"Application programs commonly use at least one form of time measurement (for example, transaction time stamps). For that purpose, POSIX libraries provide timing functions, such as gettimeofday, which give an easy-to-use interface to application programmers. When the application makes an intensive use of timing functions, a more efficient implementation of the timing routines can improve the overall performance of the program. This can be invaluable for lower-level tasks such as code profiling or precise delays in device drivers and other time-critical code.
"On the Power Architecture platform, it is possible to further improve on the performance delivered by gettimeofday..."
