I fear the Documentation Policy is being based on the wrong technical assumptions.
The fact is that what slows down HTML in an old system is not a web server or the cgi converters. It is the browser! Please take a moment and read the following timings made in a 386 SX-25 with 5MB of RAM. It will help you understand what is at stake. I did the test as fairly as I could and I claim to be a honest person. /tmp$ time lynx -dump \ http://localhost/cgi-bin/man2html/usr/man/man1/telnet.1.gz >/dev/null 5.98user 82.76system 1:36.40elapsed 92%CPU (0avgtext+0avgdata 0maxresident)k 0inputs+0outputs (360major+74minor)pagefaults 0swaps /tmp$ time man -l /usr/man/man1/telnet.1.gz >/dev/null Reformatting telnet.1.gz, please wait... 101.25user 24.03system 2:11.48elapsed 95%CPU (0avgtext+0avgdata 0maxresident)k 0inputs+0outputs (1795major+513minor)pagefaults 125swaps As you can see, man was more CPU intensive and took more time than lynx with on-the-fly conversion. /tmp$ time snarf \ http://localhost/cgi-bin/man2html/usr/man/man1/telnet.1.gz - >/dev/null 0.12user 0.12system 0:03.30elapsed 7%CPU (0avgtext+0avgdata 0maxresident)k 0inputs+0outputs (74major+16minor)pagefaults 0swaps Snarf was useful to show that the overhead of boa in a 386 SX-25 is _minimal_ compared both to man and lynx. /tmp$ time lynx -dump telnet.html.gz >/dev/null 6.81user 83.47system 1:33.22elapsed 96%CPU (0avgtext+0avgdata 0maxresident)k 0inputs+0outputs (550major+147minor)pagefaults 0swaps Lynx accessing the pre-formatted file was only 3 seconds faster!! /tmp$ time lynx -dump telnet.html >/dev/null 6.16user 81.58system 1:30.76elapsed 96%CPU (0avgtext+0avgdata 0maxresident)k 0inputs+0outputs (326major+68minor)pagefaults 0swaps Even more. Lynx accessing a pre-formatted and uncompressed file was only 6 seconds faster than on-the-fly conversion!!! If we keep the preferred online format as HTML we either have to live with the slowness of web browsers or write a simpler and faster one. But let's not try to be deceiving here. On-the-fly conversion adds very little overhead and in fact improves the speed compared to man+groff. Please base policy on facts, not on pre-judgements. Thanks, Fernando. -- TO UNSUBSCRIBE FROM THIS MAILING LIST: e-mail the word "unsubscribe" to [EMAIL PROTECTED] . Trouble? e-mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED] .
