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Free Running Timer
Free running timers are useful in many cases. Free running timers can be used as random number
generators, time delay generators, instance markers, etc. Consider the case of time delay generation
for instance. Rather than using wasteful CPU-cycle dependent software delay loops, it is much wiser
to use a hardware timer to create precise delays and timed events. In terms of ideal coding, no task
should keep CPU busy unnecessarily nor should it keep other tasks waiting for its completion. Best
coding and design are achieved if things are arranged in such an orderly way that that there is almost
no wastage of any resource at all.
By free-running what I really mean is we start a timer at the beginning of our code and keep it running
without timer interrupt. We just take note of its counter. Here we will see how to use Timer_A3 like a
free running timer and we will use it to blink Launchpad board’s LEDs.
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