ELI5: Explain Like I'm 5

BogoMips

Bogomips is a funny-sounding word that is actually a way to measure how fast a computer can do some very simple things.

Imagine you are a computer and someone asks you to count to 100 as quickly as you can. You start counting: "1, 2, 3, 4...." until you finally reach 100. This would take you some time, but you could probably do it without too much trouble.

Now imagine you are a different computer, and someone gives you the same task. You start counting too: "1, 2, 3, 4...." just like the first computer did. But this time, you count really, really fast! You finish counting to 100 in just a few seconds!

As humans, we know that the second computer is faster than the first one. But computers are machines, and we need a way to measure how fast they are. That's where bogomips comes in.

A bogomip is a special way to measure a computer's speed by seeing how fast it can do a bunch of simple tasks (like counting to 100). More specifically, it's a measurement of how many million simple tasks the computer can do in one second. So if a computer has a bogomips rating of 5, it means that it can do 5 million simple tasks in one second - which is pretty fast!

So, next time you hear someone talk about bogomips, just remember that it's a way to measure how fast a computer can do simple tasks. And the bigger the bogomips rating, the faster the computer!
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