how to update view in UI thread from worker thread

Question

I have two threads running one id UI and other is worker thread. Worker thread continuously reads on port for some data from server, when appears I need to update my webview in UI thread. Worker thread again continues to read and never ends. Plz suggest how to accomplish this??

it may be likely as 'signals in C++' which causes a method in called thread to be invoked..!! I tried: 1)As running worker thread on UI (runOnUIThread)may degrade UI webview performance, and if I put the thread on sleep it may miss data appeared at port when sleeping..(i m not sure!) 2)using Handler, I hav to specify time before calling thread again n again which may cause to miss data if appeared on port as like sleep(). 3)Having a separate thread in same class,it gives: any other thread cant update view of main UI thread.

Plz help.. :(

Answer 1

Maybe I am missing something, but it seems like creating a Handler object and then using the post() method is what you need: http://developer.android.com/reference/android/os/Handler.html#post%28java.lang.Runnable%29

Answer 2

I had a similar problem. I have a UI thread and a few threads that do backend serverices. I use the observer Pattern to have the services update the UI and to do so I have the update method in a new thread and call runOnUiThread() to have it update the UI. It seems to work well for something quick. If you want something better than a quick band-aid I would suggest reading this android threading guide from Google and trying to incorporate it with your design.