OTN's new tech article is "Experimenting with Java Timers" by T. Lamine Ba. This article studies time—how Java handles timers and the scheduling of tasks. Java timers are utilities that let you execute threads or tasks at a predetermined future time, and these tasks can be repeated according to a set frequency.

The article starts with a simple "Hello World" program in a web application that's composed of JavaServer Pages (JSP) and uses the model-control-view (MVC) design pattern. The IDE used in this article is NetBeans IDE 7.1, but you can use any IDE that supports Java.

"Experimenting with Java Timers" demonstrates how to get started scheduling jobs with Java. To learn about Swing timers, check out the Java tutorial "How to Use Swing Timers" and additional information in the Java Platform, Standard Edition 7 API Specification for Class Timer.