Unity3d delay in while true loop not working

Question

I'm still working on the game and i ran into another problem, I'm trying to make an infinite loop which waits for a couple seconds every execute, i currently have:

---

StartScript.cs

using UnityEngine;
using System.Collections;
using ProgressBar;

public class StartScript : MonoBehaviour {

    private ProgressBarBehaviour hunger;
    private ProgressBarBehaviour stamina;
    private ProgressRadialBehaviour health;
    private ProgressBarBehaviour thirst;

    public void OnGUI(){
        this.hunger = GameObject.Find("hungerBar").GetComponent<ProgressBarBehaviour>();
        this.stamina = GameObject.Find("staminaBar").GetComponent<ProgressBarBehaviour>();
        this.health = GameObject.Find("healthBar").GetComponent<ProgressRadialBehaviour>();
        this.thirst = GameObject.Find("thirstBar").GetComponent<ProgressBarBehaviour>();

        this.health.Value = 100f;
        this.stamina.Value = 100f;

        StartCoroutine ("runHunger");
    }

    bool addBar(ProgressBarBehaviour target, float percentage){
        Debug.Log (percentage);
        if ((target.Value + percentage) <= 100f) {
            target.IncrementValue (percentage);
            return true;
        }
        return false;
    }

    bool damageBar(ProgressBarBehaviour target, float percentage){
        if ((target.Value - percentage) >= 0f) {
            target.DecrementValue (percentage);
            return true;
        }
        return false;
    }

    bool addRadial(ProgressRadialBehaviour target, float percentage){
        if ((target.Value + percentage) <= 100f) {
            target.IncrementValue (percentage);
            return true;
        }
        return false;
    }

    bool damageRadial(ProgressRadialBehaviour target, float percentage){
        if ((target.Value - percentage) >= 0f) {
            target.DecrementValue (percentage);
            return true;
        }
        return false;
    }

    IEnumerator runHunger(){
        while (true) {
            yield return new WaitForSeconds(10f);
            /*if (!this.addBar(this.hunger,5f)) {
                this.damageRadial(this.health,3f);
            }*/
            Debug.Log("Time: "+Time.time);
        }
    }

    IEnumerator runHealth(){
        while (true) {

        }
    }
    /*
    IEnumerator runThirst(){
        while (true) {

            if (!this.thirst.Add (2)) {
                this.health.Damage(8);
            }

        }
    }*/
}

As you guys can see I'm trying to make a while(true){} loop with an yield return new WaitForSeconds(), the idea is that it runs the function in the loop every (in this test case) 10 seconds.

The first time executing works like a charm, it waits for 10 seconds, but after that it only waits for like 0.1 seconds and executes again.

---

I hope someone can help me with this problem.

Answer 1

There are too many wrong things I currently see in your code.

This:

IEnumerator runHealth(){
    while (true) {

    }
}

Change it to

IEnumerator runHealth(){
    while (true) {

        yield return null;
    }
}

Also This:

IEnumerator runThirst(){
    while (true) {

        if (!this.thirst.Add (2)) {
            this.health.Damage(8);
        }
    }           
}

Change it to

IEnumerator runThirst(){
    while (true) {

        if (!this.thirst.Add (2)) {
            this.health.Damage(8);
        }
        yield return null;
    }
}

If you are gonna have while(true) in a coroutine, you must have yield return something or it will lock your program. Fix these problems first. It is good to have it just before the closing bracket of the while loop.

I am sure you did this in other scripts too. Go over the rest of other scripts and do the same thing. Put yield return null inside each while loop in each coroutine function.

ANOTHER BIG MISTAKE: Remove every code from OnGUI function and put it in Start function like below. The code is being called too several times per frame and that will lead to slow down as you will be creating many many coroutines that never stops due to your while loop in the coroutine function.Putting it in the Start function will call it once.

void Start()
{
    this.hunger = GameObject.Find("hungerBar").GetComponent<ProgressBarBehaviour>();
    this.stamina = GameObject.Find("staminaBar").GetComponent<ProgressBarBehaviour>();
    this.health = GameObject.Find("healthBar").GetComponent<ProgressRadialBehaviour>();
    this.thirst = GameObject.Find("thirstBar").GetComponent<ProgressBarBehaviour>();

    this.health.Value = 100f;
    this.stamina.Value = 100f;

    StartCoroutine ("runHunger");
}

Answer 2

Call the StartCoroutine ("runHunger"); somewhere other than in OnGUI(). It will work then. Since everytime OnGUI is called it starts a new coroutine

Call the StartCoroutine in Start() or someplace else