Hi
While Tracker has always been faster than Beagle and without the memory leaks, previous versions were lacking in features. Tracker 0.6 (http://jamiemcc.livejournal.com/8837.html) has a number of improvements making it more or less reached feature parity with Beagle which we dropped out by default in Fedora 7. Tracker is also going to be the default in the next version of Ubuntu.
What do folks think about installing and enabling Tracker by default in Fedora 8?
Rahul
On Wed, 2007-08-08 at 03:16 +0530, Rahul Sundaram wrote:
Hi
While Tracker has always been faster than Beagle and without the memory leaks, previous versions were lacking in features. Tracker 0.6 (http://jamiemcc.livejournal.com/8837.html) has a number of improvements making it more or less reached feature parity with Beagle which we dropped out by default in Fedora 7. Tracker is also going to be the default in the next version of Ubuntu.
What do folks think about installing and enabling Tracker by default in Fedora 8?
Personally - I'm a bit skeptical of Tracker actually being better than Beagle. I don't have anything substantial, but my instinct on this is that writing a desktop search engine is actually really hard - not barfing on bad files (inherent tension with supporting lots of file types), figuring out all the touchy details of when to do the indexing[1], etc., and that unlike Beagle, Tracker actually hasn't seen wide deployment so it hasn't yet been truly tested.
[1] screensaver integration, am I playing a performance-hungry game, did I just create a new file I might want to find, etc.
On 8/7/07, Colin Walters walters@redhat.com wrote:
Personally - I'm a bit skeptical of Tracker actually being better than Beagle. I don't have anything substantial, but my instinct on this is that writing a desktop search engine is actually really hard - not barfing on bad files (inherent tension with supporting lots of file types), figuring out all the touchy details of when to do the indexing[1], etc., and that unlike Beagle, Tracker actually hasn't seen wide deployment so it hasn't yet been truly tested.
I don't expect any implementation of an indexer to be perfect. But what I desperately need, is an implementation that expects to run into problems and knows how to communicate back to the users when it runs into a problem indexing a file... so we can attempt to actually report something credible and reproducible. My biggest beef with beagle wasn't that it sat there and chewed system resources. My biggest beef with beagle was that there was no obvious feedback to a user nor a way to query what the exact nature of the problem is while its happening. if tracker doesn't do a better job of problem feedback, it's not going to taste better.
-jef
Colin Walters wrote:
Personally - I'm a bit skeptical of Tracker actually being better than Beagle. I don't have anything substantial, but my instinct on this is that writing a desktop search engine is actually really hard - not barfing on bad files (inherent tension with supporting lots of file types), figuring out all the touchy details of when to do the indexing[1], etc., and that unlike Beagle, Tracker actually hasn't seen wide deployment so it hasn't yet been truly tested.
If testing is the only major issue, it is already in the devel branch of Ubuntu by default so it should get some good testing there and we can just enable it in rawhide - wait and watch the results and decide before the general release of Fedora 8.
Beagle doesn't seem to be actively maintained in Fedora, not installed by default anymore and we don't seem to have enough mono expertise. Not having these saves a good amount of space in the live images too. If you still consider Beagle as the better choice, let's enable it back in rawhide by default then.
Either way, desktop search is a good thing to have by default.
Rahul
El mié, 08-08-2007 a las 04:20 +0530, Rahul Sundaram escribió:
If you still consider Beagle as the better choice, let's enable it back in rawhide by default then.
Either way, desktop search is a good thing to have by default.
I'm a lurker here in this list, but I couldn't avoid getting into this thread at this point. Just my particular experience, just an end-user: * I ended up removing beagle from F7 here (too..) * It's scandalous the amount of CPU usage that such a thing eats continuously in the background. I'm not much hardened in Linux, but just by doing a single "top" at the CLI we will always find beagle at the top.. * Beagle, and other things such as tomboy drag others like Mono, too much weight... IMO. * I can't see clearly its (acclaimed) benefits and goodness. It isn't worthwhile, at least for me.. * I can't understand "the fashion" about that tool, I've even heard (read) that at the moment it's ("should be") one of the "five priorities" for the desktop, "which would be able to ensure the success of this or that Linux flavour.." * I use "gnome-search" and I think it's a powerful tool. I'm happy with it. * I don't know "tracker", but I hope it works & it does it with no too much cpu load.
Daniel
El jue, 09-08-2007 a las 18:35 +0530, Rahul Sundaram escribió:
M Daniel R Magarzo wrote:
- I use "gnome-search" and I think it's a powerful tool. I'm happy with
it.
- I don't know "tracker", but I hope it works & it does it with no too
much cpu load.
Try it out and let us know what you think.
Rahul
Tried.
Faster, more powerful, tidy interface when showing results, indexing deeply and it does not last eternally, just a few seconds/minutes. Doing a "top" reveals that there isn't "an alien chewing into our stomach" anymore.. Tracker goes smoothly without doubt.
Preferences panel shouldn't go split from the main interface though, IMO.
Daniel
M Daniel R Magarzo wrote:
Tried.
Faster, more powerful, tidy interface when showing results, indexing deeply and it does not last eternally, just a few seconds/minutes. Doing a "top" reveals that there isn't "an alien chewing into our stomach" anymore.. Tracker goes smoothly without doubt.
Preferences panel shouldn't go split from the main interface though, IMO.
Thanks for the feedback. I agree about the preferences disconnect. Please file a RFE preferably on GNOME bugzilla.
Rahul
On 8/9/07, Rahul Sundaram sundaram@fedoraproject.org wrote:
M Daniel R Magarzo wrote:
Tried.
Faster, more powerful, tidy interface when showing results, indexing deeply and it does not last eternally, just a few seconds/minutes. Doing a "top" reveals that there isn't "an alien chewing into our stomach" anymore.. Tracker goes smoothly without doubt.
Preferences panel shouldn't go split from the main interface though, IMO.
Thanks for the feedback. I agree about the preferences disconnect. Please file a RFE preferably on GNOME bugzilla.
Rahul
I also will add onto this thread, as someone that has continually had problems with beagle and have voiced my opinion on it.
I find Tracker pretty usable and acceptable. I will whisper this silently here as to not wrinkle the feathers from other threads, "Tracker uses less cpu and binds IO even less if the filesystem is mounted noatime, ssssshhhhh". Actually tracker should open all the files noatime and that bug has been filed and agreed upon by the tracker team.
My only real gripe right now is that it doesn't open my IM logs in pidgin, but as normal text files. Other than that it runs happily on my system and I almost don't even know it is there.
I haven't poked at the code much, so I can't comment on that.
Jon
On 8/7/07, Rahul Sundaram sundaram@fedoraproject.org wrote:
Hi
While Tracker has always been faster than Beagle and without the memory leaks, previous versions were lacking in features. Tracker 0.6 (http://jamiemcc.livejournal.com/8837.html) has a number of improvements making it more or less reached feature parity with Beagle which we dropped out by default in Fedora 7. Tracker is also going to be the default in the next version of Ubuntu.
What do folks think about installing and enabling Tracker by default in Fedora 8?
why do you think is tracker better than beagle? its true that it uses less memory but I doubt its any different about i/o and cpu usage. and does it stop indexing when running on battery? beagle does this. also with the cfs scheduler the impact on the system due to high cpu usage should be less. the only remaining part is i/o and I open a thread on lkml about allowing non root user to set the i/o prio to idle. beagle already tryes to do this but fails because it don't have the permission to do so. Removing the check from the kernel is easy but there is a discussion on what idle task can to to the system and if its safe to allow it for non root users. if the kernel gets this change I would opt for re enabling beagle and see what it does.
dragoran wrote:
why do you think is tracker better than beagle? its true that it uses less memory but I doubt its any different about i/o and cpu usage.
It is. Run them both and see for yourself. The performance, cpu usage and the speed of the indexer is very different between them.
and does it stop indexing when running on battery? beagle does this.
I don't know. It should be easy enough to add if it doesn't. File a RFE.
Rahul
On 8/8/07, Rahul Sundaram sundaram@fedoraproject.org wrote:
dragoran wrote:
why do you think is tracker better than beagle? its true that it uses less memory but I doubt its any different about i/o and cpu usage.
It is. Run them both and see for yourself. The performance, cpu usage and the speed of the indexer is very different between them.
sure will test tracker only used a early version but havn't lokked at recent releases.
and does it stop indexing when running on battery? beagle does this.
I don't know. It should be easy enough to add if it doesn't. File a RFE.
shouldn't be hard to add but this is a blocker for enabling it by default.
Matthias Clasen wrote:
On Wed, 2007-08-08 at 03:16 +0530, Rahul Sundaram wrote:
What do folks think about installing and enabling Tracker by default in Fedora 8?
I guess we need a fully filled out and approved feature page for that. Shouldn't take more than 10 minutes... :-)
I guess you didn't read the feature process. A spec needs a owner before it gets approved ;-) A discussion on whether you want to do it or not doesn't need a spec anyway. Discuss it, evaluate it and make a decision first.
Rahul
On Wed, 2007-08-08 at 03:16 +0530, Rahul Sundaram wrote:
Hi
While Tracker has always been faster than Beagle and without the memory leaks, previous versions were lacking in features. Tracker 0.6 (http://jamiemcc.livejournal.com/8837.html) has a number of improvements making it more or less reached feature parity with Beagle which we dropped out by default in Fedora 7. Tracker is also going to be the default in the next version of Ubuntu.
What do folks think about installing and enabling Tracker by default in Fedora 8?
I think the code is dreadful. I'd rather try and hunt a packager in the community (easy), as well as a developer/upstream person for Beagle to make sure bugs are tracked, and regressions are avoided.
desktop@lists.fedoraproject.org
-
Bastien Nocera -
Colin Walters -
drago01 -
Jef Spaleta -
Jon Nettleton -
M Daniel R Magarzo -
Matthias Clasen -
Rahul Sundaram