Throw Error in TimerFcn

I want to throw an error when timer fires up .

try 
   timeout = timer('TimerFcn','error(''TIMEOUT OCCURED'');','StartDelay',0.01);
   start(timeout);
   '''Some Code'''
    stop(timeout);
    delete(timeout);
catch ME
    delete(timeout);
    disp('Error is caught')
    ''' Do something else '''
end

Upon executing, I am getting

Error while evaluating TimerFcn for timer 'timer-47' 

Answer 1

[Steven Lord]

This is not going to work as you've written it.

Imagine if the timer's StartDelay was 60 seconds and the body of your try block took 5 seconds to run. Would MATLAB wait, twiddling its thumbs, for 55 seconds for the timer's delay to elapse and then jump into the catch block? No, it wouldn't. By the time the TimerFcn actually executes, the code that created and started the timer may have long since finished.

You could potentially get something like this to work as long as you're willing to have "Some Code" poll. Have the TimerFcn change a value stored somewhere accessible to the function (in the timer object's UserData, for example) and have "Some Code" periodically check if that stored value has changed. If it has, the body of the try has run for too long and "Some Code" should terminate.

Alternately, if you're willing to poll, you don't need a timer. Store the current time (as a datetime would be easist to check) at the start of "Some Code" and periodically check if the difference between the current time and stored time, terminating "Some Code" if it's been too long.

currentTime = datetime('now');
totalPause = 0;
while true
    r = rand;
    disp("About to pause for " + r + " seconds.")
    pause(r)
    totalPause = totalPause + r;

    if datetime('now')-currentTime > seconds(4.5)
        break;
    end
end
end
disp("Paused for a total of " + totalPause + " seconds.")

[Sohil Shrestha]

Based on the documentation of stop and delete, timer object's Running property is set to false and and it is deleted from the memory. If the try block code is executed in less than 5 seconds, timer object will be deleted .

While the suggestion of polling is great, unfortunately I cannot use it since I am checking if a Simulink model is being compiled or not(which based on its size and computing resources may take milliseconds to couple of minutes). Based on my usecase, I have found Keyboard Interrupt is the straightforward way . The following code works for me .

 timeout = timer('TimerFcn',' com.mathworks.mde.cmdwin.CmdWinMLIF.getInstance().processKeyFromC(2,67,''C'')','StartDelay',120);
                                   

Answer 2

[Ameer Hamza]

TimerFcn can either be a function handle or the name of a function. To display anything, you need to use a function. For example

timeout = timer('TimerFcn',@(~,~) disp('error(''This is error'');'),'StartDelay',0.01);

[Sohil Shrestha]

I want to throw an error from the timer function when it fires up and catch it and do something else (other than just displaying it.). I followed the example in the documentation . Is that possible?

[Ameer Hamza]

Ok. I get your point. But the example you referred is not related to error handling. Can you tell why do you want to do such a thing? Isn't it logical to write your TimerFcn callback such that it executes the code inside 'catch' block?

[Sohil Shrestha]

I have updated the code above. The main purpose is for timeout functionality. I have a script that checks if a Simulink models compiles or not. If the model takes too long to compile, I basically want to interrupt and continue. hence throwing error.