Feature: Add Ox for Improved Performance

[jjmonsalveg]

Summary

This PR introduces a significant performance improvement by refactoring the EasySax.parser implementation to use ox as the underlying parser instead of Nokogiri.

The new ox_parser method is fully backward compatible with the current parser implementation, ensuring no breaking changes for existing users.

Note

While working on the EasyBroker challenge, I realized that achieving good performance and efficient memory usage requires a deeper analysis of the current implementation.

Key Changes

1. Added ox_parser as an alternative parser method.
2. Improved performance benchmarks:
   • Time: ox_parser is ~52% faster than EasySax.parser using Nokogiri.
   • Memory: ox_parser reduces allocated memory by ~35% and cuts object allocations by ~52%.
3. Updated documentation to highlight the new ox_parser method and performance results.

Benchmark Results

Environment:

• OS: macOS Sequoia 15.1.1 arm64
• Hardware: MacBook Pro (14-inch, 2021), Apple M1 Pro, 32GB Memory
• Ruby: 3.3.6 (2024-11-05 revision 75015d4c1f)

Results:

Time Benchmark:
                 user     system      total        real
Nokogiri:    0.000114   0.000015   0.000129 (  0.000128)
Ox:          0.000058   0.000002   0.000060 (  0.000062)

Memory Benchmark:
Nokogiri Parser:
Total allocated memory: 22.90625 KB
Total retained memory:  0.0 KB
Total objects allocated: 430
Total objects retained:  0

Ox Parser:
Total allocated memory: 14.984375 KB
Total retained memory:  0.078125 KB
Total objects allocated: 205
Total objects retained:  2

Changelog

New Features

• Add new OxParser:
  • Introduced ox_parser for faster and more memory-efficient XML parsing, while maintaining backward compatibility with EasySax.parser.

Enhancements

• Benchmark Tests:
  • Added memory and time benchmarks to compare performance between Nokogiri and Ox parsers.
• Refactor Tests:
  • Updated test cases to support ox_parser.

Documentation

• Update README:
  • Documented the ox_parser method and its performance benefits.
  • Reorganized README for better readability (80-character wrapping).

Code Quality

• Run RuboCop:
  • Applied RuboCop to ensure code style and consistency.

Dependency Updates

• Add Ox:
  • Added Ox as a dependency in the Gemfile for improved performance.
• Ignore RVM Config:
  • Updated .gitignore to exclude .ruby-gemset and .ruby-version files.