2012-04-17



Finally solved the problem with lighttpd, php-cgi and  very  slow
serving of websites, from which I've suffered for some weeks now.
I can tell you: Reading error logs really is  helpful.  ;-)  They
pointed  me to the right script.  It contained this sorting func-
tion:

     function sortFiles($files, $path) {
         for ($i = 0; $i < sizeof($files); $i++){
             //for ($j = sizeof($files) - 1; $j >= $i + 1; $j--){
             for ($j = $i + 1; $j < sizeof($files); $j++){
                 //if (fileatime($path."/".$files[$i]) <
                 //            fileatime($path."/".$files[$j])) {
                 if ($files[$j] > $files[$i]) {
                     $h = $files[$j];
                     $files[$j] = $files[$i];
                     $files[$i] = $h;
                 }
             }
         }
         return $files;
     }

I don't want to discuss the code itself and I  don't  care  where
the  problem  lies. The point is that there should no need at all
to program a sorting function yourself, unless the rare case when
the standard library of your language does not provide one.

I replaced the calls to function with calls to rsort(), and  thus
solved the problem.


Just as a side note (as PHP bashing is popular these  days,  par-
ticularly thanks to eevee's ``big shot'' [0]):  Why does PHP need
a dozen sorting functions, and half of them being only `r' (= re-
verse) variants? That's redicular. The only one you  do  need  is
usort(),  anything  else  is  redundancy. Have a look at Perl and
you'll see.



Someone pointed me to Rob Pike's blog.  [1] I feel sad, that  he,
who  I  value much, uses such an inelegant form of presenting his
elegant thoughts.  Read him discussing about byte order.  [2]



And finally, there are those pool  computers  at  my  university,
which now have some brand new Ubuntu version. They can't remember
my window manager choice at the login manager. The problem  seems
to  lie  in the LDAP, NFS, whatever setup they have. I don't care
... but I care that I need to select my window manager of  choice
each time again. How annoying!

[0]  http://me.veekun.com/blog/2012/04/09/php-a-fractal-of-bad-
design/
[1]  http://commandcenter.blogspot.de/
[2]  http://commandcenter.blogspot.de/2012/04/byte-order-
fallacy.html


http://marmaro.de/lue/        markus schnalke <meillo@marmaro.de>