ap te r T h r ee

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Th r ea d s

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Contents
• Definition
• Thread vs process
• Thread advantage
• Single vs multithread
• Why thread
• Thread types

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THREAD…
• A thread refers to a single sequential flow of activities being
executed in a process
• A thread is a lightweight process as it possesses some of the
properties of process (states + scheduling + register + program
counter + stack space…)
• For example, in a browser, multiple tabs can be different threads.
MS Word uses multiple threads: one thread to format the text,
another thread to process inputs, etc.
• Most modern applications are multithreaded
• Threads run within application
• Process creation is heavy-weight while thread creation is light-
weight (why?) Discuss
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Why thread is lightweight…
• Thread uses fewer resources compared to process
• Threads share the same address space but processes
cannot
• Context switch among threads is fast compared to
that of context switch for process (switching is time
consuming in process)
• Thread termination is less time

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Difference Between Process and
Thread
• The primary difference is that threads within the same process
run in a shared memory space, while processes run in separate
memory spaces.
• Threads are not independent of one another like processes are,
and as a result, threads share with other threads their code
section, data section, hence no inter-process
communication.
• Thread allows multiple executions to take place in the same
process environment, called multithreading but processes
executed in different environment.
• similarity of thread and process are, like process, a thread has
its own program counter (PC), register set, and stack space.
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Web server request

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 Benefits
• Responsiveness – may allow continued execution if
part of process is blocked, especially important for user
interfaces
• Resource Sharing – threads share resources of
process, easier than shared memory or message
passing
• Economy – cheaper than process creation, thread
switching lower overhead than context switching
• Scalability – process can take advantage of
multiprocessor architectures
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Single and Multithreaded Processes

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 (a) Three processes each with one thread.
(b)One process with three threads each thread has a
program counter, registers stack, and state; but all
threads of a process share address space, global
variables and other resources such as open files,
etc.

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 • The first column lists some items
shared by all threads in a process.
• The second one lists some items
private to each thread.

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Threads-usage :-Why we do need
threads?
• Simplifying the programming model since many
activities are going on at once.
• They are easier to create and destroy than processes
since they don't have any resources attached to them
• Performance improves by overlapping activities if there
is too much I/O
• Real parallelism is possible if there are multiple CPUs
• Note: implementation details are beyond the scope of
the course (distributed systems).

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Threads-usage :-Why we do need
threads?
• E.g., a word processor has different parts; parts for
• Interacting with the user
• Formatting the page as soon as the changes are made
• Timed savings (for auto recovery)
• Spelling and grammar checking

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Multithreading Models
Many-to-One
 Many user-level threads mapped to
single kernel thread
 One thread blocking causes all to block
 Multiple threads may not run in parallel
on multi-core system because only one
may be in kernel at a time
 Few systems currently use this model
 Examples:
 Solaris Green Threads
 GNU Portable Threads

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Types of thread
• User level threads - management done by user-level threads library,
kernel knows nothing about them
• Three primary thread libraries:
• POSIX Pthreads
• Windows threads
• Java threads
• Kernel level threads - Supported by the Kernel
• Examples – virtually all general purpose operating systems, including:
• Windows
• Solaris
• Linux
• Tru64 UNIX
• Mac OS X

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 One-to-One
• Each user-level thread maps to
kernel thread
• Creating a user-level thread creates
a kernel thread
• More concurrency than many-to-one
• Number of threads per process
sometimes restricted due to
overhead
• Examples
• Windows
• Linux
• Solaris 9 and later

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 Many-to-Many Model

• Allows many user level

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