Maximum and minimum file size

[pdl]

Follows on from discussion in #529.

• The only per-file overhead for users who don't use the new options is a single boolean check to see if the size filter exists.
• No new stats, we use -s _.
• I can't see anything in there which would break on Windows and the only failures I saw running the tests (a couple of commits back, because I have that running on a different machine) looked like irrelevant stuff for which there are open issues.

[petdance]

@hoelzro : Please don't do anything with this until we've talked. I think I want to freeze new features until we get bugs under control, even cool new features like this one.

[hoelzro]

@pdl Thanks for the patch! I took a look and left a few comments on the changes. In addition, you may want to try using the timings script in the dev directory to see how your changes affect the runtime of ack. I would checkout the dev branch, make ack-standalone, run timings.pl with --store, and then try on your branch, to see how it compares to what's current.

[pdl]

Thanks for the feedback! I'll give the timings script a go. Noting your and @petdance's comments (particularly bugs before features), I'll go and fiddle with it some more and come back with something more refined.

[pdl]

@hoelzro, I'm getting values of x_x for all results when I do

perl Makefile.PL
make ack-standalone
dev/timings.pl

Any ideas what I'm doing wrong?

[hoelzro]

@pdl You probably need to check out parrot to your $HOME; the script expects it to be there, and doesn't complain appropriately when it's not. =/

[pdl]

Ah, thanks. Assuming you mean https://github.com/parrot/parrot, the timings (as of ea9f26b) look like margin of error difference (I did them in backwards order, sorry, I've adjusted the column heads).

                                    |   1.96 |   2.02 |   2.04 |   2.08 |   2.10 |   2.12 |   2.14 |  max-size |    dev
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
             ack foo /home/d/parrot |   0.39 |   2.80 |   0.70 |   0.66 |   0.67 |   0.68 |   0.69 |     0.25 |   0.25
        ack foo --cc /home/d/parrot |   0.12 |   1.06 |   0.26 |   0.25 |   0.25 |   0.25 |   0.27 |     0.12 |   0.12
      ack foo --rust /home/d/parrot |    x_x |   0.23 |   0.14 |   0.14 |   0.14 |   0.14 |   0.16 |     0.10 |   0.10
     ack foo --known /home/d/parrot |   0.39 |   3.16 |   0.77 |   0.83 |   0.64 |   0.64 |   0.65 |     0.24 |   0.24
              ack -f /home/d/parrot |   0.06 |   0.26 |   0.17 |   0.17 |   0.21 |   0.18 |   0.19 |     0.13 |   0.13
         ack -f --cc /home/d/parrot |   0.06 |   0.23 |   0.14 |   0.15 |   0.14 |   0.15 |   0.16 |     0.10 |   0.10
       ack -f --rust /home/d/parrot |    x_x |   0.23 |   0.14 |   0.15 |   0.14 |   0.15 |   0.16 |     0.10 |   0.11
      ack -f --known /home/d/parrot |   0.06 |   0.59 |   0.34 |   0.36 |   0.17 |   0.18 |   0.19 |     0.13 |   0.13
          ack foo -l /home/d/parrot |   0.58 |   2.77 |   0.33 |   0.33 |   0.34 |   0.34 |   0.25 |     0.19 |   0.19
     ack foo -l --cc /home/d/parrot |   0.20 |   0.80 |   0.18 |   0.19 |   0.18 |   0.18 |   0.17 |     0.11 |   0.11
   ack foo -l --rust /home/d/parrot |    x_x |   0.23 |   0.14 |   0.14 |   0.14 |   0.15 |   0.16 |     0.10 |   0.10
  ack foo -l --known /home/d/parrot |   0.59 |   3.21 |   0.51 |   0.41 |   0.32 |   0.32 |   0.25 |     0.18 |   0.18
          ack foo -c /home/d/parrot |   0.67 |   2.81 |   0.36 |   0.37 |   0.36 |   0.36 |   0.25 |     0.19 |   0.19
     ack foo -c --cc /home/d/parrot |   0.21 |   0.79 |   0.18 |   0.19 |   0.19 |   0.19 |   0.17 |     0.11 |   0.12
   ack foo -c --rust /home/d/parrot |    x_x |   0.23 |   0.14 |   0.14 |   0.14 |   0.15 |   0.16 |     0.10 |   0.10
  ack foo -c --known /home/d/parrot |   0.67 |   3.07 |   0.55 |   0.55 |   0.35 |   0.36 |   0.25 |     0.19 |   0.19
        ack foo -A10 /home/d/parrot |   0.50 |   2.94 |   1.41 |   1.34 |   1.36 |   1.35 |   1.39 |     0.96 |   0.95
   ack foo -A10 --cc /home/d/parrot |   0.13 |   0.83 |   0.40 |   0.41 |   0.40 |   0.40 |   0.41 |     0.28 |   0.28
 ack foo -A10 --rust /home/d/parrot |    x_x |   0.23 |   0.14 |   0.14 |   0.18 |   0.14 |   0.16 |     0.10 |   0.10
ack foo -A10 --known /home/d/parrot |   0.49 |   3.45 |   1.41 |   1.50 |   1.32 |   1.30 |   1.28 |     0.89 |   0.94
        ack foo -B10 /home/d/parrot |   0.56 |   2.83 |   1.43 |   1.43 |   1.43 |   1.42 |   1.45 |     1.08 |   1.08
   ack foo -B10 --cc /home/d/parrot |   0.16 |   0.82 |   0.42 |   0.42 |   0.42 |   0.42 |   0.43 |     0.31 |   0.31
 ack foo -B10 --rust /home/d/parrot |    x_x |   0.23 |   0.14 |   0.14 |   0.14 |   0.14 |   0.16 |     0.10 |   0.10
ack foo -B10 --known /home/d/parrot |   0.56 |   3.13 |   1.49 |   1.50 |   1.36 |   1.34 |   1.37 |     1.15 |   1.01
        ack foo -C10 /home/d/parrot |   0.62 |   3.03 |   1.66 |   1.62 |   1.62 |   1.65 |   1.64 |     1.09 |   1.09
   ack foo -C10 --cc /home/d/parrot |   0.15 |   0.85 |   0.46 |   0.45 |   0.45 |   0.46 |   0.48 |     0.31 |   0.31
 ack foo -C10 --rust /home/d/parrot |    x_x |   0.23 |   0.14 |   0.14 |   0.14 |   0.14 |   0.16 |     0.10 |   0.10
ack foo -C10 --known /home/d/parrot |   0.61 |   3.47 |   1.70 |   1.75 |   1.52 |   1.56 |   1.54 |     1.01 |   1.03

[hoelzro]

This looks pretty good to me; we're in kind of a code freeze at the moment, but after that's done with, one of us can merge it in.

[petdance]

What is the use case for --min-file-size? I can't think of why one would use it.

[pdl]

More for completeness than anything but it's plausible that when searching directory structure with so many tiny files (like Dancer YAML session files) and a few large interesting files that the little ones become annoying.

[petdance]

I don't want to add --min-file-size for completeness. I only want it if it will actually get used, and it seems very unlikely to me.

Every bit of code in the project has weight and cost.