Process Timeout

I recently needed to run an unreliable tool that might possibly get stuck. I don’t have any control about this process, so if it does not finish in some time, I would like to stop it and try it again.

Turns out there is a parameter available to WaitForExit method of the Process that allows exactly that. It returns true when the process exited itself, so we can detect that condition and kill it if it is still running.

Here is the code:

const int timeoutMilliseconds = 2*60*1000;    // 2 minutes

Process process = new()
{
    StartInfo = new ProcessStartInfo
    {
        FileName = "tool.exe",
        Arguments = "something",
    }
};

try
{
    process.Start();
    if (!process.WaitForExit(timeoutMilliseconds))
        process.Kill(entireProcessTree: true);
}
catch (Exception ex)
{
    log.Error($"Error: {ex.Message}");
}

This is another example on nice design of the .NET and wide array of options it provides.