Is java Thread using Real time timer in system or it has it's own dedicated timer?

Question

Does any one know what timer the Thread.sleep(1000) method uses? Does Thread using real time system timer or does it has it's own dedicated timer?

Thanks in advance for answers.

Answer 1

The Java Language Specification defers the details of the semantics of this method to the underlying system. Thus the behaviour will depend on which JVM implementation, which rt.jar you're using and presumably also which OS and hardware the application is running on.

This is all that is said about the method in the JLS (Chapter 17: Threads and Locks):

17.9 Sleep and Yield

Thread.sleep causes the currently executing thread to sleep (temporarily cease execution) for the specified duration, subject to the precision and accuracy of system timers and schedulers. The thread does not lose ownership of any monitors, and resumption of execution will depend on scheduling and the availability of processors on which to execute the thread.

Neither a sleep for a period of zero time nor a yield operation need have observable effects.

It is important to note that neither Thread.sleep nor Thread.yield have any synchronization semantics. In particular, the compiler does not have to flush writes cached in registers out to shared memory before a call to Thread.sleep or Thread.yield, nor does the compiler have to reload values cached in registers after a call to Thread.sleep or Thread.yield.

Answer 2

Thread.sleep(long) is a native method. How it works is dependent on the OS and JVM implementation.

You can take a look at the native source in jvm.cpp [openjdk.java.net]:

JVM_ENTRY(void, JVM_Sleep(JNIEnv* env, jclass threadClass, jlong millis))
  JVMWrapper("JVM_Sleep");

  if (millis < 0) {
    THROW_MSG(vmSymbols::java_lang_IllegalArgumentException(), "timeout value is negative");
  }

  if (Thread::is_interrupted (THREAD, true) && !HAS_PENDING_EXCEPTION) {
    THROW_MSG(vmSymbols::java_lang_InterruptedException(), "sleep interrupted");
  }

  // Save current thread state and restore it at the end of this block.
  // And set new thread state to SLEEPING.
  JavaThreadSleepState jtss(thread);

  HS_DTRACE_PROBE1(hotspot, thread__sleep__begin, millis);

  if (millis == 0) {
    // When ConvertSleepToYield is on, this matches the classic VM implementation of
    // JVM_Sleep. Critical for similar threading behaviour (Win32)
    // It appears that in certain GUI contexts, it may be beneficial to do a short sleep
    // for SOLARIS
    if (ConvertSleepToYield) {
      os::yield();
    } else {
      ThreadState old_state = thread->osthread()->get_state();
      thread->osthread()->set_state(SLEEPING);
      os::sleep(thread, MinSleepInterval, false);
      thread->osthread()->set_state(old_state);
    }
  } else {
    ThreadState old_state = thread->osthread()->get_state();
    thread->osthread()->set_state(SLEEPING);
    if (os::sleep(thread, millis, true) == OS_INTRPT) {
      // An asynchronous exception (e.g., ThreadDeathException) could have been thrown on
      // us while we were sleeping. We do not overwrite those.
      if (!HAS_PENDING_EXCEPTION) {
        HS_DTRACE_PROBE1(hotspot, thread__sleep__end,1);
        // TODO-FIXME: THROW_MSG returns which means we will not call set_state()
        // to properly restore the thread state.  That's likely wrong.
        THROW_MSG(vmSymbols::java_lang_InterruptedException(), "sleep interrupted");
      }
    }
    thread->osthread()->set_state(old_state);
  }
  HS_DTRACE_PROBE1(hotspot, thread__sleep__end,0);
JVM_END

In the code above it is calling the operating system's sleep function.