Updating field in icefaces using thread

Good morning guys

I have a textField on my icefaces page which display n开发者_开发技巧umber of messages in one table in a database.

Since that data changes from other users using the application so I want to update that field after some interval ,lets say every 5 minutes.

Does any one have idea what could be the best way to solve this issue ?

Is it ok to use a thread in the background which sleeps for that interval and change the bean value which is displayed on the page (not sure if it works )?

Why not store the value in an application variable, where all the sessions can update and read from it? You can also synchronize it with the database regularly