PixelCheckSum time out?

[SweatyOgre]

Is there a way i could set an amount of time for a pixel checksum to timeout after? I know it would involve creating a new function that involves a pixelchecksum.

[pekster]

You could create a function that starts a timer as soon as it is called. You then loop a PixelSearch call, and after each search, test to see if the timer is greater than your timeout time. If it did timeout, you might want to return a -1, otherwise return the coordinates.

[SweatyOgre]

Could you please explain Timers more in depth to me? The helpfile makes it a little confusing to understand how to apply them. And even though I don't think it matters, this is for a PixelCheckSum, not a PixelSearch.

[pekster]

Could you please explain Timers more in depth to me? The helpfile makes it a little confusing to understand how to apply them.

You start a timer with the TimerStart() call, and it returns a number representing when that timer started. Whenever you call the TimerStop($var) function, it will return the amount of time that has elapsed between the time whan you set $var with TimerStart. Here is an example:

$timer = TimerStart() ;define a new timer
Sleep(3000) ;3 second pause
$result = TimerStop($timer)
MsgBox(0, "result", "the timer time was: " & $result)

Now, what I suggested was to test the timer in a loop. Like this:

$timer = TimerStart() ;define a new timer
While 1
  Sleep(100)
 ;do stuff here
 ;if timer is longer than 10 seconds, exit the loop
  If TimerStop($timer) > 10000 Then ExitLoop
WEnd

You might also want to set a variable if the timer expired rather than your loop ending normally.

And even though I don't think it matters, this is for a PixelCheckSum, not a PixelSearch.

Well, it would change how I would suggest you solve the problem . The above example won't "time out" the checksum because all script execution is paused while it checksums.

To solve that problem, you'll probably want to have a 2nd instance of your program, and have the main process either ignore (and let the checksum of the 2nd instance expire) or have it kill the 2nd process when the timeout value occurs.

[SweatyOgre]

Thanks, I now fully understand Timers