Re: [jamboost] Re: [bjam] implementation of builtin CAT

From: Rene Rivera (grafik.list_at_[hidden])
Date: 2005-09-04 09:22:25

Joao Abecasis wrote:
> Rene Rivera wrote:
> 
>>How about something like:
>>
>>rule READ ( file : first-and-last-line * : regexp ? )
>> # file, path to file
>> # first-and-last-line, range of lines to read, default ( 0 1 )
>> # regexp, optional regex to apply to each line before it is returned
>> #
>> # returns: ( first-line-read last-line-read strings * )
> 
> Some issues regarding the implementation of a READ command.
> 
> * How are multiple reads on the same file to be handled? Is the file 
> repeatedly opened? Does it remain open for the duration of a bjam run?
> 
> FWIW, map_file_* could still be used as a back-end to cache file data in 
> memory. A possible issue with my implementation is that it naively 
> assumes files don't change, if they are changing they must be explicitly 
> unmapped or remapped.
> 
> * Are (file, line) pairs tracked? Or do we fopen/fseek on repeated 
> reads? What about when sequentially calling READ a line at a time?

I always go for the simplest and most portable solution first. So reopen 
and rereading would be the first thing to try. If it becomes a 
performance issue then one can do buffering, for example (file, FILE*, 
offset, line) in an MRU list.

> Hmm... Then again, perhaps I'm letting implementation details cloud my 
> vision of the big picture ;-)

I'd say your are :-) It's the user interface that's important, the READ 
rule in this case.

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