Thread Safety

Thread Safety

By default, the standard JsonConfiguration is not thread-safe, similar to HashMap. If multiple threads try to read/write to the same config simultaneously, you may encounter ConcurrentModificationException or an inconsistent state.

ConcurrentJsonConfiguration

The library provides a wrapper class ConcurrentJsonConfiguration that handles locking automatically.

Usage

Wrap your existing configuration:

import com.github.frosxt.jsonconfig.api.JsonConfiguration;
import com.github.frosxt.jsonconfig.api.concurrent.ConcurrentJsonConfiguration;

JsonConfiguration baseConfig = JsonConfiguration.loadConfiguration(file);
JsonConfiguration threadSafeConfig = new ConcurrentJsonConfiguration(baseConfig);

You can now use threadSafeConfig exactly like a normal configuration. It implements the same interface but uses ReadWriteLock internally.

• Reads (getters) use a shared Read Lock. Multiple threads can read at the same time.
• Writes (setters) use an exclusive Write Lock. Only one thread can write at a time, blocking readers/writers.

Use Cases

• Async Saving: You can safely save the configuration to a file in a background thread while the main thread continues to read from it.
• Web Applications: Safe to share a global config instance across multiple request threads.

Performance Note

There is a small overhead due to locking. For single-threaded applications, use the standard JsonConfiguration.