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@smholloway
Created February 3, 2013 19:45
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Comparing the speed of polymorphism in Ruby. See http://www.6blog.us/2013/02/is-polymorphism-faster-in-ruby/ for more.
# http://www.6blog.us/2013/02/is-polymorphism-faster-in-ruby/
#
# Testing the speed of polymorphism in Ruby. This program is based on the Wikipedia article:
# http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polymorphism_in_object-oriented_programming
#
# To run: ruby main.rb <number of runs to time (optional)>
# Example: ruby main.rb 5
class Animal
def initialize(name)
@name = name
end
end
class Cat < Animal
def talk
"meow"
end
end
class Cow < Animal
def talk
"moo"
end
end
class Dog < Animal
def talk
"bark"
end
end
def polymorphic
animals = [Cat.new("kitty"), Cow.new("bessy"), Dog.new("fido")]
animals.each do |a|
a.talk
end
end
def not_so_polymorphic
animals = [Cat.new("kitty"), Cow.new("bessy"), Dog.new("fido")]
animals.each do |a|
case a
when Cat
"meow"
when Cow
"moo"
when Dog
"bark"
end
end
end
def time_it(f, runs=1000000)
start = Time.now
runs.times do
f.call
end
total = Time.now - start
end
def main
runs = ARGV[0] || 1000
puts "Timing #{runs} run(s) -- this may take a while."
polymorphic_times = []
not_polymorphic_times = []
runs.to_i.times do
polymorphic_times << time_it(method(:polymorphic))
not_polymorphic_times << time_it(method(:not_so_polymorphic))
end
polymorphic_average = polymorphic_times.reduce(:+) / polymorphic_times.size
not_polymorphic_average = not_polymorphic_times.reduce(:+) / not_polymorphic_times.size
puts " polymorphic average: #{polymorphic_average}"
puts "not polymorphic average: #{not_polymorphic_average}"
end
main
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