How do we use runOnUiThread in Android?

Question

Below is corrected Snippet of runThread Function.

private void runThread() {

    new Thread() {
        public void run() {
            while (i++ < 1000) {
                try {
                    runOnUiThread(new Runnable() {

                        @Override
                        public void run() {
                            btn.setText("#" + i);
                        }
                    });
                    Thread.sleep(300);
                } catch (InterruptedException e) {
                    e.printStackTrace();
                }
            }
        }
    }.start();
}

Just wrap it as a function, then call this function from your background thread.

public void debugMsg(String msg) {
    final String str = msg;
    runOnUiThread(new Runnable() {
        @Override
        public void run() {
            mInfo.setText(str);
        }
    });
}

You have it back-to-front. Your button click results in a call to runOnUiThread(), but this isn't needed, since the click handler is already running on the UI thread. Then, your code in runOnUiThread() is launching a new background thread, where you try to do UI operations, which then fail.

Instead, just launch the background thread directly from your click handler. Then, wrap the calls to btn.setText() inside a call to runOnUiThread().

runOnUiThread(new Runnable() {
                public void run() {
                //Do something on UiThread
            }
        });

There are several techniques using of runOnUiThread(), lets see all

This is my main thread (UI thread) called AndroidBasicThreadActivity and I'm going to update it from a worker thread in various ways -

public class AndroidBasicThreadActivity extends AppCompatActivity
{
    public static TextView textView;
    @Override
    protected void onCreate(Bundle savedInstanceState)
    {
        super.onCreate(savedInstanceState);
        setContentView(R.layout.activity_android_basic_thread);

        textView = (TextView) findViewById(R.id.textview);

        MyAndroidThread myTask = new MyAndroidThread(AndroidBasicThreadActivity.this);
        Thread t1 = new Thread(myTask, "Bajrang");
        t1.start();
    }
}

1.) By passing Activity's instance as an argument on worker thread

class MyAndroidThread implements Runnable
{
    Activity activity;
    public MyAndroidThread(Activity activity)
    {
        this.activity = activity;
    }
    @Override
    public void run()
    {

        //perform heavy task here and finally update the UI with result this way - 
        activity.runOnUiThread(new Runnable()
        {
            @Override
            public void run()
            {
                AndroidBasicThreadActivity.textView.setText("Hello!! Android Team :-) From child thread.");
            }
        });
    }
}

2.) By using View's post(Runnable runnable) method in worker thread

class MyAndroidThread implements Runnable
{
    Activity activity;
    public MyAndroidThread(Activity activity)
    {
        this.activity = activity;
    }
    @Override
    public void run()
    {
     //perform heavy task here and finally update the UI with result this way - 
       AndroidBasicThreadActivity.textView.post(new Runnable()
      { 
        @Override
        public void run()
        {
            AndroidBasicThreadActivity.textView.setText("Hello!! Android Team :-) From child thread.");
        }
    });

    }
}

3.) By using Handler class from android.os package If we don't have the context (this/ getApplicationContext()) or Activity's instance (AndroidBasicThreadActivity.this) then we have to use Handler class as below -

class MyAndroidThread implements Runnable
{
    Activity activity;
    public MyAndroidThread(Activity activity)
    {
        this.activity = activity;
    }
    @Override
   public void run()
  {
  //perform heavy task here and finally update the UI with result this way - 
  new Handler(Looper.getMainLooper()).post(new Runnable() {
        public void run() {
            AndroidBasicThreadActivity.textView.setText("Hello!! Android Team :-) From child thread.");
        }
    });
  }
}

If using in fragment then simply write

getActivity().runOnUiThread(new Runnable() {
    @Override
    public void run() {
        // Do something on UiThread
    }
});

We use Worker Thread to make Apps smoother and avoid ANR's. We may need to update UI after the heavy process in worker Tread. The UI can only be updated from UI Thread. In such cases, we use Handler or runOnUiThread both have a Runnable run method that executes in UI Thread. The onClick method runs in UI thread so don't need to use runOnUiThread here.

Using Kotlin

While in Activity,

this.runOnUiThread {
      // Do stuff
}

From Fragment,

activity?.runOnUiThread {
      // Do stuff
}

Using Java,

this.runOnUiThread(new Runnable() {
     void run() {
         // Do stuff
     }
});