Timer not running...

Question

Please could someone assist me as to why this timer is not running. I've tried using the javax.Timer method and am now using the Thread which implements the Runnable interface.
public class superMarketRun
     public static void main(String [] args)
          superMarket sm = new superMarket();
          //sm.startSim();
}The above start initializes the superMarket object which holds the timer. This is a console program.
import java.awt.event.*;
public class superMarket implements Runnable
     private Thread      mainThread;
     private final int     DELAY = 20;
     public superMarket()
          System.out.println("Initializing supermarket...");
          // organise the thread
          mainThread = null;
          start();
     public void start()
          System.out.println("Starting sim...");
          // organise the thread
          if(mainThread == null)
               mainThread = new Thread(this);
     public void stop()
          mainThread = null;
     public void run()
          Thread myThread = Thread.currentThread();
          while(mainThread == myThread)
               try {
                    System.out.println("debug");
                    mainThread.sleep(DELAY);
               catch(InterruptedException e){}
}I really have no clue why it works. The output I get is:
Initializing supermarket...
Starting sim...
Press any key to continue...In other words the thread is not running as the output "debug" is not being shown.
Any assistance would be greatly appreciated.

Answer 1

I think you should scrap this code and start over with something that just demonstrates the basics. I have a bad feeling about why you implemented start and stop. I also don't like that you used a Swing component instead of java.util.Timer.
Compile and run the following.
public class Test implements Runnable{
  private int delay;
  private boolean stayalive;
  public static void main(String args[])throws Exception{
    Test t = new Test();
    Thread myThread = new Thread(t);
    myThread.start();
    for(int i=0;i<5;i++){
      System.out.println("Hello from main thread!");
      Thread.currentThread().sleep(500);
    System.out.println("Main STOPPING test!");
    t.kill();
    for(int i=0;i<5;i++){
      System.out.println("Hello again from main thread!");
      Thread.currentThread().sleep(500);
    System.out.println("Bye from main thread!");
  public Test(){
    this.delay = 1000;
    this.stayalive = true;
  public void kill(){
    this.stayalive = false;     
  public void run(){
    while(this.stayalive){
      System.out.println("Hello from TEST thread!");          
      try{
        Thread.currentThread().sleep(delay);
      }catch(InterruptedException e){
    System.out.println("Bye from TEST thread!");
}