Process vs Thread: Isolation vs Shared Execution
Overview A process is an independently executing program instance with its own private address space, while a thread is a lightweight unit of execution that runs inside a process and shares that process’s memory with its sibling threads. The distinction matters because it determines how much isolation, communication overhead, and crash-safety you get versus how cheap context switching and data sharing are. Comparison Diagram Process Thread Process A Code Data Heap Stack Process B Code Data Heap Stack no shared memory (IPC only) single process address space Shared Code / Data / Heap Thread 1 Stack Registers Thread 2 Stack Registers Thread 3 Stack Registers shared heap/code, private stack per thread ...