Re: [Gnu-arch-users] abrowse and rbrowse

[Miles Bader]

On Mon, May 10, 2004 at 03:18:01PM -0500, Charles Duffy wrote:
> "rbrowse" is new code, written with the intent of replacing "abrowse".
> However, since abrowse still has some advantages to it (more options and
> such), they're coexisting for the time being.

abrowse can be much faster if you're listing a slow remote archive, and
specify a particular category/branch.  The reason is that abrowse only
accesses the category/branch you specify, but rbrowse -- to best of my
knowledge (based on observation, not reading the code) -- fetches everything
and then only prints what matches.

rbrowse could be optimized to use abrowse-style behavior when a limit is
specified, and then should be as fast as abrowse in that case, but it hasn't
been done yet.

So for now, consider rbrowse and abrowse different tools for different
situations.  I don't see any reason why their functionality _can't_ be merged
though, and hopefully this will happen someday; just a small matter of
programming.... :-)

[BTW, I notice that abrowse and rbrowse use different amounts of indentation;
 perhaps this should be made consistent, in case somebody's tools are keying
 off indentation level?]

-Miles
-- 
"Unless there are slaves to do the ugly, horrible, uninteresting work, culture
and contemplation become almost impossible. Human slavery is wrong, insecure,
and demoralizing.  On mechanical slavery, on the slavery of the machine, the
future of the world depends." -Oscar Wilde, "The Soul of Man Under Socialism"