How does PSGI/Plack affect performance or memory usage?

PSGI (Perl Web Server Gateway Interface) and Plack are powerful tools for building web applications in Perl. They provide a standardized way to handle HTTP requests and responses, allowing for easier development and deployment of web apps. However, their impact on performance and memory usage can vary depending on how they are utilized.

Performance-wise, PSGI/Plack can introduce some overhead because they act as an interface between the web server and the application. This layer adds complexity that might slow down request handling. However, the modularity and flexibility they provide often outweigh this cost, especially in larger applications where maintainability and scalability are more critical.

Memory usage can also be affected. PSGI-based applications can consume more memory compared to classic Perl web applications because they load additional modules and frameworks. Using Plack middleware can optimize this by providing shared utilities that can be reused across requests, thus improving memory efficiency.

Example usage of PSGI/Plack:

use Plack::Builder; my $app = sub { my $env = shift; return [200, [ 'Content-Type' => 'text/plain' ], [ 'Hello, PSGI!' ]]; }; builder { enable "Plack::Middleware::Static", path => qr{.+\.static$}; $app; };

PSGI Plack Perl web applications performance memory usage middleware