JUnit test not executing all threads created within the test

Question

I wrote a simple example for threading which generates tables for numbers starting from 1 to 20. when I tested it with main method it executes all the threads (prints all the messages), while all threads are not being run (all messages are not being printed) most of the times (sometimes it runs all the threads) when doing the same with JUnit test. I think there should not be any difference in terms of output.

Here is the class with main method:

public class Calculator implements Runnable {

    private int number;

    Calculator(final int number){
        this.number = number;
    }

   @Override
   public void run() {
        for(int i = 1; i <= 10; i++){
            System.out.printf("%s : %d * %d =  %d \n", Thread.currentThread().getName(), number, i, number * i);
        }

   }

    public static void main(String[] args){
        Calculator calculator = null;
        Thread thread = null;
        for(int i = 1; i < 21; i ++){
            calculator = new Calculator(i);
            thread = new Thread(calculator);
            System.out.println(thread.getName() + " Created");
            thread.start();
            System.out.println(thread.getName() + " Started");
        }

     }

}

When I invoke the main method it prints all the results.

Bellow is the code for JUnit test equivalent to the main method:

public class CalculatorTest {

private Calculator calculator;
private Thread thread;

@Test
public void testCalculator() {
    for(int i = 1; i < 21; i ++){
        calculator = new Calculator(i);
        thread = new Thread(calculator);
        System.out.println(thread.getName() + " Created");
        thread.start();
        System.out.println(thread.getName() + " Started");
     }
 }

}

When I run the above test case, the behavior of the output is not consistant in the scene that sometimes it prints all the messages and most of the times prints only a few and exits. Here is the output captured in case of the above JUnit test case:

Thread-0 Created
Thread-0 Started
Thread-1 Created
Thread-1 Started
Thread-2 Created
Thread-2 Started
Thread-3 Created
Thread-3 Started
Thread-4 Created
Thread-4 Started
Thread-5 Created
Thread-5 Started 
Thread-6 Created
Thread-6 Started
Thread-7 Created
Thread-7 Started
Thread-8 Created
Thread-8 Started
Thread-9 Created
Thread-9 Started
Thread-10 Created
Thread-10 Started
Thread-11 Created
Thread-11 Started
Thread-12 Created
Thread-12 Started
Thread-13 Created
Thread-13 Started
Thread-14 Created
Thread-14 Started
Thread-15 Created
Thread-15 Started
Thread-16 Created
Thread-16 Started
Thread-17 Created
Thread-17 Started
Thread-18 Created  
Thread-18 Started
Thread-19 Created 
Thread-19 Started
Thread-0 : 1 * 1 =  1 
Thread-0 : 1 * 2 =  2 
Thread-0 : 1 * 3 =  3 
Thread-0 : 1 * 4 =  4 
Thread-0 : 1 * 5 =  5 
Thread-0 : 1 * 6 =  6 
Thread-0 : 1 * 7 =  7 
Thread-0 : 1 * 8 =  8 
Thread-0 : 1 * 9 =  9 
Thread-0 : 1 * 10 =  10 
Thread-2 : 3 * 1 =  3 
Thread-2 : 3 * 2 =  6 
Thread-2 : 3 * 3 =  9 
Thread-2 : 3 * 4 =  12 
Thread-2 : 3 * 5 =  15 
Thread-2 : 3 * 6 =  18 
Thread-2 : 3 * 7 =  21 

Output ends here without printing the remaining messages in other threads/ executing other threads.

Can somebody help me to understand the reason behind this. Thanks in advance.

Answer 1

JUnit is exiting the test method early. You need to wait for all of the threads to complete before you exit the testCalculator() method.

An easy way to do that is by using a CountDownLatch.

1. Initialize a CountDownLatch with CountDownLatch latch = new CountDownLatch(20).

2. Pass each Calculator runnable a reference to the latch. At the end of the run() method, call latch.countDown().

3. At the end of the testCalculator() method call latch.await(). This will block until latch.countDown() has been called 20 times (i.e. when all threads have completed).

Answer 2

Your test method finishes before all the spawned threads are finished. When the JUnit executor finishes, all spawned threads are killed.

If you want to run this kind of test, you should keep a collection of the threads you have created and join() each of them at the end of your test method. The calls to join() each thread are executed in a second loop (following the loop that starts all the threads).

Something like this:

@Test
public void testCalculator() {
    List<Thread> threads = new ArrayList<>();
    for (int i = 1; i < 21; i++) {
        calculator = new Calculator(i);
        thread = new Thread(calculator);
        threads.add(thread);
        System.out.println(thread.getName() + " Created");
        thread.start();
        System.out.println(thread.getName() + " Started");
    }
    for (Thread thread : threads) {
        thread.join();
    }
 }

If you want to have the threads all start around the same time (e.g., if your loop that is creating the threads does some non-trivial work each time through the loop):

@Test
public void testCalculator() {
    List<Thread> threads = new ArrayList<>();
    for (int i = 1; i < 21; i++) {
        threads.add(new Thread(new Calculator(i)));
    }
    for (Thread thread : threads) {
        thread.start();
    }
    for (Thread thread : threads) {
        thread.join();
    }
}