Run a macro every minute but don't run it if it's already running

[jack777]

Hi,

I have a macro that is scheduled to run every minute, it executes a batch script and it takes sometimes more than 1 minute to complete. I don't want the macro to run again if it's already running. How can I achieve that ?

Related question : is there a way to wait for a command (the batch script) to terminate before continuing the macro ?

[rberq]

Didn't you already ask the first question in another thread?  I believe the answer was, the scheduled macro will not run again if the previous instance is still running.  I would recommend you do some testing to make sure that is true.   

For your related question, this should work:

1) When your macro starts, create a temp file -- let's call it marker.txt.

2) Start the batch script.

3) Use a Repeat loop to check over and over for the existence of marker.txt.  Do not exit from the Repeat loop as long as the file exists.  Somewhere inside the Repeat loop, include a few seconds delay -- this is just so looping won't chew up so much processor time.
 
4) As the last step in your batch script, delete marker.txt.

5) Next time the macro goes through the Repeat loop, the file will no longer exist, so exit from the Repeat and the macro can continue with whatever else it needs to do.  

[jack777]

44 minutes ago, rberq said:

Didn't you already ask the first question in another thread?  I believe the answer was, the scheduled macro will not run again if the previous instance is still running.  I would recommend you do some testing to make sure that is true.   

For your related question, this should work:

1) When your macro starts, create a temp file -- let's call it marker.txt.

2) Start the batch script.

3) Use a Repeat loop to check over and over for the existence of marker.txt.  Do not exit from the Repeat loop as long as the file exists.  Somewhere inside the Repeat loop, include a few seconds delay -- this is just so looping won't chew up so much processor time.
 
4) As the last step in your batch script, delete marker.txt.

5) Next time the macro goes through the Repeat loop, the file will no longer exist, so exit from the Repeat and the macro can continue with whatever else it needs to do.  

Yes I already asked a similar question... Sorry. But I checked with examples. And I noticed the macro runs again every minute even if the previous instance didn't terminate... I will try your solution...

[Cory]

As an 'aside'check out the Windows Task Scheduler. You can schedule MEP macros, and other things, from there. Used in combination with MEP's scheduler, one can do some things one can't do with either of them individually.