[issue3865] explain that profilers should be used for profiling, not benchmarking

[Fredrik Lundh]

New submission from Fredrik Lundh <effbot at users.sourceforge.net>:

You often see people using the profiler for benchmarking instead of
profiling.  I suggest adding a note that explains that the profiler
modules are designed to provide an execution profile for a given
program, not for benchmarking different libraries or, even worse,
benchmarking Python code against C libraries.  Point people to the
"timeit" module if they want resonably accurate results.

(and yes, it would be nice if the copyright text on the page

http://docs.python.org/dev/library/profile.html

was moved to the bottom of the page.  If necessary, add something like
"This description of the profile module is Copyright © 1994, by InfoSeek
Corporation, all rights reserved.  Full copyright message below" at the
top.)

----------
assignee: georg.brandl
components: Documentation
messages: 73213
nosy: effbot, georg.brandl
severity: normal
status: open
title: explain that profilers should be used for profiling, not benchmarking
type: feature request
versions: Python 2.6

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Python tracker <report at bugs.python.org>
<http://bugs.python.org/issue3865>
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