Can the Unity Client API run in a separate thread?

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Dale Strickler asked Sep 1, '20

Can the Unity Client API run in a separate thread?

Unity is a multi-threaded system. But the main UnityEngine APIs are not thread-safe so they can only be called from the main Unity thread.

I plan on examining the PlayFab source code but I also wanted to get input from others in case I miss something.

Do any of the PlayFab calls make calls to the UnityEngine? If so likely they cannot run on a thread other then the main thread.

The way I designed PlayFab data sync calls PlayFab C# will push it off to another thread. (A side effect I did not plan on.) I am trying to decide if I should redesign before I code or if I should push ahead. Thread collisions are really hard to test for so it might test ok but still be hosed from time to time not hosed in the editor but hosed on a mobile device :-)

apis unity3d

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Dale Strickler commented · Sep 01, 2020 at 07:52 PM

From reading the code I am guessing no! The Unity PlayFab SDK needs to be called from the main Unity thread. Confirmation from a developer who knows for sure would be great!

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Answer 1 · 2020-09-02T07:08:35Z

Citrus Yan answered Sep 2, '20

Theoretically, you can try using C# SDK in your Unity project instead, as that doesn’t make calls to the UnityEngine. In that case you can create a new thread and run PlayFab APIs in it without having to interfere with the main method too much. However, please note that the C# SDK is not designed for Unity projects hence we haven’t done much test on its performance in Unity, you can still give a try though.

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Dale Strickler commented · Sep 08, 2020 at 11:51 PM

Ah, interesting thought. Perhaps I should consider the C# SDK... more to think about. I keep ending up in callback hell and keep looking for a nice design pattern out of it. Using the Job System that Unity now has in preview can get ride of the callback hell but the Job don't run on the main thread so call the PlayFab Unity SDK will not work in the job system.

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