Find Execution time of a Method

Question

I am making an Image Steganography project for my college. I have finished the project and have kept several different algorithms for hiding data in images.

What I want to ask is that is there any way in C# through which I can find the execution/running time between two points in a program. For example

//Some Code
//Code to start recording the time.
hideDataUsingAlgorithm();
//Code to stop recording and get the time of execution of the above function. 

I want to do this to show the difference between simple(less time consuming) and more efficient but time consuming algorithms (using same data and same image). I have around 10 different algorithms for Color and GrayScale Images.

There is no multithreading so that wont be a problem. Theres simply just one main Thread.

Answer 1

This is a useful extension method for Stopwatch:

public static class StopwatchExt
{
    public static string GetTimeString(this Stopwatch stopwatch, int numberofDigits = 1)
    {
        double time = stopwatch.ElapsedTicks / (double)Stopwatch.Frequency;
        if (time > 1)
            return Math.Round(time, numberofDigits) + " s";
        if (time > 1e-3)
            return Math.Round(1e3 * time, numberofDigits) + " ms";
        if (time > 1e-6)
            return Math.Round(1e6 * time, numberofDigits) + " µs";
        if (time > 1e-9)
            return Math.Round(1e9 * time, numberofDigits) + " ns";
        return stopwatch.ElapsedTicks + " ticks";
    }
}

Use it like this:

Stopwatch stopwatch = Stopwatch.StartNew();
//Call your method here
stopwatch.Stop();
Console.WriteLine(stopwatch.GetTimeString());

Answer 2

System.Environment.TickCount and the System.Diagnostics.Stopwatch class are two that work well for finer resolution and straightforward usage.

See Also:

1. Is DateTime.Now the best way to measure a function’s performance?
2. High resolution timer in .NET
3. Environment.TickCount vs DateTime.Now
4. What’s the best way to benchmark programs in Windows?

Answer 3

You can use StopWatch class:

var timer = System.Diagnostics.StopWatch.StartNew();
hideDataUsingAlgorithm();
timer.Stop();
var elapsed = timer.ElapsedMilliseconds;