[C#]Spinning Class

[SheenBR]

I made this class to show to the user that "the program is still running". Like this:

/*
        Copyright © 2012, The Divinity Project
        All rights reserved.
        http://board.thedivinityproject.com
        http://www.ragezone.com


        This file is part of PTEmu.

        PTEmu is free software: you can redistribute it and/or modify
        it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by
        the Free Software Foundation, either version 3 of the License, or
        any later version.

        PTEmu is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
        but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
        MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.  See the
        GNU General Public License for more details.

        You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License
        along with PTEmu.  If not, see <http://www.gnu.org/licenses/>.
 */

#region Includes

using System;
using System.Threading;

#endregion

namespace PTEmu.Animation
{
    public static class Spin
    {
        #region Private Members

        static bool active = false;
        static ConsoleColor color;

        #endregion

        #region Public Methods

        public static void Run(int interval, ConsoleColor Color)
        {
            if (active == true) return;
            active = true;
            color = Color;
            ThreadPool.QueueUserWorkItem(new WaitCallback(Spinning), interval);
        }
        public static void Run(int interval)
        {
            if (active == true) return;
            active = true;
            ThreadPool.QueueUserWorkItem(new WaitCallback(Spinning), interval);
        }
        public static void Stop()
        {
            active = false;
            Thread.Sleep(100);
        }

        #endregion

        #region Private Methods

        static void Spinning(object stateInfo)
        {
            var interval = (int)stateInfo;
            var line = "";
            var chars = new char[] { '|', '/', '-', '\\' };
            while (active)
            {
                for (int i = 0; i < chars.Length; i++)
                {
                    if (!active) break;
                    var backup = new string('\b', line.Length);
                    Console.Write(backup, (color != ConsoleColor.Black) ? color : ConsoleColor.White);
                    line = string.Format("{0}", chars[i]);
                    Console.Write(line, (color != ConsoleColor.Black) ? color : ConsoleColor.White);
                    Thread.Sleep(interval);
                }
            }
            var backups = new string('\b', line.Length);
            Console.WriteLine(backups, ConsoleColor.White);
        }

        #endregion

    }
}

How to use it:

Spin.Start(100); -> the chars(|,/,-) will change in a 100ms interval, with WHITE color.
Spin.Start(100,ConsoleColor.Cyan), same, but with Cyan Color.

After executing your method, you need to:

Spin.Stop();

You can only run it once. I mean, when the Spin is already started, you cant start another one, unless you stop the previous.

[MentaL]

[Yamachi]

1. Don't use \b... Use SetCursorPosition.
2. Why on Earth are you using String.Format to convert a char to a string?
3. There's no need to have a for loop inside a while loop, especially if you want it to exit when you call Stop(). Instead, use a counter, increment it at the end of the while loop body, and get the index of the char like this: var curchar = chars[i % 4];
4. Making the thread sleep for the entire interval the user has chosen is guaranteed to give you a variable framerate. You have to think about the time it takes to actually write the characters, too. I know it doesn't really matter much in this situation, but it would if you were writing code that needed to be accurate.