Debug Java Application Issues – Part -1 (Understand Java Thread States)

The purpose of this blog series is to learn how to debug your java application issues, for this firstly we will understand what different thread states are there.

Lets understand what all are the different states of java stack :

In the above diagram you can 6 states of Java Thread:

• New : When a new thread is created, it is in the new state. The thread has not yet started to run when thread is in this state. When a thread lies in the new state, it’s code is yet to be run and hasn’t started to execute.
• Runnable/Running : A thread that is ready to run is moved to runnable state. In this state, a thread might actually be running or it might be ready run at any instant of time. It is the responsibility of the thread scheduler to give the thread, time to run. A multi-threaded program allocates a fixed amount of time to each individual thread. Each and every thread runs for a short while and then pauses and relinquishes the CPU to another thread, so that other threads can get a chance to run. When this happens, all such threads that are ready to run, waiting for the CPU and the currently running thread lies in runnable state.
• Timed Waiting : A thread lies in timed waiting state when it calls a method with a time out parameter. A thread lies in this state until the timeout is completed or until a notification is received. For example, when a thread calls sleep or a conditional wait, it is moved to a timed waiting state.
• Waiting : A thread is in the waiting state when it waits for another thread on a condition. When this condition is fulfilled, the scheduler is notified and the waiting thread is moved to runnable state.
• Blocked : A thread is in the blocked state when it tries to access a protected section of code that is currently locked by some other thread. When the protected section is unlocked, the schedule picks one of the thread which is blocked for that section and moves it to the runnable state. A thread in this state cannot continue its execution any further until it is moved to runnable state. Any thread in these states does not consume any CPU cycle.
• Terminated : A thread terminates because of either of the following reasons:
  • Because it exists normally. This happens when the code of thread has entirely executed by the program.
  • Because there occurred some unusual erroneous event, like segmentation fault or an unhandled exception.

Sample Code for creating threads with diff. thread states:

public class ThreadStatesDemo {

    public static class WaitingThread extends Thread {
        @Override
        public void run() {
            Object o = new Object();
            try {
                synchronized (o) {
                    o.wait();
                }
            } catch (InterruptedException e) {
            }
        }
    }

    public static class SleepingThread extends Thread {
        @Override
        public void run() {
            try {
                Thread.sleep(100000);
            } catch (InterruptedException e) {
            }
        }
    }

    public static class RunningThread extends Thread {
        @Override
        public void run() {
            for (int i = 1; i > 0;) {

            }
        }
    }

    public static class TimedWaitingThread extends Thread {
        @Override
        public void run() {
            Object o = new Object();
            try {
                synchronized (o) {
                    o.wait(100000);
                }

            } catch (InterruptedException e) {
            }
        }
    }

    public static Integer mutex = 0;

    public static class BlockedThread extends Thread {
        @Override
        public void run() {
            try {
                Thread.sleep(1000);
                synchronized (mutex) {

                }
            } catch (InterruptedException e) {
            }

        }
    }

    public static class BlockingThread extends Thread {
        @Override
        public void run() {
            synchronized (mutex) {
                for (int i = 1; i > 0;) {

                }
            }
        }
    }

    public static void main(String[] args) {
        Thread wTh = new WaitingThread();
        wTh.setName("waiting");
        wTh.start();
        Thread sTh = new SleepingThread();
        sTh.setName("sleeping");
        sTh.start();

        Thread rTh = new RunningThread();
        rTh.setName("running");
        rTh.start();
        Thread twTh = new TimedWaitingThread();
        twTh.setName("timed waiting");
        twTh.start();
        Thread bldTh = new BlockedThread();
        bldTh.setName("blocked");
        bldTh.start();
        Thread blcTh = new BlockingThread();
        blcTh.setName("blocking");
        blcTh.start();

        try {
            Thread.sleep(1000000);
        } catch (InterruptedException e) {
        }
    }

}

When you will run the application , and take a jstack via jstack command , you will get some output like: this:

#command to take jstack 

jstack -l <pid>


2021-10-18 17:20:34
Full thread dump Java HotSpot(TM) 64-Bit Server VM (25.221-b11 mixed mode):



"blocking" #15 prio=5 os_prio=0 tid=0x00007f1ee411e800 nid=0xc99 runnable [0x00007f1eae09d000]
   java.lang.Thread.State: RUNNABLE
        at ThreadStatesDemo$BlockingThread.run(ThreadStatesDemo.java:69)
        - locked <0x000000076e5c0bb0> (a java.lang.Integer)

   Locked ownable synchronizers:
        - None

"blocked" #14 prio=5 os_prio=0 tid=0x00007f1ee411c800 nid=0xc98 waiting for monitor entry [0x00007f1eae19e000]
   java.lang.Thread.State: BLOCKED (on object monitor)
        at ThreadStatesDemo$BlockedThread.run(ThreadStatesDemo.java:56)
        - waiting to lock <0x000000076e5c0bb0> (a java.lang.Integer)

   Locked ownable synchronizers:
        - None

"timed waiting" #13 prio=5 os_prio=0 tid=0x00007f1ee411b000 nid=0xc97 in Object.wait() [0x00007f1eae29f000]
   java.lang.Thread.State: TIMED_WAITING (on object monitor)
        at java.lang.Object.wait(Native Method)
        - waiting on <0x000000076e938550> (a java.lang.Object)
        at ThreadStatesDemo$TimedWaitingThread.run(ThreadStatesDemo.java:41)
        - locked <0x000000076e938550> (a java.lang.Object)

   Locked ownable synchronizers:
        - None

"running" #12 prio=5 os_prio=0 tid=0x00007f1ee4119000 nid=0xc96 runnable [0x00007f1eae3a0000]
   java.lang.Thread.State: RUNNABLE
        at ThreadStatesDemo$RunningThread.run(ThreadStatesDemo.java:29)

   Locked ownable synchronizers:
        - None

"sleeping" #11 prio=5 os_prio=0 tid=0x00007f1ee4117000 nid=0xc95 waiting on condition [0x00007f1eae4a1000]
   java.lang.Thread.State: TIMED_WAITING (sleeping)
        at java.lang.Thread.sleep(Native Method)
        at ThreadStatesDemo$SleepingThread.run(ThreadStatesDemo.java:20)

   Locked ownable synchronizers:
        - None

"waiting" #10 prio=5 os_prio=0 tid=0x00007f1ee4115800 nid=0xc94 in Object.wait() [0x00007f1eae5a2000]
   java.lang.Thread.State: WAITING (on object monitor)
        at java.lang.Object.wait(Native Method)
        - waiting on <0x000000076e7fae38> (a java.lang.Object)
        at java.lang.Object.wait(Object.java:502)
        at ThreadStatesDemo$WaitingThread.run(ThreadStatesDemo.java:9)
        - locked <0x000000076e7fae38> (a java.lang.Object)

   Locked ownable synchronizers:
        - None

Now in this stack trace you can see the Thread State via the line:

java.lang.Thread.State: <THREAD STATE>

eg:

java.lang.Thread.State: WAITING (on object monitor)

In the code to create various Thread States a thread a created for each state or multiple thread for same state<representing how a particular thread state is reached>.

Let’s see:

• Thread State RUNNABLE – a thread with code wise just working in a single loop.
• Thread State WAITING – a thread with name waiting and code wise called wait() on a Object.
• Thread State BLOCKED – a thread with name blocked and code wise trying to get into synchronized block on a Object whose lock is already taken by thread with name blocking <blocking thread almost always take the lock first because of sleep in Blocked Thread>
• Thread State TIMED_WAITING – a thread with name timed_waiting and code wise called wait() with time<100000> on a Object and a thread with name sleeping and code wise called sleep on Thread Object.

Now i think you got an understanding of what all java thread states are there and how thread can end up in such state, there are more ways also apart from them.

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