Pausing Certain Loops Only?

I'm trying to run multiple loops at the same time, and when I try and use sleep() inside them, it pauses all loops. Is there any simple way around this? I'll post code if anyone wants it.

Code would be great to see how your doing it. If its long please supply it as pastebin. Or else place it in code tags like this ['code] code here ['/code] without the ' of course…

function screenWipe()
	term.clear()
	term.setCursorPos(1, 1)
end

function monitorWipe()
	monitor.clear()
	monitor.setCursorPos(1,1)
end

function PrintCentered(sText)
	local w, h = term.getSize()
	local x, y = term.getCursorPos()
	x = math.max(math.floor((w / 2) - (#sText / 2)), 0)
	term.setCursorPos(x, y)
	print(sText)

end

function MonPrintCentered(sText)
	local w, h = monitor.getSize()
	local x, y = monitor.getCursorPos()
	x = math.max(math.floor((w / 2) - (#sText / 2)), 0)
	y = y+1
	monitor.setCursorPos(x, y)
	monitor.write(sText)
end

function AddOutput(sSide, ...)
	local c = colors.combine(rs.getBundledOutput(sSide), ...)
	rs.setBundledOutput(sSide, c)
end

function RemoveOutput(sSide, ...)
	local c = colors.subtract(rs.getBundledOutput(sSide), ...)
	rs.setBundledOutput(sSide, c)
end
local function CowTimer()
	while true do  
		AddOutput("back", colors.orange)
		RemoveOutput("back", colors.white)
		MonPrintCentered("CowKiller Running")
		RemoveOutput("back", colors.white)
		sleep(5)
		AddOutput("back", colors.white)
		sleep(295)
		RemoveOutput("back", colors.white)
		sleep(5)
		AddOutput("back", colors.white)
		sleep(295)
		RemoveOutput("back", colors.white)
		sleep(5)
		AddOutput("back", colors.white)
		sleep(295)
		RemoveOutput("back", colors.white)
		sleep(5)
		AddOutput("back", colors.white)
		sleep(295)
		RemoveOutput("back", colors.orange)
		MonPrintCentered("Water Started")
		sleep(20)
		AddOutput("back", colors.blue)
		MonPrintCentered("Turtles Started")
		sleep(1.5)
		RemoveOutput("back", colors.blue)
		sleep(59.5)
		AddOutput("back", colors.orange)
		RemoveOutput("back", colors.blue)
		sleep(3)
		MonPrintCentered("Cow Timer Reseting!")
		rednet.broadcast("Farm Control Cow Cycle Completed")
	end
end

function ChickenTimer()
	while true do
		MonPrintCentered("Chicken Killer Running")
		MonPrintCentered("Spawning Chickens")
		for i=1, 64 do
			AddOutput("back", colors.red)
			sleep(1)
			RemoveOutput("back", colors.red)
		end
		sleep(1200)
		MonPrintCentered("Loading Chickens")
		for i=1, 60 do
			AddOutput("back", colors.purple)
			sleep(0.5)
			RemoveOutput("back", colors.purple)
		end
		sleep(5)
		AddOutput("back", colors.yellow)
		MonPrintCentered("Killing Chickens")
		sleep(5)
		RemoveOutput("back", colors.yellow)
		MonPrintCentered("Chicken Timer Reseting!")
		rednet.broadcast("Farm Control Chicken Cycle Completed")
	end
end

	CowCorou = coroutine.create(CowTimer)
	ChickenCorou = coroutine.create(ChickenTimer)
monitor = peripheral.wrap("top")  
rednet.open("bottom")
screenWipe()
monitorWipe()
MonPrintCentered("Farm Control Running")
PrintCentered("Farm Control Running")
monitor.setCursorPos(1,2)
MonPrintCentered("VERY Experimental Version")
coroutine.resume(CowCorou)
coroutine.resume(ChickenCorou)
while true do
	print("Would you like to turn wheat production on or off?")
	local input = read()
	if input == "on" then
		AddOutput("back", colors.green)
		PrintCentered("Wheat Production Off")
	elseif input == "off" then
		RemoveOutput("back", colors.green)
		PrintCentered("Wheat Production On")
	end
end

That's it, it's an incredibly simple timer designed to control an automated chicken and cow farm. I'm just getting the basic controls down at the moment and will add nice interfaces and such later on. What's happening is, the chicken spawner (dispenser filled with eggs) only fires once then stops.

if you want to pause certain loops, the most efficient way to do that is coroutine manipulation

turn all the functions into coroutines and put those in a table

keep cycling through the table, resuming the coroutines you want to resume and skipping the ones you want to skip, until you want the program to end or move on

btw, resuming a coroutine pauses the program until the coroutine yields (sleeps), so when you resumed the cow and chicken coroutines, they just went through one cycle

Or use parallels and it'll do it for you ;)/>

TheOriginalBIT (OnHoliday), on 03 January 2013 - 10:18 PM said:

Or use parallels and it'll do it for you ;)/>/>

Yeah, I'd just go with this. Easiest and shortest way out.

What do you mean by parrallels? I haven't been doing this for very long :P/>
I've been thinking about just downloading some timer api, I think that would work nicely.

Parallel API is simple.

function hello()
  for i=1, 10 do
    print 'hello'
    sleep(math.random())
  end
end

function world()
  for i=1, 10 do
    print 'world'
    sleep(math.random())
  end
end

parallel.waitForAll(hello, world)

Prints the words "hello" and "world" ten times at the same time and at random time intervals.

That is, to say, prints ten each of "hello" and "world", interspersed at random time intervals of up to two seconds (or up to 1+1 seconds, however you want to phrase that).