Bill Yan wrote: > Hi Frank, > > Thanks for your email. The design looks great, but we have some concerns > from the performance point of view. Actually this is an outstanding > issue since DDU 1.0. The issue is: > > DDU performs the search function for missing drivers, DDU will not > display the device tree until the search finishes. If the network is > slow, it will take a long time for DDU to display the device tree. We > ever got several complains about DDU hang issue, and after > investigation, we found it's because the network issue and DDU took long > time to display the device tree. Since DDU 1.3 will support search for > multi repos, this issue will become worse. > > So by the chance of DDU enhancement to align with the driver update > project, DDU has another window to install missing drivers. > To solve this issue, we planned to seperate the "device scan" and > "search for missing driver" functions, for main window, DDU will only > show the device tree and show whether driver is missing or not. Once > user clicks the "install driver" button beside the "Submit" button, DDU > will do the "search for missing drivers" from multi repos before > displaying the the second window. Like this, this DDU "hang" issue can > be solved for those users only want to see the device tree which is > shown on the first window. > > Do you think this make sense? and really thanks for your work on the DDU > design. > I agree with you and Jack that the device scan and search should be separated. But delaying the search until the use clicks Install wastes time and will cause that user to wait a very long time after clicking Install. And as Jack suggests, the second window is likely to confuse users as it will show nearly the same thing.
An alternative suggestion; separate the device scan and search into different threads. When DDU is started do the device scan and display the results in the window. This is part of what you suggest. However, begin the search in a different thread and as information becomes available for a driver, cache/display the information for that driver while the search continues. While waiting for search result, the DDU could put some sort of message in the Driver column for that device, something like "[searching]" or something. I need to understand this better. We may need to gray (disable) a device until its search is complete, or at least keep the Install button disabled when the device is selected until the search completes. If the user selects a device, immediately do the search for that driver if it hasn't already completed. I agree that the current "hang" that you mention should be avoided. But I also really believe that we should avoid two windows. I notice that when I start DDU the devices list slowly. Is this a manifestation of devices being listed as the search progresses? I think we need some more discussion on solving this. Frank > > > Frank Ludolph ???: >> Here is the integrated window design that I referred to in >> yesterday's meeting. This works pretty much as a merge of the two >> windows except: >> >> * Since all the devices are displayed the devices with >> missing/inoperative drivers need to be highlighted. The originall >> DDU design used a light red highlight for those rows but I don't >> see it functioning in the 9.06 release (in my virtualbox install >> with a missing audio driver). >> * The "Install All Drivers" button becomes a simple, single device >> Install for the selected row. I don't think this is an issue since >> there are seldom more than a couple of drivers to install. >> >> Thoughts? >> >> Frank >> >> ------------------------------------------------------------------------ >> >> >
