Question
How much simulation work fits into one frame when the number of steps is capped?
Setup
The accumulator begins empty. The selected frame duration is divided into whole simulation steps and a fractional remainder. Only the allowed number of whole steps executes. Remaining time carries into a later frame.
Interpretation
The step count is arithmetic, not a measurement of how expensive a simulation step is. Capping work can avoid an unbounded catch-up loop, but deferred time must be handled deliberately by the application. This model does not silently discard it.
Limitation
There is no rendering, interpolation, wall-clock sampling or actual game loop here. The model isolates one scheduling decision so its consequences are visible.
Methodology & reproducibility
- Evidence type
- Deterministic model, not a runtime benchmark.
- Inputs
- The values shown in the controls above. Keep them identical when comparing results.
- Hardware & trials
- No hardware measurements or repeated timing samples are collected.
- Median / p95
- Not applicable to calculated outputs. These require a distribution of measured samples.
Use this model to form a hypothesis. To validate it in a project, record the source revision, build configuration, hardware, workload, warm-up and trial count; then compare baseline and changed builds under the same conditions.