How do you use a TimerTask to run a thread?

Question

I'm struggling to find documentation for the TimerTask function on Android. I need to run a thread at intervals using a TimerTask but have no idea how to go about this. Any advice or examples would be greatly appreciated.

score 72 · Answer 1 · answered Apr 05 '12 at 14:08

72

I have implemented something like this and it works fine:

    private Timer mTimer1;
    private TimerTask mTt1;
    private Handler mTimerHandler = new Handler();

    private void stopTimer(){
        if(mTimer1 != null){
            mTimer1.cancel();
            mTimer1.purge();
        }
    }

    private void startTimer(){
        mTimer1 = new Timer();
        mTt1 = new TimerTask() {
            public void run() {
                mTimerHandler.post(new Runnable() {
                    public void run(){
                        //TODO
                    }
                });
            }
        };

        mTimer1.schedule(mTt1, 1, 5000);
    }

answered Apr 05 '12 at 14:08

Alex

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What is the 1 in schedule? – Praneeth Feb 09 '16 at 06:10
The 1 in schedule is the amount of time in milliseconds before the first execution of the scheduled TimerTask. The 5000 is the amount of delay in between subsequent executions in milliseconds. – Cogentleman May 05 '16 at 23:54
1

Please mind that this invokes the Runnable on whatever thread this class was created on. – mkrasowski Oct 30 '18 at 11:18

score 39 · Accepted Answer · edited Jan 23 '15 at 07:42

39

You use a Timer, and that automatically creates a new Thread for you when you schedule a TimerTask using any of the schedule-methods.

Example:

Timer t = new Timer();
t.schedule(myTimerTask, 1000L);

This creates a Timer running myTimerTask in a Thread belonging to that Timer once every second.

edited Jan 23 '15 at 07:42

Goran Horia Mihail

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answered Apr 05 '12 at 13:52

Jave

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1

The above code creates a `Timer` running the task in a thread _only once_ after one second. To run a task once every second, use this overloaded `schedule` method: `schedule(TimerTask task, long delay, long period)`. For example, `timer.schedule(myTimerTask, 1000L, 2000L)` creates a timer that runs every 2 seconds after initial delay of 1 second. Here is the link to the method [link](https://developer.android.com/reference/java/util/Timer.html#schedule(java.util.TimerTask, long, long))[link] – prasad_ Jan 17 '18 at 07:28
The link was formatted wrongly in the above comment. Here is the corrected link for the [methods of Timer](https://developer.android.com/reference/java/util/Timer.html) – prasad_ Jan 17 '18 at 07:36

score 11 · Answer 3 · edited Jul 19 '18 at 04:39

11

This is perfect example for timer task.

Timer timerObj = new Timer();
TimerTask timerTaskObj = new TimerTask() {
    public void run() {
       //perform your action here
    }
};
timerObj.schedule(timerTaskObj, 0, 15000);

edited Jul 19 '18 at 04:39

SMR

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answered Nov 25 '16 at 06:08

Kalai Prakash

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How do you use a TimerTask to run a thread?

3 Answers3

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