Mechanism for obtaining a thread from, and returning a thread to, a thread pool without attaching and detaching

Abstract

A JAVA application is typically executed as follows. First, a thread from a thread pool is attached to the JAVA virtual machine (JVM). Then, that thread is used to execute the JAVA application. Once the execution of the JAVA application is completed, the thread is detached from the JVM and returned to the thread pool. This is repeated for every execution of a JAVA application. Because this constant attaching and detaching of threads imposes additional overhead on the system, this process is inefficient. To improve the efficiency of the execution process, a “sticky attach” mechanism is provided. With sticky attach, a thread is not attached and detached from the JVM each time a JAVA application is executed. Rather, a thread is attached to the JVM only once: the first time it is used to execute a JAVA application. When execution of the JAVA application is completed, the thread is returned to the thread pool without detaching from the JVM. That way, the next time that thread is obtained from the thread pool, there will be no need to reattach it to the JVM. It will already be attached. Thus, it can be used as is to execute a JAVA application. By eliminating the need to constantly attach and detach threads, the sticky attach mechanism significantly decreases overhead. This in turn increases overall system efficiency.