Core Function ThreadCreate

Revision as of 21:05, 13 January 2013

ThreadCreate( <name>, <function>, <extra> )

Description

Create a new thread and start it off executing a function or some code

Sputnik supports multi-threading and you can create threads in your code to assist you.

Threads work best if you use them as *worker threads*.

Parameters

name

Name of a thread to create.

function

Either a function to call or a string to execute similar to Eval()

extra

Optional; A variable to passed to the thread as $arg for use

Return Value

Success: Returns 1.

Failure: Returns 0.

Remarks

You can spawn as many threads as you wish however there are a few important things to consider with threads.

• Threads can cause problems and even crash if used improperly.

• A thread works best if it's like a worker thread that is designed to get/set global variables and do its own thing and call functions here and there. Threads don't like to mess with every piece of code that you are messing with.

• Threads have their own stack and local variable that is independent from everything else they can however access global variables and functions etc.

• Threads don't like GUI stuff since most GUI functions are to be edited by the thread that created them therefore other threads aren't too happy if you make them mess with GUI of the main thread etc.

Example

ThreadCreate("th1", "Thread1Func();"); // This thread will execute a function
ThreadCreate("th2", "Thread2Func();"); // This thread will execute a function
ThreadCreate("th3", 'println("Thread 3 says hi");'); // This thread will execute code
 
inputc();
 
Function Thread1Func()
{
	while(true)
	{
		println("Hello from thread '" . ThreadName() . "'");
		sleep(500);
	}
}
 
Function Thread2Func()
{
	while(true)
	{
		println("Heya from thread '" . ThreadName() . "'");
		sleep(500);
	}
}

Here the extra param is used so it stores a variable in this case it stores the class object

Class Testy
{
	my $Name;
	Function __Construct( $Name )
	{
		$this->$Name = $Name;
		ThreadCreate("th1$Name", '$arg->ThreadFunc();', $this);
	}
	Function ThreadFunc()
	{
		while(true)
		{
			Println("$this->$Name | Hello from thread: '". ThreadName() . "'");
			sleep(1000);
		}
	}
};
 
$Testy1 = new Testy("Meow");
$Testy2 = new Testy("lol");
 
while(true)
{
	DoEvents();
}