关闭线程方法

Question

What is the difference between

ExitThread(exitcode);

and

CloseHandle(threadHandle);

?

It seems that they do the same thing, but they must have a difference.

Answer 1

These functions do very different things. ExitThread immediately ends the calling thread. CloseHandle just destroys a handle, thus removing a reference to a thread object. It has no affect on the thread which handle is closed; the thread will continue its normal execution. Typically, a thread handle is closed after the thread has finished (eg after waiting for its completion with WaitForSingleObject ). But sometimes, a handle is closed for the thread that is still running; it's often referred as detaching a thread. This needs to be done if the application "forgets" the thread and will not wait for its completion; handles to such a thread should be closed to let the kernel automatically destroy associated resources when the thread completes.

Also see answers to a similar question: Windows C++ - closing thread with CloseHandle