Test: pack v. sprintf

The documentation describes sprintf() using %c as similar to chr(). It's an arguably cleaner syntax (if only using chars) than pack() uses - is it faster?

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Result: Discarded

The test labeled "sprintf()" was the faster by 0.0102 seconds, (0.988% faster)

sprintf() 100%

pack() 99.012%

The sprintf() test took 1.0195 seconds.
The pack() test took 1.0297 seconds.

Nitty-Gritty

Each test case ran 20 random code order iterations consisting of 270,643 loops for a total of 5,412,860 runs.

Line execution difference (0.000002) milliseconds.
Avg difference (0.508) milliseconds per 270,643 loops.
Total difference 10.17 milliseconds for 5,412,860 loops

The iteration variablity for Code 1 was (4.9684) milliseconds and Code 2 was (4.0018) milliseconds. The lower and the closer together there values are the more accurate the results are.

Code

The first test, "pack()", was:

$GLOBALS['dummy'] = pack('C4', 65, 65, 65, 65);

The second test, "sprintf()", was:

$GLOBALS['dummy'] = sprintf('%c%c%c%c', 65, 65, 65, 65);

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