ASP timers

[danath]

Hello

i've gotta a problem with making one of the procedures to self-restart after specific amount of time (e.g. 1 minute).
so far i've used javascript's setTimeout function, but i need something that will work on server side.

Thanks for help and happy hollidays

[IanTurner]

If you use totally server side - you won't know whether the visitor has left the page.

Can you explain what you are trying to do?

[GaryK]

Here I go again, taking a risk by perhaps showing my ignorance but here's how I do essentially what you seem to be doing.

For starters, read this tutorial [w3schools.com] from W3Schools on how to detect if a user is still connected.

There is a free ActiveX component called WaitFor [serverobjects.com] from ServerObjects that lets you pause the processing until some specific event has occurred such as having waited one minute. Within the loop for WaitFor you can check to see if the user is still connected and take whatever action you need to based on that knowledge.

EDIT: Where are my manners? That was your first post and you should have gotten a great big Welcome to WW!

[danath]

it has nothing to do with users connected. i need to send some emails at exact time. so i thought to make a procedure, that's checking time every minute-interval and if the time is correct, send emails.
if i implement it with javascript, procedure won't start unless there's at least one person online, get it?
so i need something that will run on server and check time every minute or so....

thanks, bye

[GaryK]

Someone correct me if I'm wrong but wouldn't using the Task Scheduler to execute an ASP page once a minute be the easiest solution? I'm not sure if it's the most efficient method though.

[danath]

thanks gary.:) sometime the easiest solution is hardest to find:)

[IanTurner]

I use task scheduler for that sort of task too. I haven't found any reliability problems.

[danath]

yeah, but the thing is that you can't schedule it on a minute basis
so any other suggestions?

[GaryK]

>>thanks gary.

You're more than welcome. I'm glad I provided some useful advice and that someone like Ian has confirmed it is indeed a viable option. :)

[GaryK]

What version of Windows are you using? In Win2K Professional there is an Advanced button on the Schedule tab. That will let you repeat the task as often as once a minute. I'm sure the same functionality exists in other versions of Windows.

[danath]

yes i got that:)

if i select in scheduler to run *.asp it opens it in my text editor. how am i supposed to run it like an server page?

[GaryK]

Are you using a fully qualified URL as the program to run or just the filename? If you use just the filename it will tend to open FrontPage or whatever editor you might have associated with .asp files. As a fully qualified URL it will cause your default browser to open and navigate to the URL which is what you want to happen.

[IanTurner]

I use the wget command line http utility for calling asp files via the task scheduler. You should be able to find a copy by searching on 'wget'

[GaryK]

For his use wget would be perfect!

Please let me add a slightly off-topic comment. For internal use wget is fine. Personally, and for the thousands of websites that use my browscap.ini file and global.asa code, wget is treated as a "website stripper" and will usually be redirected to a dead-end page or worse. ;)

[IanTurner]

Agree - the safest uses of wget are local on the server.