wait

Waits for a value to become true or a function to return true.
Emulates built-in WinWait, KeyWait, etc. but supports any kind of check.

Definition

ret := wait(value, timeout := 0, interval := 100)

• value: The value continuously checked or the function whose return value is continuously checked.
  • value is being called (used as a function), if it is considered callable.
• timeout – integer: Number of milliseconds to wait for at most. 0 (the default) will cause it to wait indefinitely.
• interval – integer: Number of milliseconds to wait before retrying. 100 is the default. Specifying 0 is valid and causes a Sleep 0.
• ret: The return value.
  • If timeout was reached, ret is an empty string.
  • Otherwise (if value became true), ret is value itself if it is not callable⁽¹⁾, or otherwise the return value of the last call to value.call().

Remarks

1. value is considered callable when either of these conditions is met:

   • type(value) == "Func" – value is a Func Object.
   • type(value) == "BoundFunc" – value is a BoundFunc Object.
   • value.hasMethod("Call") – value is a Functor or any other object that implements a Call method.

   These conditions are tested for in the order specified above, with short-circuit evaluation. If either test throws an exception (though only the last one is expected to do so), value is considered not callable.

2. wait is able to throw an exception if the input arguments are invalid. timeout and interval must both be a pure Integer and be 0 or greater. Any other exception is unintended and should be reported. Thank you!

Examples

; Example #1
; This will wait 1 second before setting x to true.
setTimer () => x := true, -1000

; This will consequently wait at least 1 second before continuing.
wait x

; Example #2
; This will wait until the Spacebar is pressed,
; but will check for it much more frequently than KeyWait would.
wait () => getKeyState("Space"),, 10

; Example #3
; This is exactly equivalent to the previous example.
wait func("getKeyState").bind("Space"),, 10

; Example #4
; This will wait for Joystick #1 to be plugged in
; and display its name on the screen.
msgbox "Joystick '" wait(() => getKeyState("1JoyName")) "' has been plugged in!"