Speed of the MapServer-Output

[Ed McNierney]

Reinhard -

Please keep in mind that the DEBUG ON statement in your map file will
enable the timing of layer drawing and other activities.  It cannot,
however, record the time it takes to load and parse the map file itself,
as it does not become active until after the map file is read!  Quite a
while ago, I did some performance investigations - my MapServer
performance was just fine, but nothing's ever "good enough" for me.  I
thought I had done a very good job of optimizing my data organization,
layout, and indexing, and I had.  What I did not realize until I looked
closely was that I had optimized the data so well that 75% of my
map-rendering time was spent in loading the map file!

It is a good idea to strive for minimalist map files wherever possible.
Don't leave statements in there that you don't need.  In particular,
extraneous layers, unused fonts and symbols, and unnecessary PROJECTION
objects can be relatively expensive.

	- Ed

Ed McNierney
President and Chief Mapmaker
TopoZone.com / Maps a la carte, Inc.
73 Princeton Street, Suite 305
North Chelmsford, MA  01863
Phone: +1 (978) 251-4242
Fax: +1 (978) 251-1396
ed at topozone.com

-----Original Message-----
From: UMN MapServer Users List [mailto:MAPSERVER-USERS at LISTS.UMN.EDU] On
Behalf Of Daniel Morissette
Sent: Monday, December 11, 2006 10:12 AM
To: MAPSERVER-USERS at LISTS.UMN.EDU
Subject: Re: [UMN_MAPSERVER-USERS] Speed of the MapServer-Output

Reinhard Keltermann wrote:
> 
> I would like to know if it`s possible to see somehow how fast the 
> mapserver is producing a map.
> For example an entry in a logfile or so that says: 0,034 seconds.
> 
> Is there somewhere an entry in the logfile of the apache or the
MapServer?
> 
> By now I can just get the time by looking on my watch, and that`s not
very precise.....
> 

If your MapServer is built with the DEBUG=MSDEBUG option (--with-debug
configure option) then you can set "DEBUG ON" at the top-level in your
mapfile and you'll get some timing details in Apache's error_log. The
log output will include the time required to render each layer and the
label cache. That can then be used to figure which layer(s) take most of
the time and decide which ones to work on in tuning your map.

Daniel
--
Daniel Morissette
http://www.mapgears.com/