Is there an alternative for sleep() in C?

Question

In traditional embedded programming, we will give a delay function like so:

for(i=0;i<255;i++)
   for(j=0;j<255;j++);

In the micropro

Answer 1

any decent C compiler would, without extra work, remove your code entirely and the delay would vanish

Answer 2

available in linux usleep( int microseconds ) nanosleep( ... ) more precision see man pages for calling arguments

Answer 3

an attempt... to really solve this issue, i.e. something that works (not like the above attempts of answer) lol

I still have to improve this code to make it out. Few add-ons are welcome.

// Sleep for both Windows and Linux: 
// Too bad? No one proposed you a solution that works? 
// Since Windows has no select.h nor poll.h, an implementation
// is necessary.
//  
// Solutions on boards are often refered to use either select or poll, but ok, what about C (not c++)?
//
/// implementation of poll is destined in this attempt for windows
/// Ideally, you add this part of code to the header of you *.c file, and it might work through...

#ifdef WIN32
#include <time.h>
#include <sys/time.h>
#include <ws2tcpip.h>
#include <Winsock2.h>
#include <windows.h>
/* winsock doesn't feature poll(), so there is a version implemented
 * in terms of select() in mingw.c. The following definitions
 * are copied from linux man pages. A poll() macro is defined to
 * call the version in mingw.c.
 */
#define POLLIN      0x0001    /* There is data to read */
#define POLLPRI     0x0002    /* There is urgent data to read */
#define POLLOUT     0x0004    /* Writing now will not block */
#define POLLERR     0x0008    /* Error condition */
#define POLLHUP     0x0010    /* Hung up */
#define POLLNVAL    0x0020    /* Invalid request: fd not open */
struct pollfd {
  SOCKET fd;        /* file descriptor */
  short events;     /* requested events */
  short revents;    /* returned events */
};

int mingw_poll (struct pollfd *, unsigned int, int);

#define poll(x, y, z)        mingw_poll(x, y, z)
#endif





int mingw_poll(struct pollfd *fds, unsigned int nfds, int timo)
{
    struct timeval timeout, *toptr;
    fd_set ifds, ofds, efds, *ip, *op;
    int i, rc;

    /* Set up the file-descriptor sets in ifds, ofds and efds. */
    FD_ZERO(&ifds);
    FD_ZERO(&ofds);
    FD_ZERO(&efds);
    for (i = 0, op = ip = 0; i < nfds; ++i) {
    fds[i].revents = 0;
    if(fds[i].events & (POLLIN|POLLPRI)) {
        ip = &ifds;
        FD_SET(fds[i].fd, ip);
    }
    if(fds[i].events & POLLOUT) {
        op = &ofds;
        FD_SET(fds[i].fd, op);
    }
    FD_SET(fds[i].fd, &efds);
    } 

    /* Set up the timeval structure for the timeout parameter */
    if(timo < 0) {
    toptr = 0;
    } else {
    toptr = &timeout;
    timeout.tv_sec = timo / 1000;
    timeout.tv_usec = (timo - timeout.tv_sec * 1000) * 1000;
    }

#ifdef DEBUG_POLL
    printf("Entering select() sec=%ld usec=%ld ip=%lx op=%lx\n",
           (long)timeout.tv_sec, (long)timeout.tv_usec, (long)ip, (long)op);
#endif
    rc = select(0, ip, op, &efds, toptr);
#ifdef DEBUG_POLL
    printf("Exiting select rc=%d\n", rc);
#endif

    if(rc <= 0)
    return rc;

    if(rc > 0) {
        for (i = 0; i < nfds; ++i) {
            int fd = fds[i].fd;
        if(fds[i].events & (POLLIN|POLLPRI) && FD_ISSET(fd, &ifds))
            fds[i].revents |= POLLIN;
        if(fds[i].events & POLLOUT && FD_ISSET(fd, &ofds))
            fds[i].revents |= POLLOUT;
        if(FD_ISSET(fd, &efds))
            /* Some error was detected ... should be some way to know. */
            fds[i].revents |= POLLHUP;
#ifdef DEBUG_POLL
        printf("%d %d %d revent = %x\n", 
                FD_ISSET(fd, &ifds), FD_ISSET(fd, &ofds), FD_ISSET(fd, &efds), 
                fds[i].revents
        );
#endif
        }
    }
    return rc;
}

Answer 4

One common mechanism is to use a select() that is guaranteed to time out, and specify the sleep time as the timeout:

// Sleep for 1.5 sec
struct timeval tv;
tv.tv_sec = 1;
tv.tv_usec = 500000;
select(0, NULL, NULL, NULL, &tv);

The select() is typically used to check a set of file descriptors and wait until at least one is ready to perform I/O. If none is ready (or, in this case, if no fds are specified), it will time out.

The advantage of select() over a busy loop is that it consumes very little resources while sleeping, while a busy loop monopolizes the processor as much as permitted by its priority level.