Is this an honest test?
The art of devising computer “benchmark” tests that favour your own product is almost as old as digital computers themselves. Naturally a manufacturer will highlight their best features versus the competitors’ weaknesses.
Let’s examine our example for such bias.
The choice of tasks
These are certainly things that SPLat can do with ease. However:-
- They are typical of the kinds of “twiddly” operations required in a real-world logic controller.
- Each of the three tasks is in itself quite easy to comprehend without reference to a complicated machine, so it is easy for us to explain the function and easy for you to understand it.
- The code for each task will fit in a small window.
Who we compare ourselves with
The language implementations (and by implication, the hardware products) we have compared SPLat with are leading, professional strength products.
Multitasking
The example program uses multitasking. The only control programming paradigm that is inherently multitasking is ladder, by virtue of the fact that the whole ladder program is executed on every scan. In that sense the bias is in favour of ladder.
On the other hand, only the simplest of simple control programs can get by without doing several things at once, even if it’s just monitoring a STOP button while filling a vat and watching the FULL float switch at the same time.
Any language that is intended for controls programming will support multitasking. The mechanisms for multitasking in SPLat have evolved with time, culminating in our MultiTrack system. Some other controller products come with a built in multitasking operating systems.
Object code size
A tooltip on each program link shows the “object code” size (where we have been able to establish numbers). This is the amount of memory consumed by the program once it has been loaded into the controller. If you take a minutes to study the figures you will notice SPLat is extremely efficient in its memory useage.
Presentation
We have made the presentation format as fair and even as possible. The ladder diagram was carefully scaled and cropped to avoid horizontal scrolling. The C program has been formatted to fit as well as it can. The same font size is used on text-based programs.
To ensure a level playing field all programs are presented without program comment lines except one single line for each task.
If you can spot any unfair bias, please let us know.
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