C# timer stop after some number of ticks automatically

Question

How to stop a timer after some numbers of ticks or after, let\'s say, 3-4 seconds?

So I start a timer and I want after 10 ticks or after 2-3 seconds to stop autom

Answer 1

Assuming you are using the System.Windows.Forms.Tick. You can keep track of a counter, and the time it lives like so. Its a nice way to use the Tag property of a timer. This makes it reusable for other timers and keeps your code generic, instead of using a globally defined int counter for each timer.

this code is quiet generic as you can assign this event handler to manage the time it lives, and another event handler to handle the specific actions the timer was created for.

    System.Windows.Forms.Timer ExampleTimer = new System.Windows.Forms.Timer();
    ExampleTimer.Tag = new CustomTimerStruct
    {
        Counter = 0,
        StartDateTime = DateTime.Now,
        MaximumSecondsToLive = 10,
        MaximumTicksToLive = 4
    };

    //Note the order of assigning the handlers. As this is the order they are executed.
    ExampleTimer.Tick += Generic_Tick;
    ExampleTimer.Tick += Work_Tick;
    ExampleTimer.Interval = 1;
    ExampleTimer.Start();


    public struct CustomTimerStruct
    {
            public uint Counter;
            public DateTime StartDateTime;
            public uint MaximumSecondsToLive;
            public uint MaximumTicksToLive;
    }

    void Generic_Tick(object sender, EventArgs e)
    {
            System.Windows.Forms.Timer thisTimer = sender as System.Windows.Forms.Timer;
            CustomTimerStruct TimerInfo = (CustomTimerStruct)thisTimer.Tag;
            TimerInfo.Counter++;
            //Stop the timer based on its number of ticks
            if (TimerInfo.Counter > TimerInfo.MaximumTicksToLive) thisTimer.Stop();
            //Stops the timer based on the time its alive
            if (DateTime.Now.Subtract(TimerInfo.StartDateTime).TotalSeconds > TimerInfo.MaximumSecondsToLive) thisTimer.Stop();
    }

    void Work_Tick(object sender, EventArgs e)
    {
        //Do work specifically for this timer
    }