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author | gabor <gabor@FreeBSD.org> | 2010-07-22 19:11:57 +0000 |
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committer | gabor <gabor@FreeBSD.org> | 2010-07-22 19:11:57 +0000 |
commit | 17349bffe429a953a031d171130a1138198ac7ab (patch) | |
tree | 318bb6f174fac904c08b62b93207c79c56437b11 /UPDATING | |
parent | f2d14f41cfaba8b7f13b549c183c6c939670cfad (diff) | |
download | FreeBSD-src-17349bffe429a953a031d171130a1138198ac7ab.zip FreeBSD-src-17349bffe429a953a031d171130a1138198ac7ab.tar.gz |
Add BSD grep to the base system and make it our default grep.
Deliverables: Small and clean code (1,4 KSLOC vs GNU's 8,5 KSLOC),
lower memory usage than GNU grep, GNU compatibility,
BSD license.
TODO: Performance is somewhat behind GNU grep but it is only
significant for bigger searches. The reason is complex, the
most important factor is that GNU grep uses lots of
optimizations to improve the speed of the regex library.
First, we need a modern regex library (practically by adopting
TRE), add support for GNU-style non-standard regexes and then
reevalute the performance issues and look for bottlenecks. In
the meantime, for those, who need better performance, it is
possible to build GNU grep by setting WITH_GNU_GREP.
Approved by: delphij (mentor)
Obtained from: OpenBSD (http://www.openbsd.org/cgi-bin/cvsweb/src/usr.bin/grep/),
freegrep (http://github.com/howardjp/freegrep)
Sponsored by: Google SoC 2008
Portbuild tests run by: kris, pav, erwin
Acknowledgements to: fjoe (as SoC 2008 mentor),
everyone who helped in reviewing and testing
Diffstat (limited to 'UPDATING')
-rw-r--r-- | UPDATING | 12 |
1 files changed, 12 insertions, 0 deletions
@@ -22,6 +22,18 @@ NOTE TO PEOPLE WHO THINK THAT FreeBSD 9.x IS SLOW: machines to maximize performance. (To disable malloc debugging, run ln -s aj /etc/malloc.conf.) +20100722: + BSD grep has been imported to the base system and it is built by + default. It is completely BSD licensed, highly GNU-compatible, uses + less memory than its GNU counterpart and has a small codebase. + However, it is slower than its GNU counterpart, which is mostly + noticeable for larger searches, for smaller ones it is measurable + but not significant. The reason is complex, the most important factor + is that we lack a modern and efficient regex library and GNU + overcomes this by optimizing the searches internally. Future work + on improving the regex performance is planned, for the meantime, + users that need better performance, can build GNU grep instead by + setting the WITH_GNU_GREP knob. 20100713: Due to the import of powerpc64 support, all existing powerpc kernel |