relation between JVM threads and Thread instances

Question

I think I have and understanding of a mapping between OS threads and JVM threads (first we had "green threads" with 1os:Many-green, then there was 1:1 mapping and now with jep-425 we have virtual threads with M:N mapping: please correct me if I'm wrong). I'm however quite confused about the mapping between JVM threads and Thread instances: I'm almost sure that there is a 1:1 mapping between start()-ed Thread instances and JVM threads (again, please correct me if I'm wrong), but I'm not sure if a JVM thread is created and its stack allocated when a Thread instance is constructed or only when start() method is called. Whatever the correct answer is, I also wonder if it is a part of the JVM/Java-language spec or up to implementation, such as OpenJDK.

Answer 1

For one thing you could try this for yourself by creating many Thread objects and later try to start all those Threads:

public class ThreadRunner {
    public static void main(String[] args) {
        int maxThreads = 10_000_000;

        // Create Thread instances
        Thread[] threads = new Thread[maxThreads];
        Runnable r = () -> {
            try {
                Thread.sleep(1000_000);
            } catch (InterruptedException e) {
            }
        };
        for (int i = 0; i < maxThreads; i++) {
            threads[i] = new Thread(r);
        }

        // start Threads
        int count = 0;
        try {
            for (Thread t : threads) {
                t.start();
                count++;
                if (count % 1000 == 0) {
                    System.out.println(count);
                }
                Thread.yield();
            }
        } catch (OutOfMemoryError e) {
            System.out.println(count);
        }
    }
}

The other way is to check the source of the OpenJDK:

• Thread.java calls the native start0() method

• Thread.c declares that start0 is forwared to the native JVM_StartThread

 {"start0",           "()V",        (void *)&JVM_StartThread},

• jvm.cpp contains that native function which determines the stack size for the native thread and then creates it with

      jlong size =
             java_lang_Thread::stackSize(JNIHandles::resolve_non_null(jthread));
      // Allocate the C++ Thread structure and create the native thread.  The
      // stack size retrieved from java is 64-bit signed, but the constructor takes
      // size_t (an unsigned type), which may be 32 or 64-bit depending on the platform.
      //  - Avoid truncating on 32-bit platforms if size is greater than UINT_MAX.
      //  - Avoid passing negative values which would result in really large stacks.
      NOT_LP64(if (size > SIZE_MAX) size = SIZE_MAX;)
      size_t sz = size > 0 ? (size_t) size : 0;
      native_thread = new JavaThread(&thread_entry, sz);
  

---

Does this depend on the specific JVM implementation?

In principle, it could depend on the specific JVM implementation. It would however be silly to create an OS thread before it is really needed.

The main reason why I call this silly is the resource management. When you create an OS thread you must also destroy it. When you start() a Thread the OS thread is created, the threads run() method is exeucted and after that method returns the OS thread will be destroyed.

If a hypothetical JVM implementation created the OS thread already in the Thread constructor it would also need some way of destroying that OS thread when the Thread instance is garbage collected which will be hassle.

Answer 2

A Thread is created only when the start() method is called. You can check it out on the JDK doc here: https://docs.oracle.com/en/java/javase/11/docs/api/java.base/java/lang/Thread.html

The following code shows you how this works

import java.util.Random;
public class Threads {

    private static final Random rnd = new Random();

    private static int rand(int a, int b) {
        synchronized (rnd) {
            return rnd.nextInt(b - a) + a;
        }
    }

    private static void loop() {
        while (true) {
            synchronized (rnd) {
                try {
                    Thread.sleep(rand(200, 1000));
                } catch (InterruptedException e) {}

                System.out.println("Hi, i'm ");
                System.out.println("thread #" + Thread.currentThread().getId());
            }
        }
    }

    public static class MyThread extends Thread {
        @Override
        public void run() {
            loop();
        }
    }

    public static void main(String[] args) {
        Thread t1 = new MyThread();
        t1.start();

        new Thread(Threads::loop).start();
        new MyThread().start();
        new MyThread().start();
        new MyThread().start();
        loop();

        try {
            t1.join();
        } catch (InterruptedException e) {
            e.printStackTrace();
        }

    }


}