Is there a way to block the main thread until a swingworker is done?

Question

Possible Duplicate:
How do I wait for a SwingWorker's doInBackground() method?

I've read that its really bad practice to do this but I think its the best way for me to achieve my goal... Is there a way to block the main thread until the swing worker has finished in the following example?

public void flashNode(Node node, int noOfFlashes) {
    GraphUpdater updater = new GraphUpdater(node, noOfFlashes);
    updater.execute();
}

and the SwingWorker class

    public class GraphUpdater extends SwingWorker<Integer, Integer> {
    Node node;
    int noOfFlashes;

    public GraphUpdater(Node n, int noFlashes) {
        node = n;
        noOfFlashes = noFlashes;
    }

    @Override
    protected Integer doInBackground() throws Exception {
        Color origColor = node.getColor();
        for (int i=0; i<noOfFlashes; i++) {
            changeNodeColor(node, Color.WHITE);
            Thread.sleep(500);
            changeNodeColor(node, origColor);
            Thread.sleep(500);
        }

        return 1;
    }

}

Thanks in advance

Answer 1

as I mentioned, never use Thread#sleep(int) during Swing EDT, GUI simple freeze until Thread#sleep(int) ends, more in the Concurency in Swing, example about freeze here

you have three (maybe four) options how to update GUI on some period or to delay per time some execution(s)

• use javax.swing.Timer

• use SwingWorker

• use Runnable#Thread

put all together here (plus java.util.Timer with executions wrapped into invokeLater)