hiatus

Hiatus is a python library that uses the threading module's "Timer" to implement analogues to javascript's setTimeout/clearTimeout and setInterval/clearInterval.

These functions may be used as decorators. Also important is that the python analogues take time arguments in seconds, not milliseconds, in order to be consistent with the standard library.

A Caveat:

Much of python does not "play nice" with threading. You have been warned.

(I looked into a signal-based approach, but this is limited. Another approach would be to depend on an event loop, such as twisted.reactor.)

Examples:

>>> from hiatus import set_interval
>>> @set_interval(1.00)
... def dave_grohl():
...     print "THE BEST"
...
>>> THE BEST
THE BEST
THE BEST
THE BEST
THE BEST

>>> def note():
...     print "HUGE SUCCESS"...
>>> hiatus.set_timeout(lambda: hiatus.clear_interval(glados), 6.0)
<hiatus.set_timeout object at 0xb770468c>
>>> glados = hiatus.set_interval(note, 1.000)
>>> HUGE SUCCESS
HUGE SUCCESS
HUGE SUCCESS
HUGE SUCCESS

Functions:

set_timeout(f, time=None):

Calls f after time seconds pass. If time is not specified, the first argument is used as time instead and the resulting object can then be called with a function. This allows for decorator syntax.

clear_timeout(timeout_obj):

Clears the timeout returned by set_timeout.

set_interval(f, time=None):

Calls f every time seconds pass. If time is not specified, the first argument is used as time instead and the resulting object can then be called with a function. This allows for decorator syntax.

clear_timeout(timeout_obj):

Clears the interval returned by set_interval.

Tests:

nose doesn't seem to "like" multithreading, but other than some violated expectations, testing works fine:

nosetests

Developers! Developers! Developers!

If you're a python fan and like what you see (or don't quite like what you see), I heartily invite you to dig in, fork it up and git push it good.

License:

MIT.