[Gdal-dev] RFC 11: Fast Format Identification

[Frank Warmerdam]

Ivan Lucena wrote:
> A faster identifier would be nice but IMHO I think that you can accomplish
> improvement is performance without the proposed change so that your
> application will take responsibility for that. You can thread the
> user-interface, record search-index like google desktop or/and treat
> especial case in your own driver-manager loop in your app.

Ivan,

I don't see that multi-threading is a great solution to speeding up
identification, and if it is, it should provide even more benefit
once the identify operation is available.

Keeping some sort of search index might work in some contexts, but at
a great cost in complication and there would still be the brutal hit the
first time a big directory on a network drive is accessed.

I quite agree that the identify feature is not *critical* for folks to
build applications with GDAL.  But there is an important client who wants
it to improve their user experience, and I can see it being useful for other
applications, so I'm keen to provide a solution.

Best regards,
-- 
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I set the clouds in motion - turn up   | Frank Warmerdam, warmerdam at pobox.com
light and sound - activate the windows | http://pobox.com/~warmerdam
and watch the world go round - Rush    | President OSGeo, http://osgeo.org