start processes with a delay

Question

How can I start 5 different processes, each with their own delay without holding up the other ones while waiting for the delay to finish? I can not use async or await

Answer 1

You could start every process from a different thread.

foreach (string process1 in _processList)
{
  Thread t = new Thread(() => 
           {
               Thread.Sleep(/*RANDOM NUMBER*/ 5);
               Process.Start(process1);
           });
  t.Start();
}

That way each process will have a random timer before it start and no process is delayed for the start of an other process.

If starting thread is totaly impossible in your situation, i would suggest wrapping your process to a .bat and in this batch file you add the sleep delay this way all the process will be called in time and the sleep delay will be respected.