======
Timers
======

LVGL has a built-in timer system. You can register a function to have it
be called periodically. The timers are handled and called in
:cpp:func:`lv_timer_handler`, which needs to be called every few milliseconds.
See `Porting </porting/timer-handler>`__ for more information.

Timers are non-preemptive, which means a timer cannot interrupt another
timer. Therefore, you can call any LVGL related function in a timer.

Create a timer
**************

To create a new timer, use
:cpp:expr:`lv_timer_create(timer_cb, period_ms, user_data)`. It will create an
:cpp:type:`lv_timer_t` ``*`` variable, which can be used later to modify the
parameters of the timer. :cpp:func:`lv_timer_create_basic` can also be used.
This allows you to create a new timer without specifying any parameters.

A timer callback should have a ``void (*lv_timer_cb_t)(lv_timer_t *)``
prototype.

For example:

.. code:: c

   void my_timer(lv_timer_t * timer)
   {
     /*Use the user_data*/
     uint32_t * user_data = timer->user_data;
     printf("my_timer called with user data: %d\n", *user_data);

     /*Do something with LVGL*/
     if(something_happened) {
       something_happened = false;
       lv_btn_create(lv_scr_act(), NULL);
     }
   }

   ...

   static uint32_t user_data = 10;
   lv_timer_t * timer = lv_timer_create(my_timer, 500,  &user_data);

Ready and Reset
***************

:cpp:expr:`lv_timer_ready(timer)` makes a timer run on the next call of
:cpp:func:`lv_timer_handler`.

:cpp:expr:`lv_timer_reset(timer)` resets the period of a timer. It will be
called again after the defined period of milliseconds has elapsed.

Set parameters
**************

You can modify some timer parameters later:

- :cpp:expr:`lv_timer_set_cb(timer, new_cb)`
- :cpp:expr:`lv_timer_set_period(timer, new_period)`

Repeat count
************

You can make a timer repeat only a given number of times with
:cpp:expr:`lv_timer_set_repeat_count(timer, count)`. The timer will
automatically be deleted after it's called the defined number of times.
Set the count to ``-1`` to repeat indefinitely.

Measure idle time
*****************

You can get the idle percentage time of :cpp:func:`lv_timer_handler` with
:cpp:func:`lv_timer_get_idle`. Note that, it doesn't measure the idle time of
the overall system, only :cpp:func:`lv_timer_handler`. It can be misleading if
you use an operating system and call :cpp:func:`lv_timer_handler` in a timer, as
it won't actually measure the time the OS spends in an idle thread.

Asynchronous calls
******************

In some cases, you can't perform an action immediately. For example, you
can't delete an object because something else is still using it, or you
don't want to block the execution now. For these cases,
:cpp:expr:`lv_async_call(my_function, data_p)` can be used to call
``my_function`` on the next invocation of :cpp:func:`lv_timer_handler`.
``data_p`` will be passed to the function when it's called. Note that
only the data pointer is saved, so you need to ensure that the variable
will be "alive" while the function is called. It can be *static*, global
or dynamically allocated data. If you want to cancel an asynchronous
call, call :cpp:expr:`lv_async_call_cancel(my_function, data_p)`, which will
clear all asynchronous calls matching ``my_function`` and ``data_p``.

For example:

.. code:: c

   void my_screen_clean_up(void * scr)
   {
     /*Free some resources related to `scr`*/

     /*Finally delete the screen*/
     lv_obj_del(scr);
   }

   ...

   /*Do something with the object on the current screen*/

   /*Delete screen on next call of `lv_timer_handler`, not right now.*/
   lv_async_call(my_screen_clean_up, lv_scr_act());

   /*The screen is still valid so you can do other things with it*/

If you just want to delete an object and don't need to clean anything up
in ``my_screen_cleanup`` you could just use :cpp:func:`lv_obj_del_async` which
will delete the object on the next call to :cpp:func:`lv_timer_handler`.

API
***
