54199 - link windows builds w/ "nowin98" option to reduce disk footprint.

Status: VERIFIED FIXED

(SeaMonkey :: Build Config, defect, P3)

Description

[Judson Valeski]

using the nowin98 link option reduced our components footprint in release builds
by ~10%. This may impact shared lib loading performance on win98 itself.

Comment 1

[Judson Valeski]

Attachment: changes to link windows builds w/ the nowin98 option.

Comment 2

[rpotts (gone)]

This bug is basically a dup of bug #7748 - which was the original i18n bloat 
bug.

Jud, I don't know if you want to dup it or not...  but you should probably take 
over 7748 too :-)

-- rick

Comment 3

[Judson Valeski]

I built these changes into my win98 box and did not notice a slow down in load
time.

Comment 4

[Jim Roskind]

I think the Win98 load time is supposed to be notable on re-start.  I think this
option might preclude cacheing the image, and then require a re-read.  Did I
understand the issue properly?
Although nice reload time is good, folks don't constantly start/stop a browser,
so reload time is no where near as critical as it would be for a short-lifetime
utility.

Comment 5

[Jim Roskind]

Can someone confirm the exact size changes involved?  The 10% number is quite
remarkable, so it would be good to have some actual with vs without numbers on
the record.
Thanks,
Jim (who never before heard of this option, and just started reading about it)

Comment 6

[Judson Valeski]

all the info has already been posted to mozilla-seamonkey and
mozilla-porkjockeys (last week). reposting here.

"Awhile ago Potts had mentioned some linker option that would clear out the VC6
linker cruft in shared libs and make it behave more like VC5. I built win32
using the "/opt:nowin98" linker option and got some interesting results.

release build using existing linker flags for win32 produced shared libraries
who's total size is 9,326,592 bytes.

release build using existing linker flags plus the nowin98 linker flag produced
shared libraries who's total size is 8,482,816 bytes.

Under current conditions, that's a disk space savings of 10%. The following url
provides *some* explaination about the nowin98 flag (it's undocumented so docs
are sparse) http://www.sellsbrothers.com/tools/ .

There's apparently some shared lib slow down when the libs are loaded *on*
win98. Do we want to turn the flag on and see what happens? If it's painful is
it worth providing an exclusive win98 build?

Jud
"

Comment 7

[Scott MacGregor]

looks okay to me. a=mscott

Comment 8

[Judson Valeski]

this change is only going in the trunk (it's been checked in there).

Comment 9

[Jon Granrose]

verified.