Java – Hashmap concurrency issue

There are several differences between HashMap and Hashtable in Java:

1. Hashtable is synchronized, whereas HashMap is not. This makes HashMap better for non-threaded applications, as unsynchronized Objects typically perform better than synchronized ones.

2. Hashtable does not allow null keys or values. HashMap allows one null key and any number of null values.

3. One of HashMap's subclasses is LinkedHashMap, so in the event that you'd want predictable iteration order (which is insertion order by default), you could easily swap out the HashMap for a LinkedHashMap. This wouldn't be as easy if you were using Hashtable.

Since synchronization is not an issue for you, I'd recommend HashMap. If synchronization becomes an issue, you may also look at ConcurrentHashMap.

Concurrency is when two or more tasks can start, run, and complete in overlapping time periods. It doesn't necessarily mean they'll ever both be running at the same instant. For example, multitasking on a single-core machine.

Parallelism is when tasks literally run at the same time, e.g., on a multicore processor.

Quoting Sun's Multithreaded Programming Guide:

• Concurrency: A condition that exists when at least two threads are making progress. A more generalized form of parallelism that can include time-slicing as a form of virtual parallelism.

• Parallelism: A condition that arises when at least two threads are executing simultaneously.