Stop a process after certain time in Linux

i was wondering if there is any way we can run a process upto certain time , i.e i want to run cat file_name timelimit  is 1 seconds try this for big file

so to do that i found two ways let's see

i] Using program come from GNU coreutils "timeout"

            timeout [OPTION] DURATION COMMAND [ARG].

for easy understanding try below example
            timeout 1s cat file_name
 1s => run for second for minute 'm' for hour 'h'
cat => COMMAND
file_name => argument for the command 'cat'

and donot forget to check the Manual Page "man timeout" hit the terminal.

ii] Using a shell script program

program_name &
sleep 20s
killall program_name

Line 1: The first line tells you run the program in background if you want in foreground remove the &
Line 2: delay for 20seconds for minute 'm' for hour 'h' and checkout man page.
Line 3: Its judgement time , kill the respective process.

the above shell script is simple implementation for close program after certain timeout.

If you want to know more check out the stackoverflow discussion on this topic
  http://stackoverflow.com/questions/2387485/limiting-the-time-a-program-runs-in-linux