well I have looked up the sleep() command on the net but have not found an answer, all I want to know is what #include command do I use to use the sleep command. I have tried dos.h and thread but they do not work. I know this is a very simple question but like I said I have already done some research but with no luck.

What platform are you on? sleep is not a standard C++ function.

If you're on Windows, you could try reading the MDSN link for the Win32 sleep function, which explicitly tells you which header to #include and which Win32 library you need to link to: https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/desktop/ms686298(v=vs.85).aspx

The sleep() function is not very accurate. Whatever you're doing, you're probably better off using OpenGL's timer functions.

The sleep() function is not very accurate. Whatever you're doing, you're probably better off using OpenGL's timer functions.

OpenGL itself is purely a graphics library, it doesn't have timing functionality. Are you referring to glutTimerFunc, which like glut itself is deprecated?

Are you referring to glutTimerFunc, which like glut itself is deprecated?

I was. I didn't realize it had been deprecated as I never work with OpenGL. I guess some other cross-platform high precision timer library then.

There is std::this_thread::sleep_for() and std::this_thread::sleep_until().

There is no standard solution, and as above, a high precision wait is not part of c++. The language offers a low-precision wait which is OS-specific and compiler-specific, but no high precision guarantees..

Sleep, or stopping execution for a brief time, is an operating-system specific action. The granularity is fairly rough, with the best results being on a special "real time operating system", which you are not. Most OS's it is easy to ask to be suspended and then resumed at the next scheduling cycle, which may be 10, 20, 50, or more milliseconds away. On Windows specifically, Sleep() might not even wake your process at the specified update, but it may be two or three or ten updates, or maybe even longer depending on what is going on with the rest of the system.

One of the most reliable ways to get a short-term delay is by "spinning", doing an operation over and over very quickly until the time passes. This is generally not recommended, since the faster the system the more compute cycles are blocked, the more energy is wasted (particularly bad on laptops), plus the process is more likely to be demoted in priority since the task scheduler will detect it is slowing down other processes. Very reliable, but with many negative side effects.

The next most reliable is to wait for an event from something else. It can be done by firing off a delayed operation then waiting for the system to return, called a "blocking operation". Games do this all the time. One of the easiest in games is to wait for the graphics frame buffer to be flipped. Since the game can't really draw anything else until the frame is done, it works well; draw the next frame then wait. Other blocking operations are network and disk commands. Sometimes games will launch multiple tasks and have each one blocking on different things. A server might be monitoring a network pool of perhaps 50 connections, and wake either when the regular scheduler wakes it up or as an event when network data is ready on any of the connections. However, since we're not talking about real time operating systems, even these operations tend to slip toward suspending too long. You might have a reason to sleep 320 microseconds but not wake up until 15,000 microseconds have passed.

The exact commands and methods to waiting for events depend on the operating system you are using and how precise you plan on being. For games, graphics page flipping and certain network events are the typical go-to devices.
(Sorry for the accidental downvote lennylen, mouse slipped. Upvoted the other reply, which is good, and hopefully the two will cancel out. I hope the upcoming site update will allow cancelling accidental votes.)

I am going to take lenny's advice and use the glutTimerfunc() I know it is deprecated but it might still work for me. I tried the windows.h and synchapi.h include files but it still does not work with the sleep() function. thanks for all the help

I am going to take lenny's advice and use the glutTimerfunc() I know it is deprecated but it might still work for me. I tried the windows.h and synchapi.h include files but it still does not work with the sleep() function. thanks for all the help

if your using c++, then you should be using what Ryan_001 said, std::this_thread::sleep_for is part of the standard library since c++11. you don't need to be using an outside api for this.

actually since I am working with opengl and c++ I am going to use glutTimerFunc, instead of sleep() thanks for the input.