Most operating systems provide a command in batch files to sleep, or wait, a certain number of seconds. This is great in that batch files can display text, allowing you time to read before continuing. Or, batch files may wait a few seconds in order to connect to other resources.
While Windows XP does not come with such a command, there are tricks to emulate it, such as a ”ping” command trick to emulate the sleep command. However, if you wish, the Windows 2003 Resource Kit provides a ”sleep” command requiring no extra tricks. The Resource Kit is a large download, but besides the ”sleep” command, the Windows 2003 Resource Kit also provides tools to remap keys, query the Active Directory, display the last ”n” lines of a text file (a tail command), and more. To download and install the Resource Kit:
1. Go to the Microsoft Windows Server 2003 download section at http://www.microsoft.com/windowsserver2003/
downloads/tools/default.mspx. Or, if that link does not work, visit http://www.microsoft.com/ and search for “Windows 2003”. Once there, choose the “Downloads -> Tools” link.
2. Select the link “Windows Server 2003 Resource Kit Tools”.
3. Click the “Download” link. Choose to register or not, depending on your choice, and follow the on-screen instructions to download and install the product. The default install directory is “C:\Program Files\Windows Resource Kits\Tools\”.
Once the Windows 2003 Resource Kit is installed, you may need to reboot your machine for the directory “C:\Program Files\Windows Resource Kits\Tools\” to be added to your path.
Now that the sleep command is available, to see the online help, enter the following DOS command:
C:\>sleep /?
Or, just issue the command:
C:\>sleep N
Replace N with the number of seconds for batch file to ”sleep”. For example, a batch file can wait 5 seconds before continuing by issuing this command:
C:\>sleep 5
If you need to wait just a few milliseconds, issue this command:
C:\>sleep -m N
So, to sleep half a second:
C:\>sleep -m 500
Although this command supports a ”precise” millisecond sleep, I would not recommend it for real-time processing!