On Sat, Feb 17, 2007 at 12:36:00PM -0500, R. Fumione wrote:
> Hello,
>
> I am using OpenBSD on server since few years now, and I am very happy
> with it's easy maintenance and it's stability. I want to try on
> desktop, and I am having trouble.
>
> Everything is much slower than existing Linux system. For example,
> Firefox takes 3-5 seconds to start on Linux but ~10 seconds on
> OpenBSD on same machine!
>
> I tried compiler optimizations but those didn't help. Any suggestions?
> Please cc replies to me also as I am not on misc. Thanks.
>
> Fumione
>
> (Note: please do not tell me change to lighter window manager. I
> would like to use same environment or stay with Linux. Thanks.)
I believe the standard response to any comparison "use Linux if you're
happy with it". Since you've already received that, here is an attempt
to do the question a little more justice. (However, it boils down to 'it
doesn't matter if FF loads a little slower, as long as it runs equally
fast').
Most modern Linux distributions optimize dynamic library load using
prelinking; 4.0 and later have a comparable idea implemented
('prebind'), but in a way that does not interfere with OpenBSD's
security features. This is not enabled by default (I'm not sure why not,
and would be very grateful if anybody would tell me, BTW), but can be
enabled using `ldconfig -P /usr/bin /usr/sbin /usr/local/bin
/usr/local/sbin /usr/X11R6/bin'. This should result in a noticeable
speed increase, especially on programs with lots of loaded libraries -
and look in /usr/local/mozilla-firefox to see that FF does have 'lots of
loaded libraries'!
Of course, it would be a good idea to know why it's not the default
first. Also note that, if I remember correctly, prebind won't help if
you use a nonstandard LD_LIBRARY_PATH, as FF does... so the command
listed before is likely to work for just about every *other* program.
Another aspect is that Linux is much more aggressive in caching data
from disk; if the amount of data read, the amount of work done in
between, and the amount of RAM is such that Linux can get most data from
its memory cache while OpenBSD has to read most of it from disk, Linux
will be a *lot* faster. Of course, you would only see this effect if you
started Firefox twice without doing much in between.
Both of those could explain why FF loads slower. If either of those is
the big culprit, though, FF should run just as fast (slow) as it ever
did, and since you're not likely to start it that often, I'd be inclined
to say it isn't that big an issue.
If a comparable slowdown is found in running FF, that would be a
problem. There are many variables there, of course... a dmesg might be
helpful, for instance.
Aggressive compiler optimizations are not generally a good idea. The
developers believe they are an unnecessary source of bugs, and since
many optimizations are not enabled by default, there is not quite as
much opportunity to find bugs in them. Plus, no amount of fiddling is
likely to double speed.
Since you didn't mention what you are using at the moment, I can't very
well tell you to switch to a lighter window manager, can I? Ion *is*
nice, though... ;-)
Joachim
