Re: RunLoop vs Thread ?

[Richard Frith-Macdonald]

On Monday, May 19, 2003, at 07:59  pm, Yen-Ju Chen wrote:

> Hi,
>
>  Does it have more advantage to using RunLoop than Thread
>  in terms of non-blocking user interface ?
>  Some tasks in CodeEditor take about 2-3 seconds depending on the file 
> size,
>  which block the user input and is annoying.
>  Would it be better to implement these kinds task into RunLoop than 
> Thread ?
>  I feel thread is more difficult to debug
>  and need to be careful when coupled with GUI component.
>  But I never touch RunLoop before and am not sure it is suitable.

NSRunLoop is good if your tasks can be divided into portions each 
taking a small fraction of a second and either handled in response to a 
timeout or to I/O completion.

I agree that it's usually best to avoid threads if you can, but if your 
tasks are time consuming and can't readily be divided up, you may be 
stuck with using threads.