performance tuning - Setting a lower limit on calculation time

Sometimes it can come in handy to set a lower limit for a calculation. Consider for example an animation that is generated by some infinite loop, which would run way too fast to display properly for the user. For this reason, I need a function of the type "pause at least". It would be like a little brother of TimeConstrained.

I threw together the following small code which seems to do the trick, but I'm wondering whether there is a more efficient or elegant solution for this?

Here's my version if you're interested, it's pretty straightforward:

pauseAtLeast[calculation_, pause_] :=
    Block[{start, result},
        start = AbsoluteTime[];
        result = calculation;

        If[AbsoluteTime[] < start + pause,
            Pause[start + pause - AbsoluteTime[]]
        ];
        result
    ]
SetAttributes[pauseAtLeast, HoldFirst];

Usage:

(* Pauses 2 seconds *)
AbsoluteTiming@pauseAtLeast[Pause[2], 1]

(* Pauses 1 second *)
AbsoluteTiming@pauseAtLeast[Pause[.5], 1]

Comments

functions - Get leading series expansion term?

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How to thread a list

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front end - keyboard shortcut to invoke Insert new matrix

I frequently need to type in some matrices, and the menu command Insert > Table/Matrix > New... allows matrices with lines drawn between columns and rows, which is very helpful. I would like to make a keyboard shortcut for it, but cannot find the relevant frontend token command (4209405) for it. Since the FullForm[] and InputForm[] of matrices with lines drawn between rows and columns is the same as those without lines, it's hard to do this via 3rd party system-wide text expanders (e.g. autohotkey or atext on mac). How does one assign a keyboard shortcut for the menu item Insert > Table/Matrix > New... , preferably using only mathematica? Thanks! Answer In the MenuSetup.tr (for linux located in the $InstallationDirectory/SystemFiles/FrontEnd/TextResources/X/ directory), I changed the line MenuItem["&New...", "CreateGridBoxDialog"] to read MenuItem["&New...", "CreateGridBoxDialog", MenuKey["m", Modifiers-...

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