Newsgroups: comp.arch
Path: utzoo!henry
From: henry@utzoo.uucp (Henry Spencer)
Subject: Re: Architectural analysis of RPM-40 for general usage
Message-ID: <1988Mar18.174031.653@utzoo.uucp>
Keywords: average program size
Organization: U of Toronto Zoology
References: <1840@winchester.mips.COM>, <514@imagine.PAWL.RPI.EDU>
Date: Fri, 18 Mar 88 17:40:31 GMT

>	The average program run isn't anywhere near that big, though.

This depends on what you mean by "average".  Average of all the programs
used?  Average weighted by frequency of use?  Average weighted by duration
of run?  Average weighted by interactive vs noninteractive?  Average weighted
by how much it matters to a particular customer?  Some, perhaps most, of the
workstation customers care mostly about how well their big, long-running,
interactive applications perform, and don't care about averages that aren't
weighted to reflect that.  All too often the important case is the worst
case, not the average one.
-- 
Those who do not understand Unix are |  Henry Spencer @ U of Toronto Zoology
condemned to reinvent it, poorly.    | {allegra,ihnp4,decvax,utai}!utzoo!henry