What is CyclicBarrier in Java
CyclicBarrier in Java is a synchronizer introduced in JDK 5 on java.util.Concurrent package along with other concurrent utility like Counting Semaphore, BlockingQueue, ConcurrentHashMap etc. CyclicBarrier is similar to CountDownLatch which we have seen in last article What is CountDownLatch in Java and allows multiple threads to wait for each other (barrier) before proceeding. Difference between CountDownLatch and CyclicBarrier is a also very popular multi-threading interview question in Java. CyclicBarrier is a natural requirement for concurrent program because it can be used to perform final part of task once individual tasks are completed. All threads which wait for each other to reach barrier are called parties, CyclicBarrier is initialized with number of parties to be wait and threads wait for each other by calling CyclicBarrier.await() method which is a blocking method in Java and blocks until all Thread or parties call await(). In general calling await() is shout out that Thread is waiting on barrier. await() is a blocking call but can be timed out or Interrupted by other thread. In this Java concurrency tutorial we will see What is CyclicBarrier in Java and an example of CyclicBarrier on which three Threads will wait for each other before proceeding further.
