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#153 --enable-threads slows down all Tcl/Tk apps
OriginalBugID: 4261 Bug
Version: 8.2.3
SubmitDate: '2000-02-28'
LastModified: '2000-02-28'
Severity: SER
Status: Closed
Submitter: techsupp
ChangedBy: hobbs
RelatedBugIDs: 2438
OS: Linux
OSVersion: Slackware Linus v7.0 (problem als present under Slackware v4.0 w
Machine: Cyrix 6x86L-PR200 (home-built)
ClosedDate: '2000-02-28'
Name:
Kevin D. Knerr, Sr.
Extensions:
TclX v8.2.0
CustomShell:
none
Comments:
I raised this issue on the TkRat list and was advised to compile Tcl w/o
--enable-threads. One of the responses included the following
confirmation:
On 28 Feb, Robert Newcater wrote:
> Kevin,
>
> I can confirm that this also works for Tc/Tk 8.3 -- mainly for the
benefit of others, but it's your thread :-)
>
> I also noticed this slowness when using Tcl/Tk 8.3 and TkRat 2.0b9.
When I had TkRat running, I noticed that CPU usage by TkRat was between
40% and 60% and that letters appeared on screen quite slowly (on a PII
350 with 128 MB RAM). I had also compiled Tcl/Tk with --enable-threads
at the configure stage.
>
> Recompiling Tcl/Tk without the --enable-threads parameter and then
recompiling TkRat soved the problem.
>
A further reply noted that threads are not supported in wish and that a
bug-report should be filed with Scriptics. (Hence this bug report ;-)
In the stupid question department, if wish doesn't support threads, why
is there an "enable-treads" option in the first place? Nor is there
anything that I found in reading the INSTALL/README items that would
suggest that enabling threads would be a bad idea, even if I had a
kernel which supported threads.
If this is not an easily fixable bug (and I suspect that it's not--it
might well have been present throughout the 8.x series), could you at
least update the installation info regarding the circumstances under
which it is advisable to use --enable-threads? TIA
ReproducibleScript:
compile tcl 8.2.x/8.3 with --enable-threads on a system w/ thread-safe Xlibs, such as XFree86 3.3.x or better.
invoke just about any tcl/tk app that uses extensive text input -- such as TkRat v2.0bx
ObservedBehavior:
watch your system slow to a crawl as you try to type a simple 4 line email :-(
DesiredBehavior:
system responsiveness commesurate with my system specs, as modified by cpu load
Logged In: YES
user_id=72656
This was recently fixed in 8.4a2cvs (to be backported to
8.3.3), relating to a problem in Tcl_ConditionWait
timeouts. See bug #411603.