[Xcb] questions about proper event loop and timers

[Jim Crafton]

Hi,
I'm new to xcb usage and running into a bit of problem.

I'm trying to figure out the best way to put together an event loop
that uses both timers and x events in a single thread.

If I was just catching/dispatching x events I'd do something like

XCBGenericEvent* xcbEvent = XCBWaitForEvent( connection );
while ( NULL != xcbEvent ) {
    //process the event..
    xcbEvent = XCBWaitForEvent( connection );
}

This works fine, no busy waiting, no CPU spiking


However if I want to add support for timers, i.e. registering some
callback function that gets invoked every x milliseconds, then I'm a
bit stuck.

As I understand it, on linux, timers are handled with timer_create() and
timer_settime(). If I use these API's then how do I set up the XCB
event loop such that I don't have to poll all the time? Won't
XCBWaitForEvent() block, and then the callback for the timer not get
triggered (because the thread is blocked in the XCBWaitForEvent()
code)?

Is there a standard way to handle timers with XCB? Alternately, would
anyone consider adding some extra functions that allow for add timer
support into the XCB API's?


Thanks

Jim Crafton