.NET, event every minute (on the minute). Is a timer the best option?

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I want to do stuff every minute on the minute (by the clock) in a windows forms app using c#. I'm just wondering whats the best way to go about it ?

I could use a timer and set its interval to 60000, but to get it to run on the minute, I would have to enable it on the minute precisely, not really viable.

I could use a timer and set its interval to 1000. Then within its tick event, I could check the clocks current minute against a variable that I set, if the minute has changed then run my code. This worries me because I am making my computer do a check every 1 second in order to carry out work every 1 minutes. Surely this is ugly ?

I'm using windows forms and .Net 2.0 so do not want to use the DispatchTimer that comes with .Net 3.5

This must be a fairly common problem. Have any of you a better way to do this?

timer winforms c#
15 Answers

Building on the answer from aquinas which can drift and which doesn't tick exactly on the minute just within one second of the minute:

static System.Timers.Timer t;

static void Main(string[] args)
{
    t = new System.Timers.Timer();
    t.AutoReset = false;
    t.Elapsed += new System.Timers.ElapsedEventHandler(t_Elapsed);
    t.Interval = GetInterval();
    t.Start();
    Console.ReadLine();
}

static double GetInterval()
{
    DateTime now = DateTime.Now;
    return ((60 - now.Second) * 1000 - now.Millisecond);
}

static void t_Elapsed(object sender, System.Timers.ElapsedEventArgs e)
{
    Console.WriteLine(DateTime.Now.ToString("o"));
    t.Interval = GetInterval();
    t.Start();
}

On my box this code ticks consistently within .02s of each minute:

2010-01-15T16:42:00.0040001-05:00
2010-01-15T16:43:00.0014318-05:00
2010-01-15T16:44:00.0128643-05:00
2010-01-15T16:45:00.0132961-05:00
user_1238400

I have a solution based on Environment.TickCount

    static void Main(string[] args)
    {
        //constatnt total miliseconds to one minute
        const Int32 minuteMilisecond = 60 * 1000;

        //get actual datetime
        DateTime actualDateTime = DateTime.UtcNow;

        //compenzation to one minute
        Int32 nexTimer = Environment.TickCount + ((59 - actualDateTime.Second) * 1000) + (999 - actualDateTime.Millisecond);

        //random fuction to simulate different delays on thread
        Random rnd = new Random();

        //main loop
        while (true) 
        {
            if (Environment.TickCount > nexTimer)
            {
                nexTimer += minuteMilisecond;

                //execute your code here every minute
                Console.WriteLine($"actual DateTime: {DateTime.Now.ToString("yyyy.MM.dd HH:mm:ss:ffff")}");
            }

            //random sleep between 100 - 200 ms
            Thread.Sleep(rnd.Next(100, 200));
        }
    }
user_34462280
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