[wp-trac] [WordPress Trac] #6796: Convert Walker classes to pass $output as reference

[WordPress Trac]

#6796: Convert Walker classes to pass $output as reference
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 Reporter:  mdawaffe     |       Owner:  anonymous
     Type:  enhancement  |      Status:  new      
 Priority:  normal       |   Milestone:  2.6      
Component:  General      |     Version:  2.5      
 Severity:  normal       |    Keywords:           
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 The Walker classes pass the $output variable back and forth between their
 methods many many times, each time making the variable bigger and bigger.
 For walkable data with many items, this means the classes are copying very
 large variables many many times.

 Converting the Walkers to pass $output by reference gives us a modest
 speed increase.

 On a site with ~3200 categories (yes, that's a lot), the attached patch
 gave me ~35% decrease in the time it took Walker::walk() to output the
 $output created by Walker_Category_Checklist.

 Note that any speed boost will only be significant in very large lists.
 Only then is $output copied many times and only then is $output very
 large.

 Attached passes $output by reference in Walker and all core inheriting
 classes.  Depending on how they are written, most Walker classes from
 plugins will work fine with these core modifications (but will not get the
 speed boost).

 2.5.1?

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Ticket URL: <http://trac.wordpress.org/ticket/6796>
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