[WW-1544] Dispatcher threadlocal cleanup does not clean up the threadlocal

• Type: Bug
• Status: Closed
• Priority: Major
• Resolution: Fixed
• Affects Version/s: 2.0.1
• Fix Version/s: 2.0.2
• Flags: Patch
• Assignee: Donald J. Brown
• Reporter: Rickard ?berg
• Created: 06/Dec/06 15:47
• Updated: 28/Oct/12 22:11
• Resolved: 08/Dec/06 20:56

Description

In Dispatcher.cleanup() there is supposedly code to do (as the JavaDoc states) "Cleans up thread local variables".

However, the actual codes does "instance.set(null);" which is not a threadlocal cleanup. It only sets the reference of the current thread to null, meaning, there may be a bunch of other threads with references to Dispatchers.

The proper way to clean up a threadlocal is to set it to null, i.e. "instance = null".

However, it appears that this breaks pretty much all tests. The basic usage of how Dispatchers are used is, it seems, messed up. If it is supposed to be some local context only, then it should be set and cleared immediately, e.g. in FilterDispatcher.doFilter(), instead of leaving Dispatcher references hanging possibly indefinitely.

Apart from fixing this I would suggest that the way these instances are managed should be rethought. If, for example, both FilterDispatcher and Jsr168Dispatcher are used (as we do), then (if Jsr168Dispatcher also does Dispatcher.cleanup, as it should) there will be many calls to cleanup() and hence possibly many ObjectFactory.destroy() and dispatcherListener.dispatcherDestroyed() calls. It appears that Dispatcher is a bit schizophrenic with regard to who owns and manages it.