C++: A nice thread class

Java and .Net have very nice and easy ways to create threads. We can trun any class into a thread within seconds and that's probably one of their coolest features. As a Win32 C++ programmer, we don't have this advantage. But we can achieve this very easily. Here is how.

Following is my thread class which you need to include to make threading a piece of cake.

The class:

  1 class Thread
  2 {
  3 public:
  4  Thread()
  5  {
  6     hThread = 0;
  7  }
  8
  9  void start()
 10  {
 11     _threadObj = this;
 12
 13     DWORD threadID;
 14     hThread = CreateThread(0, 0, threadProc, _threadObj, 0, &threadID);
 15  }
 16
 17  void stop()
 18  {
 19     if (hThread)
 20      TerminateThread (hThread, 0);
 21  }
 22
 23  virtual void run() = 0;
 24
 25 protected:
 26  static unsigned long __stdcall threadProc(void* ptr)
 27  {
 28     ((Thread*)ptr)->run();
 29     return 0;
 30  }
 31
 32  Thread *_threadObj;
 33  HANDLE    hThread;
 34 };
 35 

Example of usages:

 36 class YourClass: public Thread
 37 {
 38 public:
 39  YourClass() { }
 40  ~YourClass() { }
 41
 42  //the run function, you need to override this one
 43  void run();
 44
 45 private:
 46  //private variables
 47 };
 48
 49 void YourClass::run()
 50 {
 51  //Add your threaded code here
 52 }
 53
 54 int main()
 55 {
 56  YourClass obj;
 57  obj.start();
 58
 59  //the thread is running
 60
 61  obj.stop();
 62
 63  //the thread is stopped
 64  return 0;
 65 }
 66

Looks cool, right? It's your turn to try it. Happy threading.