Rule Cost

The Cost row appears under the Action section. A rule can optionally be assigned an estimate of how much it costs to be executed.  A Cost can be up to three digits and use any unit of measure. Examples are actual monetary cost, amount of computer time, storage space, or any measure that can be applied to all of the rules in the logic table (i.e. do not put CPU seconds in one column and dollars in another). These cost numbers come into play at compile time. The compiler uses the cost entry to optimize the generated program code.
 
To enter a cost numbers for rules, follow the process below:
  1. Click the mouse in the cost row under a desired rule.
  2. Enter a cost number in the box provided.
  3. Repeat steps 1 and 2 to enter each cost (not all rules are required to have a cost number).
The Frequency and Cost values are not considered as exact amounts. Values assigned to these entries are used to establish a relative relationship among the rules, such as “Rule 3 is more frequent (or costly) than Rule 6” and “Rule 2 is more frequent than Rule 7,” and so forth. Thus, it is important that we know only a rough approximation of Frequency or Cost, which after all, is the only type you are likely to have available in most instances.