How to Delay in C: 7 Steps (with Pictures) - wikiHow (2024)

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1. 1

   Make your CPU work for some time without producing any noticeable event.

2. 2

   Do no other operation during that delay, in order to create a simple time-delay.

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A program that waits a given amount of seconds:

#include <stdio.h>#include <dos.h>int main(){ int del; // The delay period printf("Enter the delay time (in seconds): "); scanf("%i",&del); del *= 1000; // Multiply it by 1000 to convert to milliseconds delay(del); // delay. printf("Done."); return 0;}

A program that counts down from 10 to 0:

#include <stdio.h>#include <time.h>int main(){ int i; for(i = 10; i >= 0; i--) { printf("%i\n",i); // Write the current 'countdown' number delay(1000); // Wait a second } return 0;}

• The above logic can be implemented by using any looping structure followed by a null statement-";",like by using while or do-while loops.

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• A millisecond is 1/1000 of a second.

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• If you are using the for-loop, the compiler may optimize the code, and, because the loop does nothing, remove it. This doesn't happen when using delay().

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• Note that when using the for-loop technique, you might need a very big span for i, because an empty statement is executed very fast. Such big numbers may not fit in an integer type.

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• This technique is generally useless in anything besides a trivial program. In general, use timers or an event-driven approach to implement this. Otherwise the program will become unresponsive during the delay time, and that's not always a good thing. Besides, choosing N in your loop, if it depends on instruction execution, may have surprising results. Apparently the original author has never heard of an optimizing compiler...it may optimize away the entire loop if it actually does nothing!

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Co-authors: 15

Updated: August 25, 2023

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