From: "M. Edward (Ed) Borasky" <znmeb@...>
Date: 2006-10-31T07:12:46+09:00
Subject: Re: Ruby performance on Windows XP

Dark Ambient wrote:
> I have plans at some point soon to switch over to Linux,  possibly Ubuntu.
> Not sure which version. at this point.

What are your criteria for choosing a Linux distro? There's actually a
web site that will walk you through the decision. I've forgotten what it
is, though -- I made my choice a couple of years ago and *then* took the
test. It got the right answer. :)

Seriously, though, Ubuntu is probably the most popular "community
desktop" Linux. If you're more interested in a server, though, CentOS,
Debian stable or Fedora might be a better choice. You'll have to manage
the Ruby and Rails packages yourself -- the "stable" versions are
ancient if they even exist.

If you like learning about Linux and want the latest stable software and
want to have things performance-tuned to your hardware, I can recommend
Gentoo. The Ruby and Rails packages generally show up in Gentoo within a
day or so of release, and with a little prodding, you can file an
enhancement bug in their Bugzilla and get beta stuff in. They have a
fairly complete list of Ruby packages already.

> rubyonrails-talk@googlegroups.com
>>
>> Also, I noticed stopping/starting the server seems to help. Not a
>> solution, but it'll save you that 5+ minutes between page refreshes!
> 
> Yep, that is exactly what I've been doing.  This is not production so it's
> acceptable.  Annoying but acceptable.

Annoying isn't acceptable in my book. Your most precious resource is
your time! "It isn't production" means it isn't wasting *other peoples'*
time. Get it fixed!

P.S.: I haven't seen anything in *this* thread so far that would tell me
-- someone who does performance engineering for a living -- that your
problem is in fact Windows-related and will go away when you move to
Linux! Sorry, Zed :).

I did run my CPU-bound Ruby Matrix benchmark a couple of days ago on my
dual-booted laptop and there was a significant slowdown from the
Gentoo-optimized (gcc 4.1.1 -O2 -march=athlon-xp) Ruby interpreter on
Gentoo Linux to the One-Click Ruby with Windows XP Professional on the
same hardware.

I think that's going to get fixed when Austin and Curt get the Microsoft
folks and their tool chain playing nice with Ruby. I'll probably have to
go tweaking the Gentoo Ruby to catch up. :)