Python threading.timer - repeat function every 'n' seconds

Question

I want to fire off a function every 0.5 seconds and be able to start and stop and reset the timer. I\'m not too knowledgeable of how Python threads work and am having diffic

Answer 1

In addition to the above great answers using Threads, in case you have to use your main thread or prefer an async approach - I wrapped a short class around aio_timers Timer class (to enable repeating)

import asyncio
from aio_timers import Timer

class RepeatingAsyncTimer():
    def __init__(self, interval, cb, *args, **kwargs):
        self.interval = interval
        self.cb = cb
        self.args = args
        self.kwargs = kwargs
        self.aio_timer = None
        self.start_timer()
    
    def start_timer(self):
        self.aio_timer = Timer(delay=self.interval, 
                               callback=self.cb_wrapper, 
                               callback_args=self.args, 
                               callback_kwargs=self.kwargs
                              )
    
    def cb_wrapper(self, *args, **kwargs):
        self.cb(*args, **kwargs)
        self.start_timer()


from time import time
def cb(timer_name):
    print(timer_name, time())

print(f'clock starts at: {time()}')
timer_1 = RepeatingAsyncTimer(interval=5, cb=cb, timer_name='timer_1')
timer_2 = RepeatingAsyncTimer(interval=10, cb=cb, timer_name='timer_2')

clock starts at: 1602438840.9690785

timer_1 1602438845.980087

timer_2 1602438850.9806316

timer_1 1602438850.9808934

timer_1 1602438855.9863033

timer_2 1602438860.9868324

timer_1 1602438860.9876585

Answer 2

The best way is to start the timer thread once. Inside your timer thread you'd code the following

class MyThread(Thread):
    def __init__(self, event):
        Thread.__init__(self)
        self.stopped = event

    def run(self):
        while not self.stopped.wait(0.5):
            print("my thread")
            # call a function

In the code that started the timer, you can then set the stopped event to stop the timer.

stopFlag = Event()
thread = MyThread(stopFlag)
thread.start()
# this will stop the timer
stopFlag.set()

Answer 3

I had to do this for a project. What I ended up doing was start a separate thread for the function

t = threading.Thread(target =heartbeat, args=(worker,))
t.start()

****heartbeat is my function, worker is one of my arguments****

inside of my heartbeat function:

def heartbeat(worker):

    while True:
        time.sleep(5)
        #all of my code

So when I start the thread the function will repeatedly wait 5 seconds, run all of my code, and do that indefinitely. If you want to kill the process just kill the thread.

Answer 4

Improving a little on Hans Then's answer, we can just subclass the Timer function. The following becomes our entire "repeat timer" code, and it can be used as a drop-in replacement for threading.Timer with all the same arguments:

from threading import Timer

class RepeatTimer(Timer):
    def run(self):
        while not self.finished.wait(self.interval):
            self.function(*self.args, **self.kwargs)

Usage example:

def dummyfn(msg="foo"):
    print(msg)

timer = RepeatTimer(1, dummyfn)
timer.start()
time.sleep(5)
timer.cancel()

produces the following output:

foo
foo
foo
foo

and

timer = RepeatTimer(1, dummyfn, args=("bar",))
timer.start()
time.sleep(5)
timer.cancel()

produces

bar
bar
bar
bar

Answer 5

I have implemented a class that works as a timer.

I leave the link here in case anyone needs it: https://github.com/ivanhalencp/python/tree/master/xTimer

Answer 6

I have come up with another solution with SingleTon class. Please tell me if any memory leakage is here.

import time,threading

class Singleton:
  __instance = None
  sleepTime = 1
  executeThread = False

  def __init__(self):
     if Singleton.__instance != None:
        raise Exception("This class is a singleton!")
     else:
        Singleton.__instance = self

  @staticmethod
  def getInstance():
     if Singleton.__instance == None:
        Singleton()
     return Singleton.__instance


  def startThread(self):
     self.executeThread = True
     self.threadNew = threading.Thread(target=self.foo_target)
     self.threadNew.start()
     print('doing other things...')


  def stopThread(self):
     print("Killing Thread ")
     self.executeThread = False
     self.threadNew.join()
     print(self.threadNew)


  def foo(self):
     print("Hello in " + str(self.sleepTime) + " seconds")


  def foo_target(self):
     while self.executeThread:
        self.foo()
        print(self.threadNew)
        time.sleep(self.sleepTime)

        if not self.executeThread:
           break


sClass = Singleton()
sClass.startThread()
time.sleep(5)
sClass.getInstance().stopThread()

sClass.getInstance().sleepTime = 2
sClass.startThread()