Thread execution halted

Question

Hi everyone,
I'm currently coding a program that acts as a link between 2 applications via a socket.
When i press the connect button in my swing form it creates a connectionmanager and executes the connectBridge() method.
Going further down the methods the method createLink() is executed.
This method listens on a specific port waiting for a connection.
This is where the program halts until a connection has been made.
Is there any way to let the execution of connectBridge() move on?
Thanks
//Swing form
ConnectionManager cm = new ConnectionManager();
cm.connectBridge("127.0.0.1", 4444, "192.168.0.1", 4444);
cm.start();
//connection manager class
public class ConnectionManager extends Thread {
    private String prefix = "ConnectionManager :: ";
    public static int bridgeSize = 20;
    public static int bridgeIndex = 0;
    public ScripterLinkManager slm;
    public ProxyLinkManager plm;
    public String[][] bridge = new String[2][bridgeSize];
    public ConnectionManager() {
     slm = new ScripterLinkManager(this);
     plm = new ProxyLinkManager(this);
     prepareBridge();
    @Override
    public void run() {
     while (true) {
         try {
          Thread.sleep(500);
          //Thread.yield();
          printBridgeStates();
         } catch (InterruptedException ex) {
          ex.printStackTrace();
public void connectBridge(String scripterIP, int scripterPort, String proxyIP, int proxyPort) {
     System.out.println(prefix + "connectBridge()\n\tScripter: " + scripterIP + ":" + scripterPort + "\n\tProxy: " + proxyIP + ":" + proxyPort);
     bridge[0][bridgeIndex] = scripterIP + ":" + scripterPort;
     bridge[1][bridgeIndex] = proxyIP + ":" + proxyPort;
     bridgeIndex++;
     plm.createLink(proxyIP, proxyPort);
     slm.createLink(scripterIP, scripterPort);
//scripter link manager
public class ScripterLinkManager extends Thread {
    private String prefix = "ScripterLinkManager :: ";
    private static int sIndex = 0;
    private ConnectionManager owner;
    private Vector<ScripterLink> slv = new Vector<ScripterLink>();
    public ScripterLinkManager(ConnectionManager owner) {
     this.owner = owner;
public int createLink(String ip, int port) {
     try {
         ServerSocket server = new ServerSocket();
//EXECUTION IS HALTED HERE
         server.bind(new InetSocketAddress(ip, port));
         this.slv.add(sIndex, new ScripterLink(this, server.accept(), sIndex));
         this.slv.get(sIndex).start();
         sIndex++;
     } catch (IOException ex) {
         ex.printStackTrace();
     return sIndex - 1;
    }

Answer 1

What happens is that now you have two separate threads happening at the same time. The first thread is the one going through your main method, the second is created by "new Thread(r)" and is started by "t.start()".
The crucial point to understand is that threads are executed independently- the run method of HelloRunner does not execute through to completion while main waits for it. The first thread will continue to execute its commands at the same time that the second thread does. Think of it this way: you have ten tasks to do. What you have done is find a coworker and given him a few of those tasks to work on. He doesn't sit and wait for you to finish yours before working on his; he works on them at the same time.
But there is a subtlety here- the CPU of your computer can execute only one thread at a time. All these threads are competing for the CPU time and the CPU switches between them (this switching can be be fast). There are ways to give threads different priorities, but most threads have the same priority level. There is no guarantee as to what thread the CPU will work on and how long it will work on that thread before switching to another. What that means is that, if you run your program many times, you may find that your output is not appearing in the same order. In this case, though, the CPU is executing the next statement of the first thread before it has initialized the loop and entered it in the second thread.