Check for user input with timeout
Posted September 4th, 2008 by Larry Hutchinson
The following function (for Igor Pro 6.1 or later) can be used in the midst of a long calculation or data acquisition run to determine if the user needs to change or enter some values. If the user is not present, the function will time out.
If the function returns true indicating the user has clicked the "Yes" button, you can then use the techniques described in the help for PauseForUser or DoPrompt to fetch the actual input.
Put the following in the procedure window and then execute:
print UserHasValue(10)
Function UserHasValue(secsToWait) Variable secsToWait NewPanel /N=CheckUserValue/W=(285,111,738,225) SetDrawEnv textxjust= 2,textyjust= 1 DrawText 317,92,"Auto-continue in" SetDrawEnv textyjust= 1 DrawText 384,93,"seconds" SetDrawEnv fsize= 20,textyjust= 1 DrawText 22,21,"Do you have a new value?" ValDisplay vd0,pos={326,78},size={50,28},bodyWidth=50,fSize=20 ValDisplay vd0,limits={0,0,0},barmisc={0,1000},value= _NUM:secsToWait Button bYes,pos={99,36},size={77,27},title="Yes" Button bNo,pos={157,80},size={49,21},title="No" DoUpdate/W=CheckUserValue/E=1 // mark this as a progress window Variable tstart= ticks Variable secsLeft= secsToWait Variable userHasValue= 0 do Variable t0= ticks do while( ticks < (t0+10) ) secsLeft= round(secsToWait - (ticks-tstart)/60) ValDisplay vd0,value= _NUM:secsLeft,win=CheckUserValue DoUpdate/W=CheckUserValue if( V_Flag == 2 ) // user clicked a button userHasValue= CmpStr("bYes",S_name) == 0 break endif while( secsLeft > 0 ) KillWindow CheckUserValue return userHasValue end