Re: [ANN] faster org-table-to-lisp

[Nicolas Goaziou]

Hello,

tbanelwebmin <address@hidden> writes:

> Here is an alternative, faster version of org-table-to-lisp. It can be
> more than 100 times faster.

Great! Thank you!

> #+BEGIN_SRC elisp
> (defun org-table-to-lisp-faster (&optional org-table-at-p-done)
>   "Convert the table at point to a Lisp structure.
> The structure will be a list.  Each item is either the symbol `hline'
> for a horizontal separator line, or a list of field values as strings.
> The table is taken from the buffer at point.
> When the optional ORG-TABLE-AT-P-DONE parameter is not nil, it is
> assumed that (org-at-table-p) was already called."

Since you're changing the signature, I suggest to provide the table
element instead of ORG-AT-TABLE-P. AFAICT, `org-babel-read-element',
through `org-babel-read-table', would greatly benefit from this.

Or, to be backward compatible, I suggest

  &optional TEXT TABLE

>   (or org-table-at-p-done (org-at-table-p) (user-error "No table at point"))
>   (save-excursion
>     (goto-char (org-table-begin))
>     (let ((end (org-table-end))
>           (row)
>           (table))

Nitpick:

    (row nil)
    (table nil)

>       (while (< (point) end)
>         (setq row nil)
>         (search-forward "|" end)
>         (if (looking-at "-")
>             (progn
>               (search-forward "\n" end)

(forward-line)

>               (push 'hline table))
>           (while (not (search-forward-regexp "\\=\n" end t))

(unless (eolp)
  ...)

>             (unless (search-forward-regexp "\\=\\s-*\\([^|]*\\)" end t)
>               (user-error "Malformed table at char %s" (point)))

A row may not be properly ended. It doesn't warrant an error. Could you
make it more tolerant?

Also `search-forward-regexp' -> `re-search-forward', i.e., use the
original.

>             (let ((b (match-beginning 1))
>           (e (match-end       1)))

Nitpick: spurious spaces.

>               (and (search-backward-regexp "[^ \t]" b t)
>                (forward-char 1))

  (skip-chars-backward " \t")

> It is faster because it operates directly on the buffer with
> (search-forward-regexp). Whereas the standard function splits a string
> extracted from the buffer.

You are right. I guess the initial implementation didn't have these
monster tables in mind.

> This function is a drop-in replacement for the standard one. It can
> benefit to Babel and Gnuplot.
>
> Would it make sense to upgrade Org Mode code base?

Certainly. Could you add an entry in ORG-NEWS, in "Miscellaneous"?

Regards,

-- 
Nicolas Goaziou