Repeat a task with a time delay?

I have a variable in my code say it is "status".

I want to display some text in the application depending on this variable value. This has to be done with a specific time delay.

It's like,

• Check status variable value

• Display some text

• Wait for 10 seconds

• Check status variable value

• Display some text

• Wait for 15 seconds

and so on. The time delay may vary and it is set once the text is displayed.

I have tried Thread.sleep(time delay) and it failed. Any better way to get this done?

Solution 1:

You should use Handler's postDelayed function for this purpose. It will run your code with specified delay on the main UI thread, so you will be able to update UI controls.

private int mInterval = 5000; // 5 seconds by default, can be changed later
private Handler mHandler;

@Override
protected void onCreate(Bundle bundle) {

    // your code here

    mHandler = new Handler();
    startRepeatingTask();
}

@Override
public void onDestroy() {
    super.onDestroy();
    stopRepeatingTask();
}

Runnable mStatusChecker = new Runnable() {
    @Override 
    public void run() {
          try {
               updateStatus(); //this function can change value of mInterval.
          } finally {
               // 100% guarantee that this always happens, even if
               // your update method throws an exception
               mHandler.postDelayed(mStatusChecker, mInterval);
          }
    }
};

void startRepeatingTask() {
    mStatusChecker.run(); 
}

void stopRepeatingTask() {
    mHandler.removeCallbacks(mStatusChecker);
}

Solution 2:

To anyone interested, here's a class I created using inazaruk's code that creates everything needed (I called it UIUpdater because I use it to periodically update the UI, but you can call it anything you like):

import android.os.Handler;
/**
 * A class used to perform periodical updates,
 * specified inside a runnable object. An update interval
 * may be specified (otherwise, the class will perform the 
 * update every 2 seconds).
 * 
 * @author Carlos Simões
 */
public class UIUpdater {
        // Create a Handler that uses the Main Looper to run in
        private Handler mHandler = new Handler(Looper.getMainLooper());

        private Runnable mStatusChecker;
        private int UPDATE_INTERVAL = 2000;

        /**
         * Creates an UIUpdater object, that can be used to
         * perform UIUpdates on a specified time interval.
         * 
         * @param uiUpdater A runnable containing the update routine.
         */
        public UIUpdater(final Runnable uiUpdater) {
            mStatusChecker = new Runnable() {
                @Override
                public void run() {
                    // Run the passed runnable
                    uiUpdater.run();
                    // Re-run it after the update interval
                    mHandler.postDelayed(this, UPDATE_INTERVAL);
                }
            };
        }

        /**
         * The same as the default constructor, but specifying the
         * intended update interval.
         * 
         * @param uiUpdater A runnable containing the update routine.
         * @param interval  The interval over which the routine
         *                  should run (milliseconds).
         */
        public UIUpdater(Runnable uiUpdater, int interval){
            UPDATE_INTERVAL = interval;
            this(uiUpdater);
        }

        /**
         * Starts the periodical update routine (mStatusChecker 
         * adds the callback to the handler).
         */
        public synchronized void startUpdates(){
            mStatusChecker.run();
        }

        /**
         * Stops the periodical update routine from running,
         * by removing the callback.
         */
        public synchronized void stopUpdates(){
            mHandler.removeCallbacks(mStatusChecker);
        }
}

You can then create a UIUpdater object inside your class and use it like so:

...
mUIUpdater = new UIUpdater(new Runnable() {
         @Override 
         public void run() {
            // do stuff ...
         }
    });

// Start updates
mUIUpdater.startUpdates();

// Stop updates
mUIUpdater.stopUpdates();
...

If you want to use this as an activity updater, put the start call inside the onResume() method and the stop call inside the onPause(), so the updates start and stop according to the activity visibility.