What kills an Android AsyncTask?

Question

PrintStatusTask parses the contents of a gmail inbox looking for various items of interest to report on. But a new AsyncTask is created for each PrintStatusTask().execute() according to the debugger. Shouldn't these tasks die on exit? Do they have to be killed manually?

public class Controller extends Activity {
    ...
    private boolean applyMenuChoice(MenuItem item) {
        switch (item.getItemId()) {
        case R.id.menuStatus:
            new PrintStatusTask().execute();
            ...
    class PrintStatusTask extends AsyncTask<Void, String, Void> {
        @Override
        protected Void doInBackground(Void... unused) {
            ...
            return null;
        }
        @Override
        protected void onPostExecute(Void unused) {
            this.cancel(true);
        }   
    }
}

Answer 1

If you keep a reference to the task around, you can call its cancel method to cancel it. Otherwise, they live as long as your app's process does, or until they return from the doInBackground and (if present) onPostExecute functions.

Answer 2

I found a good answer here.