I did a little arithmetic after sending my note off early this AM  and
it seems that with only about 120 Boids in near future (and thousands
expected) there is about an approximate  50:50 balance between the
number of 'lines' (of code) inside the Boids total and total of the
"support system" for them including the classes which represent mostly
data.  About 8,000 each (lots of white space & comments but somewhat
the same throughout).   What is interesting to me about this is that
even if 3/4 of the code from the 'Boids" is elminated as being only
necessary because of the design,  there is still a nice "balance"
achieved at about 1000 Boids.

Given that some of my work to develop a graphical "Dashboard", given
that I have now dealt with the details of 3 different domains, and
given that I'm using a lot of simulation in this project I have rather
acquired the overall impression that a system first becomes useful/
mature at somewhere over 1000 boids.  The probability of getting a
useful hit or two on a less than 1000 Boid system seems about the same
as asking a WalMart clerk a technical question :)

I also just did some checking on the rather latest and greatest
computer speeds and it seems my 3 year old system (a proud Hackintosh
that has never seen OSX) is now running at about 1/2 the speed of the
most fasterestish desktop.   This, I think, means that given the total
resources of a system that some 4,000 Boids can "fire!" per second.
(Sorry any Ruby purists, but I stuck a exclamation mark on my first
"fire" method about a year ago and I won't take it away :)

Anyway, in something like 2 seconds a state-of-the-artish micro can
mechanically throw a set of 1,000 "Boids" at a single question.  Now,
even at my primitive state of development on this less than 10% of the
Boids are actually fired!, even a rather broad set "questions'.  Where
I'm going with this is that a 10,000 Boid system, which would
represent a pretty good set of knowledge for what I'm seeing - can
effectively fired! in less than 3 seconds.

I would love to hook a active forum up to one of these things
somehow.

So, will my 1992 Model 7020 Huffy Seatpost 'fit' in a 1958 Flying
Pigeon (based on a 1942 Raleigh)?

Well, that's a million Boid question, and I'm tired....


Thunk