Re: how to let my program sleep a while

["Simon Coulter" <shc@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

"
Hello Booth,

You wrote:
>Next question: Simon and others have spoken of passing in the SleepFor 
>value as a 5 digit value.  Why isn't it passed as *HMS?  the procedure 
>itself can add the *HMS to the current time, or whatever.  The added 
>benefit is that then there is no issues as to how many seconds in 42 
>minutes.

It's partly a matter of choice.  I did suggest you may wish to do that sort of 
thing in 
an earlier note.  I just don't think it is appropriate because a TIME 
represents an 
instant not a duration.  Part of the trouble is adequately explaining the 
behaviour of 
such a procedure.  Would it derive the duration from the current time, from 
midnight, 
from noon, from the birth time of the programmer, and would that behaviour be 
apparent 
from the procedure name?

However a properly designed procedure can allow the sort of calculation you 
wish.

Assume the sleepFor() procedure expects a number of seconds to be passed.  
Would you 
like to be able to code variations on the following?

         * Sleep for 42 minutes
        C               CALLP   sleepFor(2520)

         * Sleep for 42 minutes
        C               CALLP   sleepFor(60 * 42)

         * Sleep for a chunk of time - hours minutes and seconds could overlay 
a TIME
         *   field using a DS but I think that's yucky!
        C               CALLP   sleepFor((hours * 3600) + (minutes * 60) + 
seconds))

Well you can with the right prototype incantations.  I leave that as an 
excercise for 
you but as a hint you should read about the CONST and VALUE keywords in regard 
to 
prototypes.  (That would be in the RPG IV Reference Manual :)  did I just say 
RTFM? Nah, 
couldn't be me ....)

Of course you would (well I would) use named constants for the magic values, 
e.g., 
$SECS_PER_HOUR and $SECS_PER_MINUTE or some such.

If you wanted a sleepFor( time ) procedure then I would still define the 
sleepFor( 
seconds ) version since that is a more standard version.  Then create a 
sleepForTime() 
version which probably invokes sleepFor() after calculating the duration -- Oh 
how I 
wish for a language that can overload procedures so the correct sleepFor() 
would be 
called automatically.  I could have sleepFor( seconds ), and sleepFor( time ), 
and 
sleepFor( days ), and .... and .... Hmm, what would you call such behaviour? 
(poly .....  
This parrot wouldn't voom if you put 4 million volts through it), what language 
does 
that sound like? (at least 4 spring to mind) ..... a French one, a chatty one, 
an 
incremental derivative, and a finely ground one ....

Regards,
Simon Coulter.

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