Hi,

What timers classes or components does FPC have? For example something that can fire every 200ms or ever 2 minutes, etc... I'm not worried about high precision timers etc... Being out by a couple of milliseconds is not a issue.

For example Delphi and Lazarus has a TTimer which does the job for me (if I write VCL or LCL based apps). I need something that doesn't rely on the LCL or VCL, but that could be used safely in a GUI environment like fpGUI.

I guess I'm a bit late in asking, seeing that I already implemented by own thread based timer. I works 100% for what I need. I just wondered if there was something like that built into FPC that I missed. I would like to compare the implementations, or share mine if FPC doesn't have one.

There currently isn't, as far as I know.

You're welcome to share yours.

Michael.

Hopefully somebody could find this useful or possibly it could find its way into FPC and be the beginnings of a basic timer in FPC. Why must everybody always reinvent the wheel. :-)

See attached file: threadtimer.pas

Usage:
-----------

  FTimer := TFPTimer.Create(nil);
  FTimer.OnTimer      := @FTimerTimer;
  FTimer.Interval     := 500;  // in milliseconds
  FTimer.Enabled      := False;
You can then call functions like:
FTimer.On;
FTimer.Off;
FTimer.Enabled := False;

There's a contributed units <http://www.freepascal.org/contrib/db.php3> link on the freepascal.org home page. Perhaps it could go there. Right under it is a Contribute <http://www.freepascal.org/contrib/add.php3> link that allows you to add it to the contributed units database.

I know this isn't adding it to the base RTL stuff, but it's a start for now, no?

Thanks. I had a quick look.

Do you mind if I split up the implementation like this:

TTimer - Exposes all needed properties, events. Delegates work to TTimerDriver. TTimerDriver - Abstract class which has 2 methods and a property to do the actual work. TThreadedTimerDriver - TTimerDriver Descendent which uses your implementation to do the actual work.

and then I add this to the FCL as unit fpTimer ?

This would allow the LCL to implement a TTimerDriver descendent which integrates nicely in the LCL. The actually used driver is set through some global class variable. And at the same time there is already a default driver available for all platforms.

Michael.

No problem, that's fine by me....

This would allow the LCL to implement a TTimerDriver descendent which integrates nicely in the LCL. The actually used driver is

Would you mind explaining this a bit more? What would the LCL do differently, "integrates nicely"?

Instead of using the default timer which creates a thread, it can create a TTimerDriver which asks e.g. MS-Windows for a timer event and handle everything through the event loop. Same for X11 (or however they do it there).

In other words, the LCL can use system timers if available, and integrate them with the normal event loop. I think this is preferable to threaded timers, which make applications heavier.

Also, you could improve the threaded timer with a pooled threaded timer (1 thread which does the work for all timers). If you use a lot of timers, that will be easier on resources.

Michael.

BTW, while I'm still somewhat on-topic (but quite lazy ;-) , is there a high-resolution timer in FCL? If not, what about including Martin Waldenburg's qmwfasttime? Shall I file a request in Mantis?

Best regards,
Flávio

Flávio Etrusco wrote

BTW, while I'm still somewhat on-topic (but quite lazy ;-) , is there a high-resolution timer in FCL? If not, what about including Martin Waldenburg's qmwfasttime? Shall I file a request in Mantis?

Also take a look at:
http://wiki.lazarus.freepascal.org/EpikTimer

Vincent

Flávio Etrusco wrote

BTW, while I'm still somewhat on-topic (but quite lazy ;-) , is there a high-resolution timer in FCL? If not, what about including Martin Waldenburg's qmwfasttime? Shall I file a request in Mantis?

Don't bother, because it will not be included, as it's Intel only...

Michael.