SLEEP

SLEEP pauses the program indefinitely or for a specified number of seconds, program is unpaused when the user presses a key or when the specified number of seconds has passed.

Syntax

SLEEP [seconds]

• Seconds are an optional INTEGER value. If there is no parameter, then it waits for a keypress.
• Any user keypress will abort the SLEEP time.
• SLEEP does NOT clear the keyboard buffer so it can affect INKEY$, INPUT, INPUT$ and LINE INPUT reads.
• Use an INKEY$ keyboard buffer clearing loop when an empty keyboard buffer is necessary.
• SLEEP allows other programs to share the processor time during the interval.

Example(s)

CLS 
PRINT "Press a key..."
SLEEP
PRINT "You pressed a key, now wait for 2 seconds."
SLEEP 2
PRINT "You've waited for 2 seconds."
PRINT "(or you pressed a key)"

Press a key...
You pressed a key, now wait for 2 seconds.
You've waited for 2 seconds.
(or you pressed a key)

Explanation: SLEEP without any arguments waits until a key is pressed, next SLEEP statement uses the argument 2 which means that it will wait for 2 seconds, any number of seconds can be specified.

See Also

• TIMER, INKEY$
• _DELAY, _LIMIT