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Our applications use RH 5.2, TCL/TK and Tix in particular. When we're running them with a remote X server, and sometimes even locally, the performance is unacceptable. Even worse, the applications crash every now and then. The culprit is the "containing" function, which returns the TK widget the mouse cursor is over (see .../tcl8_0/tk8.0.3/generic/tkCmds.c:1313 and .../tcl8_0/tk8.0.3/unix/tkUnixWm.c:3425). Tk_CoordsToWindow calls XTranslateCoordinates repeatedly, and XTranslateCoordinates is a synchronous function (according the Xlib Reference Manual it "should be avoided in most applications"). The Tix widgets call this function all the time and so it takes up to several seconds for the application to react to a mouse click. The implementation of Tk_CoordsToWindow can even crash. It calls XTranslateCoordinates first with the root window, then with one of its children, then with one of its grandchildren and so on. However, the X function may actually return a window that doesn't belong to the calling application. If that application exits during this process, the X server reports an error (bad window argument) and the client exits without returning from XTranslateCoordinates. This happens to us all the time because the Tix widgets spend virtually all of their time in Tk_CoordsToWindow and it is very likely that one of the applications exits while another one is inside Tk_CoordsToWindow. Possible Solutions ================== A. Never call "containing". It is a bad idea to call "containing" because it is synchronous. We have identified the few locations in TK and Tix code where it is called. It should be possible to turn those calls into asynchronous event handlers, since the Enter/Leave/MotionNofify events contain the needed coordinate and window information. B. Fix "containing". We can have "containing" process and cache mouse events and record coordinates. That way we would minimize the need to call the X server by doing it only when the mouse has moved. Additionally, we must make sure not to crash when a window is destroyed. B1. Catch the error in "containing" and restart the serial query when a window disappears. B2. Record the full window hierarchy of the application (at the moment only a subset of the windows are recorded) and never query the server about windows of other applications.
We have identified a pretty clean fix for our immediate problem. You may want to communicate it to the maintainer of Tix. The fix totally eliminates calls to the offending synchronous function "containing". The Tix Balloon module was basically 1. calling "containing" for each balloon object in the application, 2. calling "containing" for each mouse motion event, 3. calling "containing" every 200 ms just for fun. The Balloon module doesn't have to call "containing" at all because the callback event already supplies the window in %W. Furthermore it's more efficient to use the <Enter> event instead of mouse motion events. And finally, even the source code admits that the 200 ms verification is not needed. Here's the diff: ====================================================================== *** /usr/lib/tix4.1/Balloon.tcl Sun Oct 11 00:15:51 1998 --- /home/athena5/sekino/Balloon.tcl Wed Apr 21 15:22:11 1999 *************** *** 116,136 **** # "RAW" event bindings: #------------------------------------------------------------------- ! bind all <B1-Motion> "+tixBalloon_XXMotion %X %Y 1" ! bind all <B2-Motion> "+tixBalloon_XXMotion %X %Y 2" ! bind all <B3-Motion> "+tixBalloon_XXMotion %X %Y 3" ! bind all <B4-Motion> "+tixBalloon_XXMotion %X %Y 4" ! bind all <B5-Motion> "+tixBalloon_XXMotion %X %Y 5" ! bind all <Any-Motion> "+tixBalloon_XXMotion %X %Y 0" ! bind all <Leave> "+tixBalloon_XXMotion %X %Y %b" ! bind all <Button> "+tixBalloon_XXButton %X %Y %b" ! bind all <ButtonRelease> "+tixBalloon_XXButtonUp %X %Y %b" ! proc tixBalloon_XXMotion {rootX rootY b} { global tixBalloon foreach w $tixBalloon(bals) { ! tixBalloon:XXMotion $w $rootX $rootY $b } } --- 116,138 ---- # "RAW" event bindings: #------------------------------------------------------------------- ! #bind all <B1-Motion> "+tixBalloon_XXMotion %X %Y 1" ! #bind all <B2-Motion> "+tixBalloon_XXMotion %X %Y 2" ! #bind all <B3-Motion> "+tixBalloon_XXMotion %X %Y 3" ! #bind all <B4-Motion> "+tixBalloon_XXMotion %X %Y 4" ! #bind all <B5-Motion> "+tixBalloon_XXMotion %X %Y 5" ! #bind all <Any-Motion> "+tixBalloon_XXMotion %X %Y 0" ! bind all <Enter> "+tixBalloon_XXMotion %W %X %Y 0" ! bind all <Leave> "+tixBalloon_XXMotion %W %X %Y %b" ! #bind all <Button> "+tixBalloon_XXButton %X %Y %b" ! #bind all <ButtonRelease> "+tixBalloon_XXButtonUp %X %Y %b" ! proc tixBalloon_XXMotion {cw rootX rootY b} { global tixBalloon + # set cw [winfo containing $rootX $rootY] foreach w $tixBalloon(bals) { ! tixBalloon:XXMotion $w $cw $rootX $rootY $b } } *************** *** 182,188 **** return 1 } ! proc tixBalloon:XXMotion {w rootX rootY b} { upvar #0 $w data if {$data(-state) == "none"} { --- 184,190 ---- return 1 } ! proc tixBalloon:XXMotion {w cw rootX rootY b} { upvar #0 $w data if {$data(-state) == "none"} { *************** *** 204,210 **** return } - set cw [winfo containing $rootX $rootY] if [tixBalloon:GrabBad $w $cw] { return } --- 206,211 ---- *************** *** 345,351 **** set data(isActive) 1 ! after 200 tixBalloon:Verify $w } --- 346,352 ---- set data(isActive) 1 ! # after 200 tixBalloon:Verify $w } ===================================================================== --Bugtrack placed for Marko by mlm
This patch has been added to tcltk-8.0.5-30.src.rpm. Thanks
This patch is still being applied (tix-perf-patch), but I believe the problem has long since been solved (AFAIK it was saolved in tk8.3.x in the TkTranslate coordinates). Could someone confirm that this is indeed still a problem in either tix-8.1.3 or tix-8.2.0b3 - otherwise I think it is an unneeded patch. For completeness I've opend a bug report in tix.sourceforge.net http://sourceforge.net/tracker/index.php?func=detail&aid=510919&group_id=5649&atid=105649 but AFAIK this bug does not need fixing
Thanks - this patch won't be in the coming tix-8.1.3 package.