eclipse-vertx/vert.x · error · IllegalArgumentException

maxExecuteTime must be > 0

Error message

maxExecuteTime must be > 0

What it means

createSharedWorkerPool validates the maximum worker execution time and throws IllegalArgumentException when maxExecuteTime < 1. This value drives the thread-blocked checker; a non-positive timeout would disable meaningful blocking detection and cannot be configured.

Source

Thrown at vertx-core/src/main/java/io/vertx/core/impl/VertxImpl.java:1109

  @Override
  public synchronized WorkerExecutorImpl createSharedWorkerExecutor(String name, int poolSize, long maxExecuteTime) {
    return createSharedWorkerExecutor(name, poolSize, maxExecuteTime, maxWorkerExecTimeUnit);
  }

  @Override
  public synchronized WorkerExecutorImpl createSharedWorkerExecutor(String name, int poolSize, long maxExecuteTime, TimeUnit maxExecuteTimeUnit) {
    CloseableResource<WorkerPool> sharedWorkerPool = createSharedWorkerPool(name, poolSize, maxExecuteTime, maxExecuteTimeUnit);
    sharedWorkerPool = registerResource(sharedWorkerPool);
    return new WorkerExecutorImpl(this, CleanerProvider.INSTANCE.get(), sharedWorkerPool);
  }

  public CloseableResource<WorkerPool> createSharedWorkerPool(String name, int poolSize, long maxExecuteTime, TimeUnit maxExecuteTimeUnit) {
    if (poolSize < 1) {
      throw new IllegalArgumentException("poolSize must be > 0");
    }
    if (maxExecuteTime < 1) {
      throw new IllegalArgumentException("maxExecuteTime must be > 0");
    }
    Supplier<WorkerPool> factory = () -> {
      ThreadFactory workerThreadFactory = createThreadFactory(threadFactory, checker, useDaemonThread, maxExecuteTime, maxExecuteTimeUnit, name + "-", true);
      ExecutorService workerExec = executorServiceFactory.createExecutor(workerThreadFactory, poolSize, poolSize);
      PoolMetrics<?, ?> workerMetrics = metrics != null ? metrics.createPoolMetrics("worker", name, poolSize) : null;
      return new WorkerPool(workerExec, workerMetrics);
    };
    return createSharedResource("__vertx.shared.workerPools", name, factory);
  }

  @Override
  public WorkerPool wrapWorkerPool(ExecutorService executor) {
    PoolMetrics workerMetrics = metrics != null ? metrics.createPoolMetrics( "worker", null, -1) : null;
    return new WorkerPool(executor, workerMetrics);
  }

  private ThreadFactory createThreadFactory(VertxThreadFactory threadFactory, BlockedThreadChecker checker, Boolean useDaemonThread, long maxExecuteTime, TimeUnit maxExecuteTimeUnit, String prefix, boolean worker) {
    AtomicInteger threadCount = new AtomicInteger(0);

View on GitHub (pinned to fb308bd8c3)

Solutions

1. Pass maxExecuteTime >= 1 in the chosen TimeUnit, e.g. Math.max(1, configured)
2. To express a very long limit, use a large value with TimeUnit like 1 with TimeUnit.HOURS rather than 0
3. Validate config at startup and reject non-positive execute times

Example fix

// before
vertx.createSharedWorkerPool("blocking", 10, 0, TimeUnit.SECONDS); // throws
// after
vertx.createSharedWorkerPool("blocking", 10, 1, TimeUnit.HOURS);

if (maxExecuteTime < 1) {
  throw new IllegalArgumentException("maxExecuteTime must be >= 1, got " + maxExecuteTime);
}

try {
  vertx.createSharedWorkerPool(name, poolSize, maxExecuteTime, unit);
} catch (IllegalArgumentException e) {
  // use a sane default like 60s
}

When it happens

Trigger: vertx.createSharedWorkerPool(name, poolSize, maxExecuteTime, maxExecuteTimeUnit) with maxExecuteTime 0 or negative — e.g. config value in seconds converted to 0, or 0 intended as 'unlimited'.

Common situations: maxExecuteTimeUnit conversion producing 0 (e.g. sub-unit values truncated); 0 mistakenly used to mean 'no limit' (there is no such option here); negative values from bad config files.

Understand the failure class

Background: "Invalid value" and "allowed values are" config errors: what your library rejected and how to fix it — this error's family across 41 libraries.

Related errors

• poolSize must be > 0
• maxWorkerpExecuteTime must be > 0
• Can't specify < 1 instances to deploy
• workerPoolSize must be > 0
• blockedThreadCheckInterval must be > 0

AI-assisted analysis of eclipse-vertx/vert.x@fb308bd8c3 (2026-09-06). Data as JSON: /api/errors/5b6cc7947d7eb8ec. Report an issue: GitHub.