I have a java program which consists of only an infinite while(true)
loop.  I need to communicate with this program using sockets (or RMI,
or whatever is the right way to do it - please advise!).

I tried the standard socket syntax as below, but as you might guess,
the loop freezes while it waits for a command from the socket.  I need
it to continue its loop w/ NO loss of performance if there is no
socket message sent to it.

Main program:

public static void main(String[] args) {
  while (true) { // whole program is just infinite loop
    ServerSocket serverSocket = null;
    try { serverSocket = new ServerSocket(1234); }
    catch (IOException e) {}

    try {
      Socket clientSocket = serverSocket.accept();
      BufferedReader is = new BufferedReader(new
      InputStreamReader(clientSocket.getInputStream()));
      PrintStream os = new PrintStream(clientSocket.getOutputStream());
      String lineIn = is.readLine();
      String response = processMsg(lineIn);
      os.println(response);
      os.flush();
    }
    catch (IOException e) {}

    otherProcessing(); 
  }
}

Communicator program:

public class Talk {
  public static void main(String[] args) {
  Socket socket = null;
  InputStreamReader isr = null;
  BufferedReader in = null;
  PrintWriter out = null;

  try {
    socket = new Socket("localhost", 1234);
    isr = new InputStreamReader(socket.getInputStream());
    in = new BufferedReader(isr);
    out = new PrintWriter(socket.getOutputStream(), true);
  }
  catch (Exception e) {}

  if (socket!=null && isr!=null && in!=null && out!=null) {
    try {
      out.println(args[0]);
      out.flush();
      out.close();
      in.close();
      socket.close();
    }
    catch (Exception e) {}
  }
}

So when this is complete, i will type 'java Talk command1',
and it will pass command1 on to the main program thru the socket/RMI. 
And if there is no command sent from Talk, the main program will just
keep looping.

Please - if you answer this question, I expect the full completed
code, not just pointers to the solution.  Thank you in advance, -t

---

Clarification of Question by timbo70-ga on 30 Jan 2005 15:32 PST

Thank you guys, no one seems to have grabbed this so I'll close it and
study up on communicating in a new thread.

try moving your socket creation out of the loop.
Like :
public class Server {

    public static void main(String[] inArgs) throws Exception {
        <b>ServerSocket serverSocket = null;
        try {
            serverSocket = new ServerSocket(1234);
        } catch (IOException e) {
            e.printStackTrace();
            throw e;
        }
        System.out.println("Server started... ");</b>

        while (true) { // whole program is just infinite loop
         ....
         }

Seems to work fine to me.

This is wrong way of programming, 

After calling Accept method of serversocket, when you have recieved
Socket, you must create a new thread and let that new thread handle
the communication.