Get .NET thread type?

Question

From my current process in .NET I can get a list of all its threads. Is it possible to find out what kind of thread it is? To get details if it's for example a worker, IO, CLR, backgroud or main thread?

Answer 1

There is not going to be a one-size-fits-all solution for doing this.

• You can check the Thread.IsBackground property to see if it is a background thread (that is according to the definition of background that the property is using that is).
• You can take advantage of the Thread.Name name property to identify it later.
• You can use thread local storage to stuff information "into" a thread which you can extract later to identify it.
• You can use the Thread.IsThreadPoolThread to see if it is a thread managed by the thread pool.

Each of these has their own advantages and disadvantages. I think you are going to find it difficult to identify a thread without having attached some kind of information to it ahead of time.