Table 1.

Comparison of synapse update schemes.

	Time-driven	Event-driven	Event-driven & compression
History length L	1	I	i
Synapse function calls M	K · T	K · T/I	K · T/I
Weight change computations C	K · T	K · T	T
History entry manipulations H	T	T	K · T/I · i

From the view point of a postsynaptic neuron, the table shows the maximal length of the history L, the number of function calls M of synapse code, the number of computations C of infinitesimal weight changes $\Delta W_{ij}(t^{\alpha },t^{\alpha +1})$, and the number of history entry manipulations H for a simulation of T time steps, a uniform inter-spike interval I between spikes of a single presynaptic neuron, and an in-degree K for each neuron and no delays. For the event-driven compression scheme the entries show the length of the compressed history where i is the number of different spike times within the last inter-spike interval I.