If the delay is more than 2147483648 milliseconds(24.8551 days) the function will fire immediately.
setTimeout(function(){ console.log('hey') }, 2147483648) // this fires early
setTimeout(function(){ console.log('hey') }, 2147483647) // this works properly
I tried it under Chrome v26 and Node.js v8.21
Since you are limited to 32 bits, just wrap setTimeout in a recursive function like so:
function setLongTimeout(callback, timeout_ms)
{
//if we have to wait more than max time, need to recursively call this function again
if(timeout_ms > 2147483647)
{ //now wait until the max wait time passes then call this function again with
//requested wait - max wait we just did, make sure and pass callback
setTimeout(function(){ setLongTimeout(callback, (timeout_ms - 2147483647)); },
2147483647);
}
else //if we are asking to wait less than max, finally just do regular seTimeout and call callback
{ setTimeout(callback, timeout_ms); }
}
This isn't too complicated and should be extensible up to the limit of javascript number which is 1.7976931348623157E+10308, which by that number of milliseconds, we will all be dead and gone.
The upper limit of setTimeout is 0x7FFFFFFF (or 2147483647 in decimal)
This is because setTimeout uses a 32bit integer to store its delay value, so anything above that will cause the problem
If you want a timeout which fires after an X ammount of days, you could try to use setInterval instead with a lower delay value like this
function setDaysTimeout(callback,days) {
// 86400 seconds in a day
var msInDay = 86400*1000;
var dayCount = 0;
var timer = setInterval(function() {
dayCount++; // a day has passed
if(dayCount == days) {
clearInterval(timer);
callback.apply(this,[]);
}
},msInDay);
}
You would then use it like this
setDaysTimeout(function() {
console.log('Four days gone');
},4); // fire after 4 days