interrupting a running task in a thread

[tatae alvostru]

I have a thread processing task by task in the run method
while(running) {
Task = getTask();
porcess(task);
}
Sometimes (like process running too much) I might want to stop
a running task and make the thread skip to the next one.
What's the best solution ? (without creating a new 'clone')
Do application servers provide such a feature for an object (timeout or task interrupting) ?

[Mo Ibrahim]

It is not a good idea to interrupt an executing thread. This will result in undefined state of the thread and lead to inconsistent results. If you think that you want to interrupt a thread, use a timer or other mechanisms to alter a variable whose value is checked by the thread and return normally out of the run method after cleaning up non-memory related resources.

[Peter den Haan]

There's certainly nothing wrong with interrupting a running thread (as opposed to stopping it!) If your task wait()s or sleep()s reguarly, you don't need to do anything special except handling the <code>InterruptedException</code> they may throw. Otherwise, you could put code such as the following in the inner loop of your task:

if (Thread.interrupted()) {
   throw new InterruptedException();
}

And handle the exception at the appropriate level.
- Peter