Help with a loop (Runs too fast / Ignores timers)

[rlkoshak (Rich Koshak)]

@rossko57

Okay, that’s quite complicated. A limitation of createTimer() is that it runs its block of code once only.

Design Pattern: Looping Timers

Please see Design Pattern: What is a Design Pattern and How Do I Use Them to understand the scope and purpose of this and other Design Patterns. Problem Statement Often one may require a loop in a Rule, often with a Thread::sleep to wait for some event to occur or some state to change before continuing the rest of the Rule. However, long running Rules are a bad idea (see Why have my Rules stopped running? Why Thread::sleep is a bad idea). Concept [image] Use a Timer that reschedules itself in…

@rossko57

difficult to create cascading timers that follow on from each other,

Design Pattern: Cascading Timers

Please see Design Pattern: What is a Design Pattern and How Do I Use Them. This Design Pattern is a revisitation of a solution I wrote up here. Problem Statement There are many situations where one needs to cause a series of activities to take place in sequence with the option of being able to cancel the sequence of activities and be able to control how long each step takes to complete. One common use case is for controlling an irrigation system that consists of more than one zone. Concept …

I’ve got DPs for everything.

@Sharpy

i do like the idea of one using last weeks persistence data too trigger items its in the post you linked

I think I was the one who originally came up with that idea. I’ve often wondered if I should write it up as a DP. Maybe I should.

Anyway, to implement what you are trying to do correctly I think you would do something like (note I’ll assume [Deprecated] Design Pattern: Time Of Day) the following. It think the behavior you are after is every hour to send a command to some lights, wait for a time, then send the command off, then wake up in some number of minutes and do it again:

val Timer awayFromHomeTimer = null
val Timer offTimer = null

rule "Away from home lighting"
when
    Item Away_from_home changed
then
    // cancel the timer if someone comes home
    if(Away_from_home.state == OFF && awayFromHomeTimer !== null) {
        awayFromHomeTimer.cancel
        awayFromHomeTimer = null
        offTimer.cancel
        offTimer = null
        return;
    }

    // Ignore the command if there is already a Timer (this should never happen)
    else if(awayFromHomeTimer !== null) return;

    awayFromHomeTimer = createTimer(now.plusSeconds(60), [  
        var lightsState = if(TimeOfDay.state == "DAY") 100 else 30 // I'm assuming Ghouselights is a Number Item
        var lights = if(TimeOfDay.state == "DAY") Ghouselights else GusLights
        var offTime = if(TimeOfDay.state == "DAY") 15 else 1
        var reschedule = if(TimeOfDay.state == "DAY") 25 else 132

        if(Away_from_home == ON) {
            lights.sendCommand(lightsState)
            offTimer = createTimer(now.plusMinutes(offTime), [ |
                lights.sendCommand(0)
                offTimer = null
            ]
            awayFromHomeTimer.reschedule(now.plusMinutes(reschedule))
        }
        else awayFromHomeTimer = null
    ]
end

I have to say, this is not pretty code but I think it does what you originally intended using Timers. I’d highly recommend using one of the other approaches discussed on the thread rossko57 linked to.