Am 22.12.2009 20:05, schrieb Jonathan Gordon:
loading the theme first into the plugin buffer means loading and parsing it twice, like I said before, there is just way too much pointer use to copy the whole buffer or resize it once its loaded the first time. We can't use the audio buffer for this, because doing that would mean wasting a massive amount each time a new theme is loaded (remember, there is no way to restore ram to the audio buffer.
It has been suggested to just leave the already allocated buffer if the skin fits. After the next reboot it will be allocated correctly. I think that's a fine trade-off. Parsing twice shouldn't be a problem, since that's already quite fast. And skipping the loading of bitmaps will make the first pass even faster. Considering that this only happens during theme changing, not repeatedly, it doesn't appear to be a problem. The pointer stuff wouldn't be needed as well; the buffer could just be trashed after the first pass. Doing that only means that skins can't be loaded separately, but rather like the first pass for each skin, then the second pass for each skin.
In the end it would be a major gain for people that don't change theme too often and for those using minimal themes.
Best regards.
