TimeIt

TimeIt is a tool that can be used to measure the time it takes for regions of code to execute and perform various actions based on that, such as throwing exceptions if the elapsed time exceeds some specified timeout.

The idea is that you wrap up the code region you want to profile in a using block and configure the sequence of actions to perform after the block has finished running:

using (TimeIt.Then.Do(elapsed => { /* something */ }).And.Do(elapsed => { /* something else */ }))
{
    // Profiled code goes here.    
}

Importing the TimeItCore namespace also allows you to use a core set of extension methods for configuring common actions:

using Microsoft.Extensions.Logging;
using TimeItCore;

public class Foo
{
    private readonly ILogger _logger;

    public Foo(ILogger<Foo> logger)
    {
        _logger = logger;
    }

    public void Bar()
    {
        using (TimeIt.Then.Log(_logger, "Code took {Elapsed} time").And.ThrowIfLongerThan(500))
        {
            // Profiled code goes here.    
        }
    }
}

Installation

TimeIt targets the .NET Standard and can be used within .NET Core and .NET Framework applications. It is available on the standard NuGet feed and can be installed from there. For example, using the dotnet CLI:

dotnet add package TimeIt

Performance

Although you can use TimeIt to help measure and optimise parts of your code, it will inevitably have a small impact on performance itself. Each general use case of the tool has been profiled using BenchmarkDotNet, and for each case we measure:

• The time it takes for an expensive operation to be performed once, without profiling ("One off control").
• The time it takes for an expensive operation to be performed, wrapped in a TimeIt block ("One off SUT").
• The time it takes for a simple operation to be performed thousands of times repeatedly ("Looping control").
• The time it takes for a simple operation to be performed thousands of times repeatedly, with a TimeIt block being created and destroyed on each loop ("Looping SUT"). This practice is not recommended in real code.

These are one obtained set of results:

TimeIt.Then.DoNothing

BenchmarkDotNet=v0.10.14, OS=macOS High Sierra 10.13.4 (17E199) [Darwin 17.5.0]
Intel Core i5-4308U CPU 2.80GHz (Haswell), 1 CPU, 4 logical and 2 physical cores
.NET Core SDK=2.1.4
  [Host]     : .NET Core 2.0.5 (CoreCLR 4.6.0.0, CoreFX 4.6.26018.01), 64bit RyuJIT
  DefaultJob : .NET Core 2.0.5 (CoreCLR 4.6.0.0, CoreFX 4.6.26018.01), 64bit RyuJIT

Method	Mean	Error	StdDev
OneOffControl	103.18 ms	0.6265 ms	0.5860 ms
OneOffSut	102.70 ms	0.7494 ms	0.7010 ms
LoopingControl	26.43 ms	0.2262 ms	0.1889 ms
LoopingSut	33.15 ms	0.1524 ms	0.1426 ms

TimeIt.Then.Log

BenchmarkDotNet=v0.10.14, OS=macOS High Sierra 10.13.4 (17E199) [Darwin 17.5.0]
Intel Core i5-4308U CPU 2.80GHz (Haswell), 1 CPU, 4 logical and 2 physical cores
.NET Core SDK=2.1.4
  [Host]     : .NET Core 2.0.5 (CoreCLR 4.6.0.0, CoreFX 4.6.26018.01), 64bit RyuJIT
  DefaultJob : .NET Core 2.0.5 (CoreCLR 4.6.0.0, CoreFX 4.6.26018.01), 64bit RyuJIT

Method	Mean	Error	StdDev
OneOffControl	103.01 ms	0.7194 ms	0.6729 ms
OneOffSut	103.47 ms	0.5551 ms	0.5193 ms
LoopingControl	26.40 ms	0.1219 ms	0.1140 ms
LoopingSut	113.92 ms	0.8666 ms	0.8107 ms

TimeIt.Then.ThrowIfLongerThan

BenchmarkDotNet=v0.10.14, OS=macOS High Sierra 10.13.4 (17E199) [Darwin 17.5.0]
Intel Core i5-4308U CPU 2.80GHz (Haswell), 1 CPU, 4 logical and 2 physical cores
.NET Core SDK=2.1.4
  [Host]     : .NET Core 2.0.5 (CoreCLR 4.6.0.0, CoreFX 4.6.26018.01), 64bit RyuJIT
  DefaultJob : .NET Core 2.0.5 (CoreCLR 4.6.0.0, CoreFX 4.6.26018.01), 64bit RyuJIT

Method	Mean	Error	StdDev
OneOffControl	106.26 ms	1.1729 ms	1.0971 ms
OneOffSut	105.75 ms	1.9630 ms	1.8361 ms
LoopingControl	29.13 ms	0.4260 ms	0.3985 ms
LoopingSut	57.76 ms	0.2895 ms	0.2566 ms