How to Know which Thread is executing a function? - c

Question

So I have a scaled down version of an elevator program that uses pthreads in c. Each thread is an individual lift that calls function request(). I am not sure how to know which lift (1, 2 or 3) which are threads are using the function request. In the request function I need to print which thread used it at that time. Sorry if my explanation doesn't make complete sense.
void* request(void* abc)
{
int ii;
for(ii = 0; ii < 8; ii++)
{
sleep(1);
printf("REQUEST FROM LIFT COMPLETED\n");
}
}
int main()
{
pthread_t lift1;
pthread_t lift2;
pthread_t lift3;
pthread_create(&lift1, NULL, request, NULL);
pthread_create(&lift2, NULL, request, NULL);
pthread_create(&lift3, NULL, request, NULL);
pthread_join(lift1, NULL);
pthread_join(lift1, NULL);
pthread_join(lift1, NULL);
return 0;
}

Answer 1

You could do this in multiple ways, the simplest one is to pass some meaningful value as thread parameter to identify each thread.
Here's an example:
void *request(void *data)
{
const int id = *(const int *)data;
int ii;
for(ii = 0; ii < 8; ii++)
{
sleep(1);
printf("REQUEST FROM LIFT %d COMPLETED\n", id);
}
}
int main()
{
const int id1 = 1, id2 = 2, id3 = 3;
pthread_t lift1;
pthread_t lift2;
pthread_t lift3;
pthread_create(&lift1, NULL, request, (void *)&id1);
pthread_create(&lift2, NULL, request, (void *)&id2);
pthread_create(&lift3, NULL, request, (void *)&id3);
pthread_join(lift1, NULL);
pthread_join(lift2, NULL);
pthread_join(lift3, NULL);
return 0;
}
You could also define those id varibles as static globals:
// Outside main:
static const int id1 = 1, id2 = 2, id3 = 3;