# Help Understanding setInterval() and call()

**URL:** https://forum.kirupa.com/t/help-understanding-setinterval-and-call/279103
**Category:** flash
**Created:** [January 9, 2009, 2:55pm UTC](https://forum.kirupa.com/t/help-understanding-setinterval-and-call/279103 "2009-01-09T14:55:40Z")
**Posts on this page:** 1
**Page:** 1

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### Author: ![bigbstanley](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@bigbstanley](https://forum.kirupa.com/u/bigbstanley)
#### Post date: [January 9, 2009, 2:55pm UTC](https://forum.kirupa.com/t/help-understanding-setinterval-and-call/279103/1 "2009-01-09T14:55:40Z")

</div>

I’ve looked up setInterval() and call() but I’m having a hard time understanding it still. I’m hoping someone can explain to me a bit better. I’m in the process of learning OOP and I downloaded a small file and am editing it a bit and trying to read the code and follow it to better understand. However, I am stumped on one thing - where is ‘m’ coming from? No where in my code is ‘m’ being set other than this function and when I trace it, it outputs the name of an mc as ‘\_level0.mmi0’. And why does it need to “call” it? Thanx in advance.

private function setTimeout(f:Function, t:Number) {  
if (interval != undefined) {  
clearInterval(interval);  
}

```
    interval = setInterval(
        function (m) {
            trace(m);
            clearInterval(m.interval);
            f.call(m);
        }, t*1000, this);

```

}