private PossiblyLimitedTopDocs getTopDocs(Query query, Sort sort) throws IOException { final TopFieldCollector topCollector = TopFieldCollector.create(sort, maxHits, true, false, false, false); final Counter clock = Counter.newCounter(true); final int waitMillis = 1000; // TODO: if we interrupt the whole thread anyway, do we still need the TimeLimitingCollector? final TimeLimitingCollector collector = new TimeLimitingCollector(topCollector, clock, maxSearchTimeMillis / waitMillis); collector.setBaseline(0); final Thread counterThread = new Thread() { @Override public void run() { final long startTime = System.currentTimeMillis(); while (true) { final long runTimeMillis = System.currentTimeMillis() - startTime; if (runTimeMillis > maxSearchTimeMillis) { // make sure there's no lingering thread for too long return; } clock.addAndGet(1); try { Thread.sleep(waitMillis); } catch (InterruptedException e) { throw new RuntimeException(e); } } } }; counterThread.setName("LuceneSearchTimeoutThread"); counterThread.start(); boolean timeLimitActivated = false; try { indexSearcher.search(query, collector); } catch (TimeLimitingCollector.TimeExceededException e) { timeLimitActivated = true; } return new PossiblyLimitedTopDocs(topCollector.topDocs(), timeLimitActivated); }