CCNA, CCNP, MCSA, CCNA Final Exam, All Answer Test Module With 100/100

I need to write an application that will check for something every X time and update it to GUI comtols. I have some little knowledge in java and written some applications before but I've never dealt with stuff like multiple threads and updating the GUI. I though it will be an easy task so I've started to write my software. Everything else is pretty much functioning. I just cant get the app to perform checks every X time and then update the GUI. Can someone please give some guidance on this? What shold I look into? what is the common practice? Is it threads? recursive? anything else? Also if possible provide me some code examples, I can understand better. thanks for any effort!