CODEWITHSUNDEEP
javascriptjqueryperformanceweb-applications
maze
maze

Reputation: 2284

How does setInterval() affect performance?

We are building a web app using Twitter Bootstrap as a framework and have problems showing/hiding tooltips. Apart from trying to find a solution to the actual problem, I have a question regarding the workaround we use in the meantime:

Performance-wise, is it generally a bad idea to use setInterval()?

How can I measure the performance impact caused by this?

Are there better ways to constantly check for the presence of elements and remove them?

// temporary workaround to remove unclosed tooltips
setInterval(function() {
    if ( $('.tooltip.in').length > 1 ) {
        $('.tooltip').remove();
    }
}, 1000);

Upvotes: 4

Views: 6957

Answers (2)

Frances McMullin
Frances McMullin

Reputation: 5706

if you're really, really worried about performance, using a live nodelist might be faster :

var tooltipInNodes = document.getElementsByClassName("tooltip in");
var tooltipNodes = document.getElementsByClassName("tooltip");

setInterval(function() {
    if ( tooltipInNodes.length > 1 ) {
        $(tooltipNodes).remove();
    }
}, 1000);

This is unlikely to make much of a difference though, and as has been mentioned, using setInterval with long intervals (a second is big, 4ms is small) is unlikely to have any major effects.

Upvotes: 1

Pouki
Pouki

Reputation: 1664

This is better to avoid this technic, but until you find a real solution, you can optimize this workaround.

Create a not anonymous function and call it, you'll avoid "context function creation" every second.

You can also optimize jQuery selectors by caching and specify the tag name.

setInterval(tmp_workaround, 1000);

function tmp_workaround() {
  var $selectors = $('[TAG IF ALWAYS THE SAME].tooltip.in');

  if ( $selectors.length > 1 ) {
    $selectors.remove();
  }
}

Upvotes: 0

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