December 11, 2003 — 10:41

Using Large Data in Central

Jesse Warden encounters preformance issuses while populating a DataGrid using LCDataProvider and some insanely large XML.

I face similar issues in my World Time application. The size of the XML data I use isn't quite insane, but large enough to cause a noticable pause when parsing. Luckily the data I need isn't regularly updated, so here's what I do:

  1. Install Application
  2. Locally cache XML data as part of the install process
  3. Agent parses the cached XML (a WDDX file)
  4. Agent attempts to save the parsed data to a Shared Object
  5. Agent populates a LCDataProvider server in the with the parsed data
  6. Use DataGrids in my app with LCDataProvider clients

On subsequent launches I look for the presence of the pre-parsed data in the Shared Object and use that, otherwise parse the WDDX data again and use that instead. It works okay, but I've got a feeling there are better ways of distributing local data for Central.

Comments

  1. can't you load in chunks at a time? large chunks of course,

    Comment by ericd on December 11, 2003 12:34 PM

  2. I think the key for me was #5. Regardless of size, just throwing a large, 50 row array of objects into the dataprovider was light speed faster than populating the LCDataProvider one at a time. I used to use this method when parsing and displaying large pieces of data in internal apps, but I think because of the overhead of actually pushing and managing that data between 2 movies, taking the quick, one time hit is better than distributing it out in this case.

    Comment by JesterXL on December 11, 2003 01:10 PM

  3. Re: comment #1:

    Eric, yeah loading in chunks could be the way to go (coupled with a progress meter in the app). Just found out about Lazy deserialization in the WebServiceConnector which deserialises on an as-needed basis, I think I've got a bit more reading to do!

    Comment by Tim on December 11, 2003 02:10 PM

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