I keep wanting to use DiffArray as the natural functional solution to
single-threaded array use. But everytime I try, I get smacked over
the head with the actual performance figures. Sometimes, even plain
arrays are faster in a loop doing array updates, in spite of all the
copying involved. And when copying on update dominates the runtime,
using IntMap tends to be faster - the "indirections" are the wrong way
round, but don't pile up, just that array lookups aren't quite constant
time.
But when I really need to avoid the updates, and need constant
time lookup, I'm stuck: DiffArray tends to slow everything down
(I vaguely recall locks and threads being at the heart of this, but
I haven't checked the code recently), so my only option seems to
be to transform my nice functional code into not-nice sequential
code and use STArray.
Is there any way out of this dilemma? What do other Ghc users use?
If locks really are the issue, perhaps using STM instead of MVars
in the DiffArray implementation could help. As long as my array
uses are single-threaded, STM optimism might be able to avoid
waiting/scheduler issues? Or am I on the wrong track?
Claus
PS Btw, I thought the DiffArray performance issue was ancient,
but I can't find a ticket for it, nor does the haddock page for
Data.Array.Diff mention this little hickup. Should I add a ticket?
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