicBarrier, and Semaphores. As the name suggests, the Exchanger allows two Threads to meet and exchange data at the rendezvous or meeting point. This means you can use Exchanger to share objects between threads and for inter-thread communication. The java.util.Exchanger is a parametric class, which defines and holds the type of object to be exchanged. It has an overloaded method called the exchange(), which is used to exchange objects between threads.

Difference between notify and notifyAll in Java - When and How to use

notify vs notifyAll in Java

What is the difference between notify and notifyAll method is one of the tricky Java questions, which is easy to answer but once the Interviewer asks follow-up questions, you either got confused or not able to provide clear-cut and to the point answers? The main difference between notify and notifyAll is that the notify method will only notify one Thread and the notifyAll method will notify all Threads which are waiting on that monitor or lock. By the way, this is something you have been reading all over places and to be frank,  this statement despite being correct is not complete, and it's very difficult to understand the difference between notify vs notifyAll by just reading this statement.