Bug 16891 – [GTK] Make use of a precompiled and/or prefix header to speed up the build

• Component: WebKitGTK
• Status: RESOLVED LATER

[Alp Toker]

The autotools build system is slower than the qmake system it replaces.

I've looked into avoiding libtools, and using precompiled headers so far but no timings yet.

Apparently the current system is slow even with ccache which suggests time is being spend doing things other than compiling.

[Alp Toker]

The README in GIMP and the autotools docs suggest that --disable-shared will half build time by invoking libtool less. I couldn't get this to work without modifying the Makefile.ams heavily though. Anyone else try this?

Getting a fast static build is good enough to solve the main objections with autotools right now.

[Luca Bruno]

At all, lately the build is not slow anymore, it's as fast as qmake for me.

[Mike Hommey]

http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/2008/04/msg00286.html

This could help make things much faster.

[Jan Alonzo]

Since dolt is already part of the build, what sort of target are we aiming at for this bug to be closed?

[Alp Toker]

Created attachment 23516 [details]
Use gcc precompiled headers (proof-of-concept)

After applying patch, copy WebKit/qt/WebKit_pch.h to WebCore/platform/WebKit_pch.h

You might need to do 'make WebCore/platform/WebKit_pch.h.gch' before attempting a build. Dependency tracking may not be correct, didn't verify.

If someone could try timing a build to see if this helps, that'd be great.

The Makefile change might also be a good example for how we can reduce some of the lists of sources in the build system using GNU make syntax (though automake limits exactly how much we can automate things).

[Martin Robinson]

This bug is somewhat nebulous right now, so I think we should have it simply focus on adding a pre-compiled prefix header to the build.

[Martin Robinson]

We should open a new bug when someone is ready to do this with CMake.