What is the difference between threads and processes?

Processes and threads are units of execution in an operating system, but they differ in several key aspects:

• Processes are separate instances of programs with their own address space. Each process is isolated from others and has its own resources (memory, descriptors).

• Threads are lighter-weight units of execution within a process. All threads of a process share its memory and resources.

Main differences:

1. Isolation: processes are isolated, threads are not.
2. Memory: processes have separate memory, threads share it.
3. Creation and switching: threads are created and switched faster than processes.
4. Interaction: threads can easily exchange data through shared memory, processes require inter-process communication (IPC).

In Java:

• Each process is a separate JVM or OS process.
• Threads are created within the JVM and run in parallel, sharing memory.

Example of creating a thread in Java:

Thread thread = new Thread(() -> {
    System.out.println("Thread is running");
});
thread.start();