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Compiling your own software is a really humbling experience. When it takes way more time to compile a browser than a full fledged OS or you find out that seemin

Compiling your own software is a really humbling experience. When it takes way more time to compile a browser than a full fledged OS or you find out that seemingly simple programs need to pull a mind boggling amount of dependencies you really start to question the state of the software world

dijit 5y ago
I think the main reason browsers are so extremely slow to compile is the heavy templating. But, I agree, I can compile my entire OS including user-space software and desktop environments in about the same time it takes to compile chrome. Which is scary. But then again, people want it to do everything (WebUSB, WebGL etc; etc; etc;). So it stands to reason that it's inherently complicated and difficult to compile. I wonder if the high iteration time hampers development...
- mwcampbell 5y ago
  > I wonder if the high iteration time hampers development... You might be interested in this post from someone on the Edge team at Microsoft: https://textslashplain.com/2020/02/02/my-new-chromium-build-pc/ https://textslashplain.com/2020/02/02/my-new-chromium-build-... In particular: > I returned to Microsoft as a Program Manager on the Edge team in mid-2018, unaware that replatforming atop Chromium was even a possibility until the day before I started. Just before I began, a lead sent me a 27 page PDF file containing the Edge-on-Chromium proposal. “What do you think?” he asked. I had a lot of thoughts (most of the form “OMG, yes!“) but one thing I told everyone who would listen is that we would never be able to keep up without having a cloud-compilation system akin to Goma.
zh3 5y ago
> ...that seemingly simple programs need to pull a mind boggling amount of dependencies you really start to question the state of the software world Recent jawdrop: 'apt-get install asciidoc' on a pi needs to pull 189 packages, will use 889Mb of additional disk space.
- arthur6667 5y ago
  Maybe you already know, but in case not or someone else needs this: try with --no-install-recommends, it skips a lot of bs. I don't recall exactly what it was, but I remember installing something like a tiny library and it wanted to also install mysql-server or something like that >_<
  - hansel_der 5y ago
    is good advice for any system not operated by a novice echo "APT { Install-Recommends \"false\"; }" >/etc/apt/apt.conf.d/90norecommendsthxby
    - sameerds 5y ago
      Why is that not good advice for a novice too? I do this by reflex every time I install Debian or Ubuntu, and to my experience it did not create a situation that needed "expertise in apt".
- mayli 5y ago
  due to depends on latex and friends.
tokumei 5y ago
Gentoo was fun, too bad I don’t have time for it anymore. I used to go for nice walks when Firefox was compiling. Great opportunity to go outside and take a break. USE flags in Gentoo also allows for a much more configurable system.

dijit 5y ago

I think the main reason browsers are so extremely slow to compile is the heavy templating. But, I agree, I can compile my entire OS including user-space software and desktop environments in about the same time it takes to compile chrome. Which is scary. But then again, people want it to do everything (WebUSB, WebGL etc; etc; etc;). So it stands to reason that it's inherently complicated and difficult to compile. I wonder if the high iteration time hampers development...

mwcampbell 5y ago
> I wonder if the high iteration time hampers development... You might be interested in this post from someone on the Edge team at Microsoft: https://textslashplain.com/2020/02/02/my-new-chromium-build-pc/ https://textslashplain.com/2020/02/02/my-new-chromium-build-... In particular: > I returned to Microsoft as a Program Manager on the Edge team in mid-2018, unaware that replatforming atop Chromium was even a possibility until the day before I started. Just before I began, a lead sent me a 27 page PDF file containing the Edge-on-Chromium proposal. “What do you think?” he asked. I had a lot of thoughts (most of the form “OMG, yes!“) but one thing I told everyone who would listen is that we would never be able to keep up without having a cloud-compilation system akin to Goma.

zh3 5y ago

> ...that seemingly simple programs need to pull a mind boggling amount of dependencies you really start to question the state of the software world Recent jawdrop: 'apt-get install asciidoc' on a pi needs to pull 189 packages, will use 889Mb of additional disk space.

arthur6667 5y ago
Maybe you already know, but in case not or someone else needs this: try with --no-install-recommends, it skips a lot of bs. I don't recall exactly what it was, but I remember installing something like a tiny library and it wanted to also install mysql-server or something like that >_<
- hansel_der 5y ago
  is good advice for any system not operated by a novice echo "APT { Install-Recommends \"false\"; }" >/etc/apt/apt.conf.d/90norecommendsthxby
  - sameerds 5y ago
    Why is that not good advice for a novice too? I do this by reflex every time I install Debian or Ubuntu, and to my experience it did not create a situation that needed "expertise in apt".
mayli 5y ago
due to depends on latex and friends.

tokumei 5y ago

Gentoo was fun, too bad I don’t have time for it anymore. I used to go for nice walks when Firefox was compiling. Great opportunity to go outside and take a break. USE flags in Gentoo also allows for a much more configurable system.