Util/Timer cancel call

[vitaliy]

Hi All,

I am looking for some clarification into Poco::Util::Timer cancel call. I have a timer object in my program. I am scheduling certain task to repeat on a set interval. I need to change the interval based on the input. My original approach was to call timer.cancel() and timer.scheduleAtFixedRate right after with the new interval.

What I am observing is if I call to cancel nothing get's scheduled after the call. Timer doesn't execute the task that was scheduled right after the cancel call.

Looking through the sources I see that cancel just schedules a task that clears the queue. I wonder if I have some sort timing issue or cancel is not supposed to be used in this context.

I would appreciate any advice.

Thanks,
Vitaliy

[aderouineau]

Perhaps try tun use .run() after scheduling it...

[vitaliy]

Run is a protected method. And it is an entry point for the thread. If I don't call cancel() scheduled tasks are being executed. The trick is to change the schedule. I may have to recreate the timer but I was curious if I can avoid that.

Thanks for the suggestion.
Vitaliy

[aderouineau]

Sorry, I hadn't checked the doc when replying.

Perhaps you could create a child class with Timer as parent, and add a member function to reschedule the task (in which case you'd be able to call run).

[vitaliy]

Calling run will just block main thread in this case.

Thanks for the suggestion.
Vitaliy

[guenter]

cancel() works asynchronously, which is a problem if you schedule a new task immediately afterwards.
A better way would be to keep a pointer to the TimerTask, then call cancel() on the TimerTask object and schedule a new TimerTask.

[vitaliy]

Right, I've added a sleep right after cancel as a workaround. But more deterministic approach like canceling the task directly is better.

Thanks,
Vitaliy

[aderouineau]

Why not use a mutex rather than sleep ?