Win32 - read from stdin with timeout

Question

I\'m trying to do something which I think should be simple: do a blocking read from standard input, but timing out after a specified interval if no data is available.

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Answer 1

In case anyone is writing chrome native messaging host and is looking for solution to check if there is any input on stdin without blocking then this works perfect:

HANDLE hStdin = GetStdHandle(STD_INPUT_HANDLE);
int timer = GetTickCount();
while(timer+10000 > GetTickCount())
{
    unsigned int length = 0;
    DWORD bytesAvailable = 0; 
    PeekNamedPipe(hStdin,NULL,0,NULL,&bytesAvailable,NULL);
    if(bytesAvailable > 0)
    {
        for (int i = 0; i < 4; i++)
        {
            unsigned int read_char = getchar();
            length = length | (read_char << i*8);
        }


        for (int i = 0; i < length; i++)
        {
            msg += getchar();
        }
        timer = GetTickCount();
    }
    else
    {
        // nothing to read, stdin empty
        Sleep(10);
    }
}