How do I wait for a C# event to be raised?

Question

I have a Sender class that sends a Message on a IChannel:

public class MessageEventArgs : EventArgs {
  public Message Message { get; private set; }
  public MessageEventArgs(Message m) { Message = m; }
}

public interface IChannel {
  public event EventHandler<MessageEventArgs> MessageReceived;
  void Send(Message m);
}

public class Sender {
  public const int MaxWaitInMs = 5000;
  private IChannel _c = ...;

  public Message Send(Message m) {
    _c.Send(m);
    // wait for MaxWaitInMs to get an event from _c.MessageReceived
    // return the message or null if no message was received in response
  }
}

When we send messages, the IChannel sometimes gives a response depending on what kind of Message was sent by raising the MessageReceived event. The event arguments contain the message of interest.

I want Sender.Send() method to wait for a short time to see if this event is raised. If so, I'll return its MessageEventArgs.Message property. If not, I return a null Message.

How can I wait in this way? I'd prefer not to have do the threading legwork with ManualResetEvents and such, so sticking to regular events would be optimal for me.

Answer 1

Have you tried assigning the function to call asynchronously to a delegate, then invoking the mydelegateinstance.BeginInvoke?

Linky for reference.

With the below example, just call

FillDataSet(ref table, ref dataset);

and it'll work as if by magic. :)

#region DataSet manipulation
///<summary>Fills a the distance table of a dataset</summary>
private void FillDataSet(ref DistanceDataTableAdapter taD, ref MyDataSet ds) {
  using (var myMRE = new ManualResetEventSlim(false)) {
    ds.EnforceConstraints = false;
    ds.Distance.BeginLoadData();
    Func<DistanceDataTable, int> distanceFill = taD.Fill;
    distanceFill.BeginInvoke(ds.Distance, FillCallback<DistanceDataTable>, new object[] { distanceFill, myMRE });
    WaitHandle.WaitAll(new []{ myMRE.WaitHandle });
    ds.Distance.EndLoadData();
    ds.EnforceConstraints = true;
  }
}
/// <summary>
/// Callback used when filling a table asynchronously.
/// </summary>
/// <param name="result">Represents the status of the asynchronous operation.</param>
private void FillCallback<MyDataTable>(IAsyncResult result) where MyDataTable: DataTable {
  var state = result.AsyncState as object[];
  Debug.Assert((state != null) && (state.Length == 2), "State variable is either null or an invalid number of parameters were passed.");

  var fillFunc = state[0] as Func<MyDataTable, int>;
  var mre = state[1] as ManualResetEventSlim;
  Debug.Assert((mre != null) && (fillFunc != null));
  int rowsAffected = fillFunc.EndInvoke(result);
  Debug.WriteLine(" Rows: " + rowsAffected.ToString());
  mre.Set();
}

Answer 2

Use a AutoResetEvent.

Gimme a few minutes and I'll throw together a sample.

Here it is:

public class Sender
{
    public static readonly TimeSpan MaxWait = TimeSpan.FromMilliseconds(5000);

    private IChannel _c;
    private AutoResetEvent _messageRecieved;

    public Sender()
    {
        // initialize _c
        this._messageRecieved = new AutoResetEvent(false);
        this._c.MessageReceived += this.MessageReceived;
    }

    public Message Send(Message m)
    {
        this._c.Send(m);
        // wait for MaxWaitInMs to get an event from _c.MessageReceived
        // return the message or null if no message was received in response


        // This will wait for up to 5000 ms, then throw an exception.
        this._messageRecieved.WaitOne(MaxWait);

        return null;
    }

    public void MessageReceived(object sender, MessageEventArgs e)
    {
        //Do whatever you need to do with the message

        this._messageRecieved.Set();
    }
}

Answer 3

Perhaps your MessageReceived method should simply flag a value to a property of your IChannel interface, while implementing the INotifyPropertyChanged event handler, so that you would be advised when the property is changed.

By doing so, your Sender class could loop until the max waiting time is elapsed, or whenever the PropertyChanged event handler occurs, breaking the loop succesfully. If your loop doesn't get broken, then the message shall be considered as never received.

Answer 4

WaitOne is really the right tool for this job. In short, you want to wait between 0 and MaxWaitInMs milliseconds for a job to complete. You really have two choices, poll for completion or synchronize the threads with some construct that can wait an arbitrary amount of time.

Since you're well aware of the right way to do this, for posterity I'll post the polling version:

MessageEventArgs msgArgs = null;
var callback = (object o, MessageEventArgs args) => {
    msgArgs = args;
};

_c.MessageReceived += callback;
_c.Send(m);

int msLeft = MaxWaitInMs;
while (msgArgs == null || msLeft >= 0) {
    Thread.Sleep(100);
    msLeft -= 100; // you should measure this instead with say, Stopwatch
}

_c.MessageRecieved -= callback;