RE: [HEADS-UP] BSD sort is the default sort in -CURRENT

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Doug Barton [mailto:dougb_at_FreeBSD.org]
> Sent: Tuesday, June 26, 2012 11:18 PM
> To: Gabor Kovesdan
> Cc: FreeBSD Current; Oleg Moskalenko
> Subject: Re: [HEADS-UP] BSD sort is the default sort in -CURRENT
> 
> On 06/26/2012 11:04 PM, Gabor Kovesdan wrote:
> > Hi Folks,
> >
> > as I announced before, the default sort in -CURRENT has been changed
> > to BSD sort.
> 
> Has this been performance tested vs. the old one? If so, where are the
> results?

Of course it was performance-tested. As this is a totally different program with different 
algorithms, it has totally different performance profile on different tests,
comparing to the old sort. In the default compilation mode (single thread sort) 
the performance is on the same level as the old sort (sometimes faster, sometimes slower). 
The new sort is often significantly faster in numeric sort tests. In "experimental" multi-threading 
mode, the new sort is much faster than the old sort on multi-CPU systems.

The sort speed comparison is not actually fair because the old sort cuts some corners and 
has a number of bugs.

The concrete figures do not have much sense because you change the sort file and you get a totally 
different performance ratio. 

> 
> > Since the import, the reported minor bugs have been
> > fixed and BSD sort has passed the portbuild test. If you encounter
> any
> > problems or incompatibility with the old GNU version, please report.
> 
> Has this been thoroughly regression-tested against the old version,
> option by option?

Of course we have the regression tests. We have an overnight test that runs through 
probably 17 millions various sort option combinations.  But we actually had to compare 
the new sort against a fresh GNU sort implementation (version 8.15), because the old BSD GNU sort 
is very buggy and testing against the old GNU sort has no sense.

Oleg