Re: Multiple profiles with Guix Home

[Maxime Devos]

Liliana Marie Prikler schreef op do 05-05-2022 om 19:27 [+0200]:
> > I'm not sure what you mean here, what cause and what effect are you
> > referring to here?  And I'm not sure what the connection between
> > ‘for
> > small n, O(n) = O(1)’ and the previous sentences is (I guess
> > something about profile building times and small profiles -> fast
> > building, but I don't see any connection to cause and effect ...)?
> You get the fast builds because you have small inputs to union-build.
> You can't get small inputs to union-build without splitting your
> profile and if everything goes into one profile, you need union-build
> in the end.

I assume you mean ‘cause = tinier profiles’ and ‘effect = faster build
times’ here?

That's one method for faster builds, but you'll get even faster builds
by also making union-build O(n lg n) instead of O(n²), and the latter
optimisation will help everyone and not only Guix Home users.

And the O(n)=O(1) doesn't seem quite right here to me -- individual
profiles will be smaller and hence faster, but there will also be
_more_ profiles.  Maybe if you sum over the profiles, you'll get to
O(n) instead of O(n²) (where n = number of store items in the
profiles), but this doesn't take in account the _user_'s time cost of
having to figure out some kind of thematic split that doesn't break
search paths.  Or worse, if the user doesn't know what search paths are
and when they can break.

Also, I still don't see the relation to

> > I am not debating any legitimacy (<home-profile> is not some
> > government), I am discussing the reasons, and whether some of the
> > features (e.g. faster profile building) can be implemented more
> > generally (not Guix Home-exclusive), without manual configuration.
> > [...]

-- I mention the phrase ‘faster profile building’ here, but I don't
think I'm implying here that faster build times cause tinier profiles,
or that tinier profiles don't help or such?  Is there some specific
phrase in that paragraph you disagree with?  Is there some point you
consider to be already addressed or not yet addressed or some point you
consider to not have to be addressed?  I don't know what we are
disagreeing about here?

Greetings,
Maxime.

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