Prev: Calling kernel.dll from
Next: estimation
From: Leo Alekseyev on 24 Mar 2010 05:34
For a few months now I have been using Mathematica 7.0.1 under Ubuntu
9.10, and I'm finding the front end to be very sluggish. Scrolling is
slow, and when I am editing a part of a large code block, it sometimes
takes a few seconds for the characters displayed to catch up with my
typing. Sometimes I am tempted to switch to my old Windows laptop for
long Mathematica sessions, or to simply use Emacs to edit files and
load them into the math kernel's CLI. (This is not to mention
frequent crashes when copying/pasting large cell groups, or the fact
that Mathematica seems to always have a couple of Java processes
running even when it's idle that take up about 15% of CPU each).

I am wondering if other Linux Mathematica users are observing
similarly sluggish behavior of the front-end. Is it common? Is it a
misconfiguration of some sort on my end?.. I'd appreciate any
insight!

--Leo

From: Herman Kuun on 25 Mar 2010 05:24
Leo I can understand your frustration. Been there myself.

1) If not already use the Xfce GUI instead of KDE or GNOME. You should get a
noticable improvement because Xfce is a lightweight desktop environment.
Configure it and cut out the frills like animation effects and such.

2) Mathematica performs better with Umbuntu 8.xx than 9.xx. In general
Mathematica does not do well in the Debian-Linux environment that Ubuntu is
based on. That goes for both GUI and kernel performances. Switch to CentOS
or RedHat You will experience the difference.

3) If (2) is not an option and you have a Mathematica service subscription,
there are java modules available that improves the Mathematica Benchmark
test by 18-23 percent on Ubuntu 9.xx.

After a few weeks of the above gyrations and many Mathematica password
requests for different hard-drives and operating system combinations I
decided to use Gentoo-linux and from that day never look back. Here are the
reasons why:

- You start with a minimal basic operating system.
- Only add applications and utilities you need thus cutting down on CPU and
operating system overhead.
- For ultimate performance and using the gcc compiler everything is targeted
and compiled specifically for the computer hardware. Instead of the general
one glove fits all linux-x86_64 bit kernel, it is now compiled to extract
every ounce from an AMD dual core K8-architechture cpu. Which also holds for
all applications and utilities.
- Use J/Link to point to the locally compiled java Sun-JDK-1.6. The
Mathematica Java hierarchy has the Java module downloads installed as well.

Benefits:
- No GUI Notebook or Palette lags. Compares favorably with Mathematica-7
installed on Windows XP.
- Test result for the Mathematica Benchmark shows a 39-48 percent gain
compared to the Ubuntu-9 configuration test results.

Wish you success.

Best
Herman.


On Wed, Mar 24, 2010 at 11:42 AM, Leo Alekseyev <dnquark(a)gmail.com> wrote:

> For a few months now I have been using Mathematica 7.0.1 under Ubuntu
> 9.10, and I'm finding the front end to be very sluggish. Scrolling is
> slow, and when I am editing a part of a large code block, it sometimes
> takes a few seconds for the characters displayed to catch up with my
> typing. Sometimes I am tempted to switch to my old Windows laptop for
> long Mathematica sessions, or to simply use Emacs to edit files and
> load them into the math kernel's CLI. (This is not to mention
> frequent crashes when copying/pasting large cell groups, or the fact
> that Mathematica seems to always have a couple of Java processes
> running even when it's idle that take up about 15% of CPU each).
>
> I am wondering if other Linux Mathematica users are observing
> similarly sluggish behavior of the front-end. Is it common? Is it a
> misconfiguration of some sort on my end?.. I'd appreciate any
> insight!
>
> --Leo
>
>

From: Jonas Stein on 8 Apr 2010 08:39
> For a few months now I have been using Mathematica 7.0.1 under Ubuntu
> 9.10, and I'm finding the front end to be very sluggish. Scrolling is
> slow, and when I am editing a part of a large code block, it sometimes

I have similar problems on debian linux. I suppose, mathematica uses the
wrong JAVA enginge by default.

I had similar experience with JOSM when it was started with something
different then SUN JAVA 6

I have no idea, how to help mathematica to find the 'correct' engine.

Kind regards,

--
Jonas Stein <news(a)jonasstein.de>

 | 
Pages: 1
Prev: Calling kernel.dll from
Next: estimation