BackgroundWorker and Threads

Question

What are the pros and cons in using the either for achieving a given task.

The million dollar question is which one to use and when?

Many Thanks.

Answer 1

If by "Threads" you mean explicitly using the System.Threading.Thread class to create, configure and kick off your own threads, then the answer is that doing this is more work on your part, involves more cpu cycles than just pulling a thread from the thread pool, (wjhich is what the other techniques do), but it gives you more flexibility, as it allows you to specify thread priority, and several other characteristics that using Thread Pool threads does not afford you.

The "Thread Pool" approach is more appropriate when the number of threads required is not known at design time. The pool initially contains a small number of threads, “ready” for you to call upon them. It can dynamically create new threads on demand, and it manages creation, coordination, and deletion of unused threads for you. There are three mechanisms you can use to access and use threads from the pool.

1. Using Delegate.BeginInvoke() (the most common technique)
2. Using timers (several variations)
3. System.Threading.ThreadPool provides several other features (BackGroundWorker class, QueueUserWorkItem(), etc.).