Threading help... threads???

**Chris Dunaway** · Nov 21 '05, 12:12 PM

Re: Threading help... threads???

After a quick glance, it appears as if you have an endless loop. You
have these lines of code in the callout function:

Do
Thread.CurrentT hread.Sleep(100 )
Loop

It will never exit that loop. Secondly, you appear to be calling back
into the main form from the thread. This is also not a good idea, and
the Windows forms controls are not thread safe. At the end of this
post, I added a small class that you can use to create derived classes
that run in their own thread. The thread wrapper class just
encapsulates a thread and make it easy to create classes that run on
that thread.

We tried using VoiceBocx with your approach but utimately decided on a
different approach. We wrote it so that each line basically ran in a
loop on a separate thread. In the loop the thread would check a "call
queue" to see if there were any calls to be made. If so, they would
remove the call record from the queue and make the call. They would
then store the call progress results to a separate results queue.
There was a single thread running that would process that queue.

We used a single queue to service all lines on the application, but if
you have a small number of lines, you could have a separate queue for
each line, but whatever process fills the queues would have to have
some sort of distribution logic so that all lines would keep busy.

Basically we had a thread that would query the database or file for the
phone numbers to be called. These would be placed on a call queue.

Each vbocx line would run on its own thread in a loop until told to
stop. The loop would check the queue to see if there were any calls to
make. If so, it would grab a call from the queue and make the call and
deliver the message. It would then place the call progress result
(Busy, No Answer, etc) on a result queue. If there were no calls on
the queue to be made, the Vbocx thread would wait for a short time for
any inbound calls, it would then repeat the loop.

There was another thread whose job was to process the items in the
result queue and update the database with the results.

Here is a class that you derive your TrunkThread from that makes it
easy to start a line on a thread. Although it is simple, you could
modify it if necessary. To use it, you derive your class from it like
this:

Public Class TrunkThread
Inherits ThreadWrapperBa se

Protected Overrides Sub Execute()
'This is where you would put the loop of execution of the
thread
'For example:

Do
'Get call to make from database or call queue
'Make call and Deliver message if answered
'Store results of call on call result queue or in
database
'Monitor line for an incoming call
Loop Until bStopProcessing
End Sub

End Class

Then to use it and start your thread, you would use code like this:

Dim MyTrunkThread As New TrunkThread
MyTrunkThread.S tart

'ThreadWrapperB ase class
Public MustInherit Class ThreadWrapperBa se

'Our thread object
Public ReadOnly Thread As System.Threadin g.Thread

Public Sub New()
'Create the thread
Me.Thread = New System.Threadin g.Thread(Addres sOf
Me.StartThread)
End Sub

'Starts execution of the thread
Public Overridable Sub Start()
Me.Thread.Start ()
End Sub

'Aborts the thread. this sub can be overridden to kill the thread
more gracefully
Public Overridable Sub [Stop]()
Me.Thread.Abort ()
End Sub

'Property to indicate the thread is completed
Private m_IsCompleted As Boolean
Public ReadOnly Property IsCompleted() As Boolean
Get
Return m_IsCompleted
End Get
End Property

'When the thread is started, this is the sub that is called, it in
turn calls the Execute method which
'derived classes must override.
Private Sub StartThread()
m_IsCompleted = False
Execute()
m_IsCompleted = True
End Sub

'This is the sub that performs the "work" of the thread. It must
be overridden in the derived class
Protected MustOverride Sub Execute()

End Class

**Keith Mills** · Nov 21 '05, 12:12 PM

Re: Threading help... threads???

Greetings Chris!!

Thanks for the reply...

I simply have the thread.currentt hread.sleep(100 ) in there to basically sit
and wait after making the callout, because we are then going to conference
this thread / trunk with an inbound call thread.

I had the basic threads started, all where running with application.run
which means they would jump to the INBOUNDCALL event when the voicebocx
received a call, I was then attempting to trigger the outbound call with a
button on the main form (this is all for testing at this point), and this is
where the blocking occurred.

I then changed the main thread, so that instead of calling APPLICATION.RUN
to startup the messaging queue, that it sat in a loop doing the following

While True
Thread.CurrentT hread.Sleep(100 )
If bcallout = True Then
RaiseEvent CallOut(iTrunk)
End If
if mvoicebocx.trun kstate=whatever the inboundcalling state was then
RaiseEvent InboundCall()
end if
End While

As surprisingly considering that the mvoicebocx was declared withevents the
regular INBOUNDCALL event was never triggered... but in this loop
methodology the trunkstate never amounts to a ringing call either.....

Very confusing....

"Chris Dunaway" <dunawayc@gmail .com> wrote in message
news:1108152909 .350827.88280@l 41g2000cwc.goog legroups.com...[color=blue]
> After a quick glance, it appears as if you have an endless loop. You
> have these lines of code in the callout function:
>
> Do
> Thread.CurrentT hread.Sleep(100 )
> Loop
>
> It will never exit that loop. Secondly, you appear to be calling back
> into the main form from the thread. This is also not a good idea, and
> the Windows forms controls are not thread safe. At the end of this
> post, I added a small class that you can use to create derived classes
> that run in their own thread. The thread wrapper class just
> encapsulates a thread and make it easy to create classes that run on
> that thread.
>
> We tried using VoiceBocx with your approach but utimately decided on a
> different approach. We wrote it so that each line basically ran in a
> loop on a separate thread. In the loop the thread would check a "call
> queue" to see if there were any calls to be made. If so, they would
> remove the call record from the queue and make the call. They would
> then store the call progress results to a separate results queue.
> There was a single thread running that would process that queue.
>
> We used a single queue to service all lines on the application, but if
> you have a small number of lines, you could have a separate queue for
> each line, but whatever process fills the queues would have to have
> some sort of distribution logic so that all lines would keep busy.
>
> Basically we had a thread that would query the database or file for the
> phone numbers to be called. These would be placed on a call queue.
>
> Each vbocx line would run on its own thread in a loop until told to
> stop. The loop would check the queue to see if there were any calls to
> make. If so, it would grab a call from the queue and make the call and
> deliver the message. It would then place the call progress result
> (Busy, No Answer, etc) on a result queue. If there were no calls on
> the queue to be made, the Vbocx thread would wait for a short time for
> any inbound calls, it would then repeat the loop.
>
> There was another thread whose job was to process the items in the
> result queue and update the database with the results.
>
>
> Here is a class that you derive your TrunkThread from that makes it
> easy to start a line on a thread. Although it is simple, you could
> modify it if necessary. To use it, you derive your class from it like
> this:
>
> Public Class TrunkThread
> Inherits ThreadWrapperBa se
>
> Protected Overrides Sub Execute()
> 'This is where you would put the loop of execution of the
> thread
> 'For example:
>
> Do
> 'Get call to make from database or call queue
> 'Make call and Deliver message if answered
> 'Store results of call on call result queue or in
> database
> 'Monitor line for an incoming call
> Loop Until bStopProcessing
> End Sub
>
> End Class
>
> Then to use it and start your thread, you would use code like this:
>
> Dim MyTrunkThread As New TrunkThread
> MyTrunkThread.S tart
>
>
> 'ThreadWrapperB ase class
> Public MustInherit Class ThreadWrapperBa se
>
> 'Our thread object
> Public ReadOnly Thread As System.Threadin g.Thread
>
> Public Sub New()
> 'Create the thread
> Me.Thread = New System.Threadin g.Thread(Addres sOf
> Me.StartThread)
> End Sub
>
> 'Starts execution of the thread
> Public Overridable Sub Start()
> Me.Thread.Start ()
> End Sub
>
> 'Aborts the thread. this sub can be overridden to kill the thread
> more gracefully
> Public Overridable Sub [Stop]()
> Me.Thread.Abort ()
> End Sub
>
> 'Property to indicate the thread is completed
> Private m_IsCompleted As Boolean
> Public ReadOnly Property IsCompleted() As Boolean
> Get
> Return m_IsCompleted
> End Get
> End Property
>
> 'When the thread is started, this is the sub that is called, it in
> turn calls the Execute method which
> 'derived classes must override.
> Private Sub StartThread()
> m_IsCompleted = False
> Execute()
> m_IsCompleted = True
> End Sub
>
> 'This is the sub that performs the "work" of the thread. It must
> be overridden in the derived class
> Protected MustOverride Sub Execute()
>
> End Class
>[/color]

**Keith Mills** · Nov 21 '05, 12:12 PM

Re: Threading help... threads???

I think we have it all figured out!!!

Thanks CHRIS!!! That was an IMMENSE HELP!!!!!!!!!!

Where do I send the KUDOS???

"Chris Dunaway" <dunawayc@gmail .com> wrote in message
news:1108152909 .350827.88280@l 41g2000cwc.goog legroups.com...[color=blue]
> After a quick glance, it appears as if you have an endless loop. You
> have these lines of code in the callout function:
>
> Do
> Thread.CurrentT hread.Sleep(100 )
> Loop
>
> It will never exit that loop. Secondly, you appear to be calling back
> into the main form from the thread. This is also not a good idea, and
> the Windows forms controls are not thread safe. At the end of this
> post, I added a small class that you can use to create derived classes
> that run in their own thread. The thread wrapper class just
> encapsulates a thread and make it easy to create classes that run on
> that thread.
>
> We tried using VoiceBocx with your approach but utimately decided on a
> different approach. We wrote it so that each line basically ran in a
> loop on a separate thread. In the loop the thread would check a "call
> queue" to see if there were any calls to be made. If so, they would
> remove the call record from the queue and make the call. They would
> then store the call progress results to a separate results queue.
> There was a single thread running that would process that queue.
>
> We used a single queue to service all lines on the application, but if
> you have a small number of lines, you could have a separate queue for
> each line, but whatever process fills the queues would have to have
> some sort of distribution logic so that all lines would keep busy.
>
> Basically we had a thread that would query the database or file for the
> phone numbers to be called. These would be placed on a call queue.
>
> Each vbocx line would run on its own thread in a loop until told to
> stop. The loop would check the queue to see if there were any calls to
> make. If so, it would grab a call from the queue and make the call and
> deliver the message. It would then place the call progress result
> (Busy, No Answer, etc) on a result queue. If there were no calls on
> the queue to be made, the Vbocx thread would wait for a short time for
> any inbound calls, it would then repeat the loop.
>
> There was another thread whose job was to process the items in the
> result queue and update the database with the results.
>
>
> Here is a class that you derive your TrunkThread from that makes it
> easy to start a line on a thread. Although it is simple, you could
> modify it if necessary. To use it, you derive your class from it like
> this:
>
> Public Class TrunkThread
> Inherits ThreadWrapperBa se
>
> Protected Overrides Sub Execute()
> 'This is where you would put the loop of execution of the
> thread
> 'For example:
>
> Do
> 'Get call to make from database or call queue
> 'Make call and Deliver message if answered
> 'Store results of call on call result queue or in
> database
> 'Monitor line for an incoming call
> Loop Until bStopProcessing
> End Sub
>
> End Class
>
> Then to use it and start your thread, you would use code like this:
>
> Dim MyTrunkThread As New TrunkThread
> MyTrunkThread.S tart
>
>
> 'ThreadWrapperB ase class
> Public MustInherit Class ThreadWrapperBa se
>
> 'Our thread object
> Public ReadOnly Thread As System.Threadin g.Thread
>
> Public Sub New()
> 'Create the thread
> Me.Thread = New System.Threadin g.Thread(Addres sOf
> Me.StartThread)
> End Sub
>
> 'Starts execution of the thread
> Public Overridable Sub Start()
> Me.Thread.Start ()
> End Sub
>
> 'Aborts the thread. this sub can be overridden to kill the thread
> more gracefully
> Public Overridable Sub [Stop]()
> Me.Thread.Abort ()
> End Sub
>
> 'Property to indicate the thread is completed
> Private m_IsCompleted As Boolean
> Public ReadOnly Property IsCompleted() As Boolean
> Get
> Return m_IsCompleted
> End Get
> End Property
>
> 'When the thread is started, this is the sub that is called, it in
> turn calls the Execute method which
> 'derived classes must override.
> Private Sub StartThread()
> m_IsCompleted = False
> Execute()
> m_IsCompleted = True
> End Sub
>
> 'This is the sub that performs the "work" of the thread. It must
> be overridden in the derived class
> Protected MustOverride Sub Execute()
>
> End Class
>[/color]

Threading help... threads???

Threading help... threads???

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