200142 - perl tool to investigate package dependencies

Status: VERIFIED FIXED

(Firefox Build System :: General, defect)

Description

[Simon Paquet [:sipaq]]

The goal of this bug is to cut down the guts of comm.jar.

We need to know what can be safely removed and what can't. Then we have to find
out where the things that can't be safely removed are referenced in the rest of
Phoenix so that the necessary contents can be forked and comm.jar can be
eliminated entirely.

So far most of (if not all of) content/communicator/bookmarks
content/communicator/history, content/communicator/pref and
content/communicator/timebomb can be safely removed. There are also some other
pref-files in other directories which can be removed. This should result in
faster startup time, reduced memory and disk footprint and a smaller download
file (approx. 180 KB).

This bug blocks bug 171082. Some of the things done her are also discussed in
this bug, but since bug 171082 is a tracking bug, I've filed a new bug.

Comment 1

[Simon Paquet [:sipaq]]

Ok, so here is a list of stuff, which can be deleted from comm.jar (roughly
tested under W2K). Any help and testing is greatly appreciated.

How can you help:
comm.jar in the chrome-directory is just a normal zip-archive. Open it and
delete the files I mention here (always make a backup copy of comm.jar first).
Then run Phoenix and test all the functionality (open all menus), browse a few
webpages, etc. See if everything works, if not, come back here and tell me.

all of content/communicator/bookmarks
all of content/communicator/history
all of content/communicator/pref
all of content/communicator/related
all of content/communicator/sidebar
all of content/communicator/search
all of content/communicator/timebomb
all of content/navigator
all of content/navigator-region
all of content/navigator-platform

in content/communicator
- communicator.css

Comment 2

[Alfred Kayser]

This 'bug' needs some revising, due to the new roadmap.

All of the theme packaging needs to be changed:
global & communicator (& editor) for the base (MRE?)

browser (for Mozilla Browser = Phoenix)

messenger (for Mozilla Messenger = ??)

Comment 3

[Simon Paquet [:sipaq]]

Alfred: 
This bug is Phoenix-only and therefore browser-only. In Phoenix (with or without
the new roadmap) we simply don't need all the messenger and editor stuff in
comm.jar. Everything in communicator should be moved to browser or to global.

Comment 4

[Chu Alan "sprite"]

some interesting report: 

1. It seems that viewsource is the largest consumer of chrome files in comm.jar
(many)
2. bookmarksManager.xul needs too comm.jar file too.
3. page setup.
4. Character Encoding -> customize needs pref-charset.xul (i do not remember the
exact file name) from comm.jar

the test is done by removing comm.jar all together, and putting back necessary
files so Phoenix will work.

however, the test is still in progress

Comment 5

[Simon Paquet [:sipaq]]

>some interesting report: 
>
>[...]
>
>the test is done by removing comm.jar all together, and putting back necessary
>files so Phoenix will work.
>
>however, the test is still in progress

Chu Alan, anything new from your tests?

Comment 6

[Chu Alan "sprite"]

> Chu Alan, anything new from your tests?

i am regreted to say that i have stopped testing because I need to take my
A-Level public examination. Do you want me to restart the test or do you have
another plan to do it in a more efficient way? :)

since I am having my summer vocation, I should have plenty of free time available.

Comment 7

[Chu Alan "sprite"]

Attachment: chrome-trace report

this report is generated by a little script I have written today, it is very
coarse and the report is very loose and not quite accurate (some essential
files are marked as dangling :)). However I do hope that it provides some
useful information to others.

Comment 8

[Chu Alan "sprite"]

while working on the script, I have notices some problems: 
1. in toolkit/jar.mn, checkbox.xml got packaged twice
2. there are many missing files got referenced 
   (try to find 'not in chrome list' in the report), is there something missing 
   in my script?

Comment 9

[Simon Paquet [:sipaq]]

Sprite, three things:

1. To verify that your script does what it is intended to do, it would be helpful 
   if you could post that script here as an attachment.
2. In your chrome-trace report many files .jars are mentioned, which are not 
   supplied with Firebird in the default build. Could you restrict your trace just 
   to comm.jar?
3. There is a similar bug to this one for classic.jar, a trace would be very 
   helpful there also. It's bug 189043.

Comment 10

[Chu Alan "sprite"]

Attachment: the chrome-trace script

simon: 
1. here it is :)
   i hope that it is doing the right thing, if not, feel free to point it out
2. can you supply me a list of directory which should be 'packaged'?
   (or i am thinking i should go through the actual packaged jar file instead 
    of working on the tree itself)

   (btw i am still trying to refine the script, for example, showing inter-jar 

    file dependency, but i am seeking for comments from others first)
3. oh... i haven't noticed it :) i will CC that bug too

Comment 11

[Chu Alan "sprite"]

Attachment: oops... the missing template file

you have to change the INCLUDE_PATH in chrome-trace script to point to the
directory which this template resides in

sorry for the spam :)

Comment 12

[Simon Paquet [:sipaq]]

> 1. here it is :)
>    i hope that it is doing the right thing, if not, feel free to point it out

Since I'm no perl hacker, I won't be able to to do that, but perhaps other
people can help.

> 2. can you supply me a list of directory which should be 'packaged'?
>    (or i am thinking i should go through the actual packaged jar file instead 
>    of working on the tree itself)

The latter would be a good idea, but beware of possible inter-jar-dependencies.
The easiest way (IMO) would be to unpack all the jars in the default build under
a single directory (maintaining the sub-directory structure of every jar of
course) and then let the script work from there.

Comment 13

[Chu Alan "sprite"]

> Since I'm no perl hacker, I won't be able to to do that, but perhaps other
> people can help.

know anybody who can take a look at my script? may be CC them to this bug?

Comment 14

[Simon Paquet [:sipaq]]

Bug 221602 covers this area more completely than this bugs and is actively being
worked on. Marking duplicate.

*** This bug has been marked as a duplicate of 221602 ***

Comment 15

[Pierre Chanial]

Chu: this script has a really great potential! Thank you very much!
However, it needs to be improved in order to be useful.
- files should be ordered by jar then alphanumerically.
- in order to figure out the dependency tree, we need to provide less
information :-) it would be great to have a way to specify a package and the
script would check the files that are not used inside itself only. That would
already provide a good information.
Could you run it for browser.jar and toolkit.jar?
Also, it would be nice to select packages (like browser.jar) and see the
dangling files of another package.
Could you run it to see the dangling files in toolkit.jar wrt browser.jar?

Comment 16

[Pierre Chanial]

-> Chu

Comment 17

[Chu Alan "sprite"]

pierre: 
i have a couple of assignments and midterms coming soon, i will come back to
this when i am available.

BTW i am studying in university now :)

Comment 18

[Simon Paquet [:sipaq]]

I guess we can call this FIXED now.