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From: tuba@ur-tut.UUCP (Jon Krueger)
Newsgroups: comp.arch
Subject: Re: Benchmarking ...[really Nelson benchmarks]
Message-ID: <1397@ur-tut.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 28-May-87 12:46:51 EDT
Article-I.D.: ur-tut.1397
Posted: Thu May 28 12:46:51 1987
Date-Received: Sat, 30-May-87 07:46:55 EDT
References: <410@winchester.UUCP> <3490003@wdl1.UUCP> <7261@amdahl.amdahl.com>
Reply-To: tuba@tut.cc.rochester.edu.UUCP (Jon Krueger)
Organization: Univ. of Rochester Computing Center
Lines: 25

In article <7261@amdahl.amdahl.com> chuck@amdahl.UUCP (Charles Simmons) writes:
>...
>The holistic approach suggests that you need to simulate the application
>environment on each system that you are considering buying.  This
>obviously has a number of difficulties associated with it.  Perhaps
>the biggest difficulty is accurately determining what the application
>environment will actually look like.
>...
>Any other reductionists want to help me out with my argument?
>-- Chuck

If you know what application you're going to run, and your
requirements and software won't change significantly over time, and
you don't mind performing unnecessary tests (of systems that clearly
can't meet requirements), and you don't care which of your candidates
is more likely to remain competitive and save you money in the future,
by all means go holistic!  Throw away all those questionable
benchmarks and perform the only test that matters to you.

If life isn't that simple in your shop, you might need some
measurements and analysis to guide a purchase choice in a complex
world.  Include here Richardson's comments in the clarify.doc file he
supplies in the dhrystone distribution.

					-- jon