Thread.Start Method

Causes the operating system to change the state of the current instance to ThreadState.Running.

[Visual Basic]
Public Sub Start()
[C#]
public void Start();
[C++]
public: void Start();
[JScript]
public function Start();

Exceptions

Remarks

Once a thread is in the Running state, the operating system can schedule it for execution. When the thread begins executing, the ThreadStart delegate supplied to the constructor for the thread invokes its methods.

Once the thread terminates, it cannot be restarted with another call to Start.

Example

[Visual Basic, C#, C++] The following code example demonstrates creating a thread and starting it.

[Visual Basic] 
Imports System
Imports System.Threading

Public Class ThreadWork
   
   Public Shared Sub DoWork()
      Dim i As Integer
      For i = 0 To 2
         Console.WriteLine("Working thread...")
         Thread.Sleep(100)
      Next i
   End Sub 'DoWork
End Class 'ThreadWork

Class ThreadTest
   
   Public Shared Sub Main()
      Dim myThreadDelegate As New ThreadStart(AddressOf ThreadWork.DoWork)
      Dim myThread As New Thread(myThreadDelegate)
      myThread.Start()
      Dim i As Integer
      For i = 0 To 2
         Console.WriteLine("In main.")
         Thread.Sleep(100)
      Next i
   End Sub 'Main
End Class 'ThreadTest

[C#] 
using System;
using System.Threading;

public class ThreadWork 
{
   public static void DoWork()
   {
      for(int i = 0; i<3;i++)
      {
         Console.WriteLine("Working thread...");
            Thread.Sleep(100);
      }
   }
}
class ThreadTest
{
   public static void Main()
   {
      ThreadStart myThreadDelegate = new ThreadStart(ThreadWork.DoWork);
      Thread myThread = new Thread(myThreadDelegate);
      myThread.Start();
         for(int i = 0; i<3; i++)
         {
         Console.WriteLine("In main.");
            Thread.Sleep(100);
         }
   }
}

[C++] 
#using <mscorlib.dll>

using namespace System;
using namespace System::Threading;

public __gc class ThreadWork 
{
public:
    static void DoWork()
    {
        for(int i = 0; i<3;i++)
        {
            Console::WriteLine(S"Working thread...");
            Thread::Sleep(100);
        }
    }
};

int main()
{
    ThreadStart* myThreadDelegate = new ThreadStart(0, &ThreadWork::DoWork);
    Thread* myThread = new Thread(myThreadDelegate);
    myThread->Start();
    for(int i = 0; i<3; i++)
    {
        Console::WriteLine(S"In main.");
        Thread::Sleep(100);
    }
}

[Visual Basic, C#, C++] This code produces the following output:

In main.
    Working thread...
    In main. Working thread...
    In main.
   Working thread...

[Visual Basic, C#, C++] Note that the sequence of the output statements is typical, but is not guaranteed to be identical across systems.

[JScript] No example is available for JScript. To view a Visual Basic, C#, or C++ example, click the Language Filter button in the upper-left corner of the page.

Requirements

Platforms: Windows 98, Windows NT 4.0, Windows Millennium Edition, Windows 2000, Windows XP Home Edition, Windows XP Professional, Windows Server 2003 family, .NET Compact Framework, Common Language Infrastructure (CLI) Standard

See Also

Thread Class | Thread Members | System.Threading Namespace | Creating Threads