How to add a Timeout to Console.ReadLine()?

Question

I have a console app in which I want to give the user x seconds to respond to the prompt. If no input is made after a certain period of time, program logic should

Answer 1

This is a fuller example of Glen Slayden's solution. I happended to make this when building a test case for another problem. It uses asynchronous I/O and a manual reset event.

public static void Main() {
    bool readInProgress = false;
    System.IAsyncResult result = null;
    var stop_waiting = new System.Threading.ManualResetEvent(false);
    byte[] buffer = new byte[256];
    var s = System.Console.OpenStandardInput();
    while (true) {
        if (!readInProgress) {
            readInProgress = true;
            result = s.BeginRead(buffer, 0, buffer.Length
              , ar => stop_waiting.Set(), null);

        }
        bool signaled = true;
        if (!result.IsCompleted) {
            stop_waiting.Reset();
            signaled = stop_waiting.WaitOne(5000);
        }
        else {
            signaled = true;
        }
        if (signaled) {
            readInProgress = false;
            int numBytes = s.EndRead(result);
            string text = System.Text.Encoding.UTF8.GetString(buffer
              , 0, numBytes);
            System.Console.Out.Write(string.Format(
              "Thank you for typing: {0}", text));
        }
        else {
            System.Console.Out.WriteLine("oy, type something!");
        }
    }