Java shutdown hook call on windows shut down

Question

I have a situation in which I want to perform some task when the user signals the OS(in my case only Windows) to shutdown.

I have tried using java shutdown hooks. The problem I face is that when I exit the program using System.exit(0);, the shutdown hooks are called but when I directly shutdown the computer, they aren't.

This is the code I have used for the shutdown hooks-

Runtime.getRuntime().addShutdownHook(new JVMShutdownHook()); //in main method

//within the main java class
private static class JVMShutdownHook extends Thread {
@Override
public void run() {
   //perform tasks
}
}

Is there any way to interact with the OS(I'm assuming some native code) so that it allows my program to exit gracefully?

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Answer 1

ShutdownHooks indeed do not work by shutdown of Windows. I consider it as a bug of Java and opened a BugReport last week. It has however not (yet) been published.

There was an old Bug Report in 2008: Runtime#addShutdownHook does not work on Windows Vista, when user logs out. The same problem occurs with Windows 7. The ticket was closed by java.com without a satifying response.

Windows gives by shutdown some time to the applications to terminate gracefully. The delay is defined by the registry key WaitToKillApplication. I expect the java program uses this delay to execute the hooks (and the finalizes if Runtime.runFinalizersOnExit() is set).

Let see if Oracle recognizes it as a bug...