Java™ How To Program (Early Objects), Tenth Edition

Concurrent Programming Is Difficult

Writing multithreaded programs can be tricky. Although the human mind can perform functions concurrently, people find it difficult to jump between parallel trains of thought. To see why multithreaded programs can be difficult to write and understand, try the following experiment: Open three books to page 1, and try reading the books concurrently. Read a few words from the first book, then a few from the second, then a few from the third, then loop back and read the next few words from the first book, and so on. After this experiment, you’ll appreciate many of the challenges of multithreading—switching between the books, reading briefly, remembering your place in each book, moving the book you’re reading closer ...