C# – ASP.NET Threading: should I use the pool for DB and Emails actions

One possible (and common) use is when you have some object that is not thread-safe, but you want to avoid synchronizing access to that object (I'm looking at you, SimpleDateFormat). Instead, give each thread its own instance of the object.

For example:

public class Foo
{
    // SimpleDateFormat is not thread-safe, so give one to each thread
    private static final ThreadLocal<SimpleDateFormat> formatter = new ThreadLocal<SimpleDateFormat>(){
        @Override
        protected SimpleDateFormat initialValue()
        {
            return new SimpleDateFormat("yyyyMMdd HHmm");
        }
    };

    public String formatIt(Date date)
    {
        return formatter.get().format(date);
    }
}

Documentation.

I can see five options available:

1. Thread.Join

As with Mitch's answer. But this will block your UI thread, however you get a Timeout built in for you.

2. Use a WaitHandle

ManualResetEvent is a WaitHandle as jrista suggested.

One thing to note is if you want to wait for multiple threads: WaitHandle.WaitAll() won't work by default, as it needs an MTA thread. You can get around this by marking your Main() method with MTAThread - however this blocks your message pump and isn't recommended from what I've read.

3. Fire an event

See this page by Jon Skeet about events and multi-threading. It's possible that an event can become unsubcribed between the if and the EventName(this,EventArgs.Empty) - it's happened to me before.

(Hopefully these compile, I haven't tried)

public class Form1 : Form
{
    int _count;

    void ButtonClick(object sender, EventArgs e)
    {
        ThreadWorker worker = new ThreadWorker();
        worker.ThreadDone += HandleThreadDone;

        Thread thread1 = new Thread(worker.Run);
        thread1.Start();

        _count = 1;
    }

    void HandleThreadDone(object sender, EventArgs e)
    {
        // You should get the idea this is just an example
        if (_count == 1)
        {
            ThreadWorker worker = new ThreadWorker();
            worker.ThreadDone += HandleThreadDone;

            Thread thread2 = new Thread(worker.Run);
            thread2.Start();

            _count++;
        }
    }

    class ThreadWorker
    {
        public event EventHandler ThreadDone;

        public void Run()
        {
            // Do a task

            if (ThreadDone != null)
                ThreadDone(this, EventArgs.Empty);
        }
    }
}

4. Use a delegate

public class Form1 : Form
{
    int _count;

    void ButtonClick(object sender, EventArgs e)
    {
        ThreadWorker worker = new ThreadWorker();

        Thread thread1 = new Thread(worker.Run);
        thread1.Start(HandleThreadDone);

        _count = 1;
    }

    void HandleThreadDone()
    {
        // As before - just a simple example
        if (_count == 1)
        {
            ThreadWorker worker = new ThreadWorker();

            Thread thread2 = new Thread(worker.Run);
            thread2.Start(HandleThreadDone);

            _count++;
        }
    }

    class ThreadWorker
    {
        // Switch to your favourite Action<T> or Func<T>
        public void Run(object state)
        {
            // Do a task

            Action completeAction = (Action)state;
            completeAction.Invoke();
        }
    }
}

If you do use the _count method, it might be an idea (to be safe) to increment it using

Interlocked.Increment(ref _count)

I'd be interested to know the difference between using delegates and events for thread notification, the only difference I know are events are called synchronously.

5. Do it asynchronously instead

The answer to this question has a very clear description of your options with this method.

Delegate/Events on the wrong thread

The event/delegate way of doing things will mean your event handler method is on thread1/thread2 not the main UI thread, so you will need to switch back right at the top of the HandleThreadDone methods:

// Delegate example
if (InvokeRequired)
{
    Invoke(new Action(HandleThreadDone));
    return;
}