runtomsized

Runtomsized is a term used in performance engineering to describe the practice of adjusting the size or complexity of a workload to fit a predefined run-time budget. The central idea is to ensure predictable latency or frame rates by scaling tasks up or down in response to available time.

Origin and usage: The term emerged on informal developer communities in the 2010s as a shorthand for run-time sizing. It is used across real-time applications, video games, streaming pipelines, and interactive simulations.

Mechanisms: It encompasses time budgeting, dynamic level of detail, adaptive sampling, frame-time slicing, resource throttling, and on-demand loading. Practically, runtomsized involves making controlled trade-offs to keep the main loop within its allotted time.

Examples: In video games, runtomsized might adjust texture detail or resolution to maintain 60 frames per second; in streaming pipelines, it may reduce encoding bitrate or skip nonessential post-processing when frames are late. In interactive simulations, it can scale physics update frequency or render quality to preserve responsiveness.

Advantages and limitations: The approach improves stability and predictability of performance, reducing frame drops and latency spikes. However, it can cause perceptible fluctuations in quality, introduce artifacts, and potentially mask underlying performance problems that would benefit from a deeper optimization.

Relation to related concepts: Runtomsized is related to dynamic quality scaling, adaptive streaming, frame pacing, and time-sliced rendering.