How do I trap ctrl-c in a C# console app

Question

I would like to be able to trap CTRL+C in a C# console application so that I can carry out some cleanups before exiting. What is the best way of doing this?

Answer 1

See MSDN:

Console.CancelKeyPress Event

Article with code samples:

Ctrl-C and the .NET console application

Answer 2

Console.TreatControlCAsInput = true; has worked for me.

Answer 3

I'd like to add to Jonas' answer. Spinning on a bool will cause 100% CPU utilization, and waste a bunch of energy doing a lot of nothing while waiting for CTRL+C.

The better solution is to use a ManualResetEvent to actually "wait" for the CTRL+C:

static void Main(string[] args) {
    var exitEvent = new ManualResetEvent(false);

    Console.CancelKeyPress += (sender, eventArgs) => {
                                  eventArgs.Cancel = true;
                                  exitEvent.Set();
                              };

    var server = new MyServer();     // example
    server.Run();

    exitEvent.WaitOne();
    server.Stop();
}

Answer 4

This question is very similar to:

Capture console exit C#

Here is how I solved this problem, and dealt with the user hitting the X as well as Ctrl-C. Notice the use of ManualResetEvents. These will cause the main thread to sleep which frees the CPU to process other threads while waiting for either exit, or cleanup. NOTE: It is necessary to set the TerminationCompletedEvent at the end of main. Failure to do so causes unnecessary latency in termination due to the OS timing out while killing the application.

namespace CancelSample
{
    using System;
    using System.Threading;
    using System.Runtime.InteropServices;

    internal class Program
    {
        /// <summary>
        /// Adds or removes an application-defined HandlerRoutine function from the list of handler functions for the calling process
        /// </summary>
        /// <param name="handler">A pointer to the application-defined HandlerRoutine function to be added or removed. This parameter can be NULL.</param>
        /// <param name="add">If this parameter is TRUE, the handler is added; if it is FALSE, the handler is removed.</param>
        /// <returns>If the function succeeds, the return value is true.</returns>
        [DllImport("Kernel32")]
        private static extern bool SetConsoleCtrlHandler(ConsoleCloseHandler handler, bool add);

        /// <summary>
        /// The console close handler delegate.
        /// </summary>
        /// <param name="closeReason">
        /// The close reason.
        /// </param>
        /// <returns>
        /// True if cleanup is complete, false to run other registered close handlers.
        /// </returns>
        private delegate bool ConsoleCloseHandler(int closeReason);

        /// <summary>
        ///  Event set when the process is terminated.
        /// </summary>
        private static readonly ManualResetEvent TerminationRequestedEvent;

        /// <summary>
        /// Event set when the process terminates.
        /// </summary>
        private static readonly ManualResetEvent TerminationCompletedEvent;

        /// <summary>
        /// Static constructor
        /// </summary>
        static Program()
        {
            // Do this initialization here to avoid polluting Main() with it
            // also this is a great place to initialize multiple static
            // variables.
            TerminationRequestedEvent = new ManualResetEvent(false);
            TerminationCompletedEvent = new ManualResetEvent(false);
            SetConsoleCtrlHandler(OnConsoleCloseEvent, true);
        }

        /// <summary>
        /// The main console entry point.
        /// </summary>
        /// <param name="args">The commandline arguments.</param>
        private static void Main(string[] args)
        {
            // Wait for the termination event
            while (!TerminationRequestedEvent.WaitOne(0))
            {
                // Something to do while waiting
                Console.WriteLine("Work");
            }

            // Sleep until termination
            TerminationRequestedEvent.WaitOne();

            // Print a message which represents the operation
            Console.WriteLine("Cleanup");

            // Set this to terminate immediately (if not set, the OS will
            // eventually kill the process)
            TerminationCompletedEvent.Set();
        }

        /// <summary>
        /// Method called when the user presses Ctrl-C
        /// </summary>
        /// <param name="reason">The close reason</param>
        private static bool OnConsoleCloseEvent(int reason)
        {
            // Signal termination
            TerminationRequestedEvent.Set();

            // Wait for cleanup
            TerminationCompletedEvent.WaitOne();

            // Don't run other handlers, just exit.
            return true;
        }
    }
}

Answer 5

The Console.CancelKeyPress event is used for this. This is how it's used:

public static void Main(string[] args)
{
    Console.CancelKeyPress += delegate {
        // call methods to clean up
    };

    while (true) {}
}

When the user presses Ctrl + C the code in the delegate is run and the program exits. This allows you to perform cleanup by calling necessairy methods. Note that no code after the delegate is executed.

There are other situations where this won't cut it. For example, if the program is currently performing important calculations that can't be immediately stopped. In that case, the correct strategy might be to tell the program to exit after the calculation is complete. The following code gives an example of how this can be implemented:

class MainClass
{
    private static bool keepRunning = true;

    public static void Main(string[] args)
    {
        Console.CancelKeyPress += delegate(object sender, ConsoleCancelEventArgs e) {
            e.Cancel = true;
            MainClass.keepRunning = false;
        };

        while (MainClass.keepRunning) {
            // Do your work in here, in small chunks.
            // If you literally just want to wait until ctrl-c,
            // not doing anything, see the answer using set-reset events.
        }
        Console.WriteLine("exited gracefully");
    }
}

The difference between this code and the first example is that e.Cancel is set to true, which means the execution continues after the delegate. If run, the program waits for the user to press Ctrl + C. When that happens the keepRunning variable changes value which causes the while loop to exit. This is a way to make the program exit gracefully.

Answer 6

Here is a complete working example. paste into empty C# console project:

using System;
using System.Collections.Generic;
using System.Linq;
using System.Runtime.InteropServices;
using System.Text;
using System.Threading;

namespace TestTrapCtrlC {
    public class Program {
        static bool exitSystem = false;

        #region Trap application termination
        [DllImport("Kernel32")]
        private static extern bool SetConsoleCtrlHandler(EventHandler handler, bool add);

        private delegate bool EventHandler(CtrlType sig);
        static EventHandler _handler;

        enum CtrlType {
            CTRL_C_EVENT = 0,
            CTRL_BREAK_EVENT = 1,
            CTRL_CLOSE_EVENT = 2,
            CTRL_LOGOFF_EVENT = 5,
            CTRL_SHUTDOWN_EVENT = 6
        }

        private static bool Handler(CtrlType sig) {
            Console.WriteLine("Exiting system due to external CTRL-C, or process kill, or shutdown");

            //do your cleanup here
            Thread.Sleep(5000); //simulate some cleanup delay

            Console.WriteLine("Cleanup complete");

            //allow main to run off
            exitSystem = true;

            //shutdown right away so there are no lingering threads
            Environment.Exit(-1);

            return true;
        }
        #endregion

        static void Main(string[] args) {
            // Some biolerplate to react to close window event, CTRL-C, kill, etc
            _handler += new EventHandler(Handler);
            SetConsoleCtrlHandler(_handler, true);

            //start your multi threaded program here
            Program p = new Program();
            p.Start();

            //hold the console so it doesn’t run off the end
            while (!exitSystem) {
                Thread.Sleep(500);
            }
        }

        public void Start() {
            // start a thread and start doing some processing
            Console.WriteLine("Thread started, processing..");
        }
    }
}