Benchmark: Check vs try...catch

HTML Preparation code:

<div class="container"></div>

Tests:

Check and act conditionally
var container=document.querySelector('div.container'); var deleteme=container.querySelector('div.deleteme'); if (deleteme !== null) container.removeChild(deleteme);
Try and (deliberately) fail
var container=document.querySelector('div.container'); try { container.removeChild(container.querySelector('div.deleteme')); } catch (e) {}

Rendered benchmark preparation results:

Suite status: <idle, ready to run>

Previous results

Test case name	Result
Check and act conditionally
Try and (deliberately) fail

Fastest: N/A

Slowest: N/A

Autogenerated LLM Summary (model llama3.2:3b, generated 27 days ago):

LLMs can make mistakes. Check important info.

**Overview**

The provided JSON represents a JavaScript benchmark test case on the MeasureThat.net website. The goal of this benchmark is to compare two approaches: checking for an element's existence and then acting, versus trying to remove an element but failing.

**Benchmark Definition**

The benchmark definition consists of a name, description, script preparation code, and HTML preparation code. In this case, there are no specific scripts or functions that need to be prepared before running the test. The test cases focus solely on measuring the performance difference between two different approaches:

1. **Check and Act Conditionally**: This approach involves checking if an element exists (`deleteme !== null`) and then removing it from the container if it does.
2. **Try and (Deliberately) Fail**: This approach involves trying to remove a non-existent element from the container using `container.removeChild()`.

**Comparison**

The two approaches have different performance characteristics:

* **Check and Act Conditionally**: This approach typically has better performance because it avoids the overhead of attempting to perform an operation that may fail. By checking for existence first, the test can avoid the unnecessary work.
* **Try and (Deliberately) Fail**: This approach is more expensive because it involves attempting to remove a non-existent element. The browser needs to parse the expression, check if the element exists, and then throw an error.

**Pros and Cons**

The pros of using `Check and Act Conditionally` include:

* Better performance due to reduced overhead
* Fewer errors thrown (in case the element does not exist)

However, there are some potential drawbacks:

* It assumes that the element will always be present, which may not be true in all scenarios.
* If the test is designed to handle cases where the element might not exist, additional checks may be necessary.

The cons of using `Try and (Deliberately) Fail` include:

* Higher performance cost due to attempting an operation that may fail
* Increased error rates due to the potential for throwing errors

**Library Usage**

There is no explicit library usage in this benchmark definition. However, some libraries like jQuery might be used in similar scenarios where element manipulation is involved.

**Special JS Features or Syntax**

This benchmark does not use any special JavaScript features or syntax that require explanation. It only relies on standard ECMAScript syntax for checking existence and attempting to remove elements.

**Alternatives**

Other approaches to measuring the performance difference between these two methods might include:

* Using a different data structure, such as an array of existing and non-existing elements
* Introducing additional overhead or delays in one of the approaches (e.g., by creating a new function that needs to be called)
* Comparing with alternative checks for element existence, such as using `container.contains()` instead of `deleteme !== null`

Keep in mind that these alternatives would likely change the focus and behavior of the benchmark.

Latest run results:

Run details: (Test run date: 3 years ago)

User agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 10.0; Win64; x64) AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/94.0.4606.54 Safari/537.36

Browser/OS: Chrome 94 on Windows

View result in a separate tab

Test name	Executions per second
Check and act conditionally	2525268.5 Ops/sec
Try and (deliberately) fail	137001.7 Ops/sec

Related benchmarks:

Check vs try...catch (version: 0)

Is it quicker to check and then act, or to try and fail on purpose?

Comparing performance of: Check and act conditionally vs Try and (deliberately) fail

Created: 3 years ago by: Guest

Jump to the latest result

Check and act conditionally

Try and (deliberately) fail

Suite status: <idle, ready to run>

Experimental features:

Fastest: N/A

Slowest: N/A

Autogenerated LLM Summary (model llama3.2:3b, generated 27 days ago):