WM_TIMER message never arrives [modified]

[KarstenK]

You dont SEND the Timer message, you INSTALL a timer!!! You got to call KillTimer somewhere. Try a delay in the Timer.

Greetings from Germany

[Hanan888]

thank You. I had some experience with PostMessage() and my problem was, that the message "passed-through" all other messages, and got ahead of them in the queue or something. Anyhow, my typical usage is to set some time interval.

[Michael Schubert]

Hanan888 wrote:

with no time delay

You cannot be sure of that. The timer resulution in WinNT is about 10 ms, it could take as long as that before the first WM_TIMER is fired.

[Hanan888]

Thank You.

KarstenK wrote:

You dont SEND the Timer message, you INSTALL a timer!!! You got to call KillTimer somewhere.

I do KillTimer(hWnd,SPECIFIC_CONST); in the message procedure when it arrives.

KarstenK wrote:

Try a delay in the Timer.

Delay didn't change anything, WM_TIMER never arrives in the message procedure.

[Hanan888]

Thank You. I don't need any accuracy in the time delay. My typical usage is to set the timer with several seconds delay. My problem is that it never arrives, breakpoint in case WM_TIMER: never gets hit.

[ramana g]

Are you sure that the timer is getting created? Check the return value of ::SetTimer.

[Michael Schubert]

Hm, you're using PM_REMOVE in PeekMessage, maybe it gets removed from the queue before it hits your message loop?

[Hanan888]

Thank You, really I didn't think of checking the return value. but now I checked and it seems alright result = SetTimer(m_hWnd, SPECIFIC_CONSTANT ,10000, NULL); after this, result = SPECIFIC_CONSTANT .

[Hanan888]

Thanks. As far as I know, it is removed from queue. But it gets in the msg variable, then processed.

[Tarmo Kalda]

result = SetTimer(m_hWnd, SPECIFIC_CONSTANT ,10000, NULL); You get WM_TIMER after 10 sec. 10000 ms. == 10 sec.

[ramana g]

MSDN says "PeekMessage does not retrieve messages for windows that belong to other threads.". So, the messages from your queue will not be removed by others. They will be in queue till you Peek or Get messages. And you can not PeekMessage from a window queue, where the window is not created by your thread

[Hanan888]

Thank you and sorry if I'm mistakenly emphasized any need for no-delay. It just that the messages never gets to the right place, whatever the delay is.

[Hanan888]

thanks.

ramana.g wrote:

MSDN says "PeekMessage does not retrieve messages for windows that belong to other threads.". So, the messages from your queue will not be removed by others. They will be in queue till you Peek or Get messages. And you can not PeekMessage from a window queue, where the window is not created by your thread

AS far as I know, all my windows and all my application is one thread.

[Rajkumar R]

Hanan888 wrote:

I was sure that my message peeking loop was pretty standard. I can't see the problem you indicated. Please describe it if you have the time.

"pretty standard" please give the standard committee link for this. typically, in win32 samples, i seen message loop with GetMessage() in winmain like, while( (bRet = GetMessage( &msg, NULL, 0, 0 )) != 0) { if (bRet == -1) { // handle the error and possibly exit } else { TranslateMessage(&msg); DispatchMessage(&msg); } } PeekMessage is used, if you are doing some lengthy operation and want to examine the message queue in between.

Hanan888 wrote:

Please describe it if you have the time.

just replace your message loop with GetMessage() and compare the processor usage in Task Manager. In my HT machine, i am getting almost 0% using GetMessage(), and using your peekmessage() more than 50%, iam sure in single processor machine it will be more than 90%.

[Hanan888]

Thank you for the info. My way was standard in DirectX samples. if PeekMessage() returns false (no messages in queue) I do graphic rendering. My recent check showed that if I do PostMessage() (instead of setTimer() )I get exactly where I wanted. Still, I must use timer to acheive the delay.

[Rajkumar R]

Hanan888 wrote:

I do graphic rendering.

That's it you are performing lengthy operation.

Hanan888 wrote:

Still, I must use timer to acheive the delay.

in your rendering loop, you can find the elapsed time since last time message posted and find out the delay. And if you find that delay you actually don't need to post message, you can call the handler for WM_TIMER directly in the rendering loop. but still i am not convinced why SetTimer() is not working.

[Hanan888]

Thanks again.

Rajkumar R wrote:

in your rendering loop, you can find the elapsed time since last time message posted and find out the delay. And if you find that delay you actually don't need to post message, you can call the handler for WM_TIMER directly in the rendering loop.

Yes, in rendering I check the time now and calculate the delay or something like that (some other from my team implemented these stuff). But what I need is triggering some GUI and rendering and business-logic events, orchestrating them with time delays. And it all worked before something got funky. All messages (PAINT, LBUTTONDOWN,...) go exactly where I need them. PostMessage(m_hWnd,WM_TIMER,SPECIFIC_CONST,NULL); get where I expect it to go. only SetTimer(m_hWnd,SPECIFIC_CONST,1000,NULL) never get to the case WM_TIMER:

Rajkumar R wrote:

but still i am convinced why SetTimer() is not working.

Do you mean you're still not convinced ?

[Hanan888]

Thank you all for help and invaluable knowledge !!! I sure learned a lot. It turns out, I stuck too much in the case WM_PAINT: , and that clogged the WM_TIMER messages. I rendered all my windows on WM_PAINT (DirectX stuff). Now, When I drag my windows some ungraceful visual effects happen, but I guess I'll manage.