Updating the ports index is slow, but system load is nil

[Chuck Swiger]

Richard Bradley wrote:
[ ... ]
> It doesn't have any open network connections, so I'm not waiting for a remote 
> machine; it doesn't have any system load so I'm not waiting for processing; 
> the hard disk is (largely) idle, so I'm not waiting for i/o, but I am still 
> waiting!
> 
> How can I make it stop messing around and get on with it?

Try "make fetchindex".

Your analysis of CPU load is largely correct, but it's helpful to understand 
that top doesn't display reliable information for transient processes which 
disappear in a second.

Also, your analysis of I/O loading is wrong: building the index is quite disk 
intensive, but it involves lots of very small transactions: take a look at 
"iostat 5" and notice that the MB/s is tiny, but the tps # will be 
significant, and quite probably so will the CPU load as measured here.

-- 
-Chuck