Re: Please document the caching and its user options

[Ihor Radchenko <yantar92@posteo.net>]

Eli Zaretskii <eliz@gnu.org> writes:

>> It is impossible. We need to store files like latex previews
>> somewhere. This somewhere is org-persist-directory now.
>
> Sorry, I don't understand: why do you need to store them as files?
> Why not keep the previews in buffer(s)?

In Org mode, in order to create latex previews, we
(1) run latex to generate the preview image
(2) that image is stored in some directory
(3) we display that image over the corresponding latex fragment in an
    overlay
(4) we retain the image on disk, so that we do not need to run latex
    many times if the users toggles displaying the previews (this is
    very important, because running latex is costly)

Can we instead store them in memory? Yes, but (1) it will make Emacs RAM
consumption grow constantly and more and more previews are generated;
(2) it will require significant changes in the Org mode codebase.

-- 
Ihor Radchenko // yantar92,
Org mode contributor,
Learn more about Org mode at <https://orgmode.org/>.
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