Run a function for X seconds

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January 30th, 2013, 03:12 AM

yo9hnf

Registered User

Join Date: Jan 2013

Posts: 2

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Run a function for X seconds

Hello,

My name is Radu and I am from Romania.

I have a problem with a coundown routine.
My program basicaly looks like this :

main():
...something...
while True :
if Button1_pressed....
If Button2_pressed...
If PLAY pressed...
if NEXT pressed...
etc

So, when i press the PLAY button i need to run a function for a specific time (like 10 seconds), BUT in this time a may press NEXT, so i can't use time.sleep(seconds).

How can i make this run ?

Thank you !

Regards,
Radu

January 30th, 2013, 09:03 AM

b49P23TIvg

Contributing User

Join Date: Aug 2011

Posts: 3,458

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run the function in a separate thread or process.
Then kill that process on appropriate event.
One of the events is the 10 second timer,
Various buttons could preempt the timer.

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January 30th, 2013, 11:06 AM

dwblas

Contributing User

Join Date: May 2009

Posts: 315

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Assuming you are using Wx for the GUI, use timer() (many examples on the web) to call some function that will set a variable causing the function to exit. Note that Wx also has threads.

January 30th, 2013, 11:09 AM

yo9hnf

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Join Date: Jan 2013

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Time spent in forums: 17 m 30 sec
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Thank you for your replays !

I dont't have a GUI

....I have a 2x16 LCD.
The buttons are (hardware) push-buttons.

I can't figure out the algorithm

January 30th, 2013, 02:21 PM

dwblas

Contributing User

Join Date: May 2009

Posts: 315

Time spent in forums: 3 Days 23 h 29 m 31 sec
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Then multiprocessing/threading is the only option since you want to do 2 things at the same time, keep track of the time, and check for button presses. A simple example where the process is terminated after 5 seconds and the list's value is changed to simulate a button press or whatever, which could also return/exit from the function.

Code:

import time
from multiprocessing import Process

class TestClass():

   def __init__(self):
      self.ctr = 0
      self.ctr_list=[0]

   def test_f(self, name):
      while True:
         self.ctr += 1
         print "test_f", self.ctr, name, self.ctr_list
         time.sleep(0.5)

if __name__ == '__main__':
   CT=TestClass()
   p = Process(target=CT.test_f, args=('P',))
   p.start()

   time.sleep(2)
   CT.ctr_list[0]=10
   print "ctr_list", CT.ctr_list

   ## sleep for 5 seconds and terminate
   time.sleep(5.0)
   p.terminate()

Run a function for X seconds

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