anaconda performance thoughts [Re: ANNOUNCE: Severn Test 2 Anaconda Updates Image Available]

[Michael Fulbright]

I did some quick profiling with oprofile of an anaconda install and the
vast majority of the total install time is spent waiting in the idle
loop in the kernel.  However I was doing an NFS install, which is pretty
much reading the RPM over the network and exploding it to disk.  The
bytes/sec we were exploding RPMs in anaconda was about 50% of what you
get if you just 'rpm2cpio | cpio -dimv ' the same RPMs to the drive (I
tried this as a test).  

Its something we want to revisit when we have time.  To be honest you're
only reinstalling once ever 6-12 months and then using up2date to keep
the system current, so it hasn't been a high priority to reduce the
install time by 30% as compared to clearing out as many bugs and adding
features which will make anaconda most useful.  I'll be happy the day
all the complaints about anaconda are just performance related.

Michael Fulbright
msf at redhat.com