multithreading - How to abort a thread in a fast and clean way in java?

Question

Here is my problem: I've got a dialog with some parameters that the user can change (via a spinner for example). Each time one of these parameters is changed, I launch a thread to update a 3D view according to the new parameter value. If the user changes another value (or the same value again by clicking many times on the spinner arrow) while the first thread is working, I would like to abort the first thread (and the update of the 3D view) and launch a new one with the latest parameter value.

How can I do something like that?

PS: There is no loop in the run() method of my thread, so checking for a flag is not an option: the thread updating the 3D view basically only calls a single method that is very long to execute. I can't add any flag in this method asking to abort either as I do not have access to its code.

Answer 1

Try interrupt() as some have said to see if it makes any difference to your thread. If not, try destroying or closing a resource that will make the thread stop. That has a chance of being a little better than trying to throw Thread.stop() at it.

If performance is tolerable, you might view each 3D update as a discrete non-interruptible event and just let it run through to conclusion, checking afterward if there's a new latest update to perform. This might make the GUI a little choppy to users, as they would be able to make five changes, then see the graphical results from how things were five changes ago, then see the result of their latest change. But depending on how long this process is, it might be tolerable, and it would avoid having to kill the thread. Design might look like this:

boolean stopFlag = false;
Object[] latestArgs = null;

public void run() {
  while (!stopFlag) {
    if (latestArgs != null) {
      Object[] args = latestArgs;
      latestArgs = null;
      perform3dUpdate(args);
    } else {
      Thread.sleep(500);
    }
  }
}

public void endThread() {
  stopFlag = true;
}

public void updateSettings(Object[] args) {
  latestArgs = args;
}