Stop a looped thread method after x seconds

Question

I'm creating a console game as simple as "I generate a random number, find it", but with many options.

My current code (without what I want here) is availlable on GitHub: https://github.com/crakmaniaque/trouvezmoi

What I want is to create a version of my game which will be timed, so the computer generates numbers, the user finds it, it generates a new one and the player have 90 seconds to find a max lot of random numbers. I can code this easily.

What I will need help is to stop the game (a thread) after 90 seconds and retrieve the number of answers founded from the thread. The Console.Title should also show time remaining. The attempt I've tried works, but the thread is not interrupted if console is asking for number input (Console.ReadLine()). But the timer is for the entire process, not only user input.

private static void timerb()
{
     int t = 90;
     for (int i = 0; i < 90; i++)
     {
         Console.Title = t + " seconds remaining";
         Thread.Sleep(1000);
         t--;
     }
}
private static void cGame()
{
    Thread t = new Thread(timerb);
    t.Start();
    while (t.IsAlive)
    {
        bool good = false;
        int rnd = new Random().Next(0,10); // 0 and 10 are sample 
        while (!good)
        {
            try
            {
                Console.Write("Enter a number between x and y >");
                int i = int.Parse(Console.ReadLine());
                if (i == rnd)
                {
                    good = true;
                }
            }
            catch (FormatException)
            {
                Console.WriteLine("Invalid answer.");
            }
        }
    }
}

I don't know much about threading and at that point I'm stuck. Can someone help me with my problem? I'm using .NET 2.0.

possible duplicate of [How to add a Timeout to Console.ReadLine()?](http://stackoverflow.com/questions/57615/how-to-add-a-timeout-to-console-readline) — Amit, Aug 08 '15 at 19:58
I've read this topic and actually the timeout here is for only the user imput not all process, validation, etc. — André-Luc Huneault, Aug 08 '15 at 20:07
That's where you have your problem. You said that yourself: *but the thread is not interrupted if console is asking for number input (Console.ReadLine())*. Use the info in that answer to solve your problem. — Amit, Aug 08 '15 at 20:10
Tip: You need to save the starting date/time and check it against the current date/time. Looping and sleeping for one second does not guarantee that you will wake at precisely one second intervals and execute the loop code in zero time. — HABO, Aug 08 '15 at 20:10
Good for date/time, but that is not solving the problem I have. — André-Luc Huneault, Aug 08 '15 at 20:26

score 0 · Answer 1 · edited Aug 08 '15 at 21:21

0

Perhaps you are looking for a timer? You could register an event, that would fire after 90 seconds, that would run while the loop is happening. The documentation can be found here: Timer class MSDN documentation.

I believe the usage would be:

Timer timer = new Timer { Interval = new Timespan (0,1,30);
timer.elapsed += //function to fire to kill the app or the game

edited Aug 08 '15 at 21:21

keenthinker

7,645
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answered Aug 08 '15 at 21:18

theogjpeezy

81
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I will look into it, thanks a bunch. I will give news if it worked. – André-Luc Huneault Aug 08 '15 at 21:29

score 0 · Answer 2 · edited May 23 '17 at 12:14

You'd need to make each console read with a timeout equal to the amount of time left in the game. That solves that issue.

Then, you need a way to signal the timerb thread to shut down when the main game loop has ended. I think the simplest way would be to end the game loop when the remaining time is <= zero. Alternatively, you could make timerb singnal the main thread to shut down when t == 0. Inter-thread communication is always complicated and error-prone, though.

You can signal the timerb thread to shut down by setting a volatile bool shutdown to true and by making timerb poll that variable and shut itself down.

Stop a looped thread method after x seconds

2 Answers2