Timers schedule actions to be performed after a delay, or over a period of time. For example, you may want to make the player invulnerable after obtaining a power-up item, then restore vulnerability after 10 seconds. Or you may want to apply damage once per second while the player moves through a room filled with toxic gas. Such actions can be achieved through the use of timers.
Timer Management
Timers are managed in a global Timer Manager (of type FTimerManager). A global Timer Manager exists on the Game Instance Object, as well as on each World. Two main functions are used to set up timers with a Timer Manager: SetTimer, and SetTimerForNextTick, each with several overloads. Each one can be attached to any type of Object or function delegate, and SetTimer can be made to repeat at regular intervals, if desired. See the Timer Manager API page for more detail on these functions.
Accessing the Timer Manager can be done through the AActor function called GetWorldTimerManager, which calls up to the GetTimerManager function in UWorld. To access the global Timer Manager, use the UGameInstance function, `GetTimerManager'. This is also the fallback used if a World doesn't have its own Timer Manager for any reason, and can be used for function calls that aren't relevant to, or should not depend on, the existence of any specific World.
Timers can be used with the standard C++ function pointers TFunction Objects or Delegates.
Setting and Clearing Timers
The SetTimer functions of FTimerManager will set a timer to call a function or delegate after a delay, and can be set to repeat that function call indefinitely. These functions will fill out a timer handle (type FTimerHandle), which can be used to pause (and resume) the countdown, query or change the amount of time remaining, or even cancel the timer altogether. It is safe to set timers within a function called by a timer, even including reuse of the timer handle that was used to call the function. One use for this might be to delay initialization of one Actor if it depends on another Actor that hasn't spawned yet but is expected to spawn soon; the dependent Actor's initialization function could set a timer to call itself again after a fixed length of time, such as one second. Alternately, the initialization function could be called by a looping timer that clears itself upon success.
Timers can also be set to run on the next frame, rather than with a timed interval. This is accomplished by calling SetTimerForNextTick, but note that this function does not fill out a timer handle.
To clear a timer, pass the FTimerHandle that was filled out during the SetTimer call into the FTimerManager function called ClearTimer. The timer handle will become invalid at this point, and can be reused to manage a new timer. Calling SetTimer with an existing timer handle will clear the timer referenced by that timer handle and replace it with a new one.
Finally, all timers associated with a specific Object can be cleared by calling ClearAllTimersForObject.
Example:
void AMyActor::BeginPlay()
{
Super::BeginPlay();
// Call RepeatingFunction once per second, starting two seconds from now.
GetWorldTimerManager().SetTimer(MemberTimerHandle, this, &AMyActor::RepeatingFunction, 1.0f, true, 2.0f);
}
void AMyActor::RepeatingFunction()
{
// Once we've called this function enough times, clear the Timer.
if (--RepeatingCallsRemaining <= 0)
{
GetWorldTimerManager().ClearTimer(MemberTimerHandle);
// MemberTimerHandle can now be reused for any other Timer.
}
// Do something here...
}
Calling SetTimer with a rate less than or equal to zero is identical to calling ClearTimer.
Pausing and Resuming Timers
The FTimerManager function PauseTimer uses a timer handle to pause a running timer. This prevents the timer from executing its function call, but the elapsed and remaining times stay the same while paused. UnPauseTimer causes a paused timer to resume running.
Timer Information
In addition to managing timers, timer managers also provide funtions for obtaining information—such as the rate, elapsed time, and remaining time—for a specific timer.
Is Timer Active
The IsTimerActive function of FTimerManager is used to determine if the specified timer is curently active and not paused.
Example:
// Is this weapon waiting to be able to fire again?
GetWorldTimerManager().IsTimerActive(this, &AUTWeapon::RefireCheckTimer);
Timer Rate
FTimerManager has a function called GetTimerRate that gets the current rate (time between activations) of a timer from its timer handle. A timer's rate cannot be changed directly, but SetTimer can be called with its timer handle to clear it and create a new timer, which could be identical except for the rate. GetTimerRate will return a value of -1 if the timer handle is not valid.
Example:
// This weapon's rate of fire changes as it warms up. Is it currently waiting to fire, and if so, how long is the current delay between shots?
GetWorldTimerManager().GetTimerRate(this, &AUTWeapon::RefireCheckTimer);
Elapsed and Remaining Time
FTimermanager provides functionality through GetTimerElapsed and GetTimerRemaining, returning the elapsed and remaining time, respectively, for the timer associated with the provided timer handle. As with GetTimerRate, these functions will return -1 if the timer handle is invalid.
Example:
// How long will it be until this weapon is ready to fire again? If the answer comes back as -1, it is ready now.
GetWorldTimerManager().GetTimerElapsed(this, &AUTWeapon::RefireCheckTimer);
The sum of the elapsed and remaining time for a timer should be equal to the rate of the timer.
Known Issues
- The code is not thread safe at the moment, and will cause an assert if accessed outside of the game thread.