# Task

Tasks represent long-running operations whose primary purpose is to report execution progress and state to the user. They provide a unified abstraction for tracking operation lifetime, progress, and completion, independent of how the task is presented in the user interface.

In the current design, tasks focus on progress reporting rather than execution itself. Future versions will extend this concept to optionally manage and run worker logic directly, allowing tasks to encapsulate both execution and reporting.

Tasks are closely integrated with the task models, which manage their lifecycle and visibility within the application.

### Related
- Task {doc}`models <../models/tasks/index>`

## Types

The task classes below are derived from the {doc}`task <task>` base class.

```{toctree}
:maxdepth: 1

types/background_task
types/dataset_task
types/foreground_task
types/modal_task
types/application_startup_task
```

## Handlers

Task handlers are responsible for presenting task-related information to the user. For example, they may display progress using a modal dialog, a progress bar in the status bar, or similar UI elements.

```{toctree}
:maxdepth: 1

handlers/abstract_task_handler
handlers/background_task_handler
handlers/dataset_task_handler
handlers/foreground_task_handler
handlers/modal_task_handler
```

## Testing

Below are some auxilliary classes for testing various task types
```{toctree}
:maxdepth: 1

testing/abstract_task_tester
testing/background_task_tester
testing/foreground_task_tester
testing/modal_task_tester
testing/task_tester_runner
```