mainly to avoid an allocation and a copy of a string that can be
modified in place (ever since EvalState holds on to the buffer, not the
generated parser itself).
# before
Benchmark 1: nix search --offline nixpkgs hello
Time (mean ± σ): 571.7 ms ± 2.4 ms [User: 563.3 ms, System: 8.0 ms]
Range (min … max): 566.7 ms … 579.7 ms 50 runs
Benchmark 2: nix eval -f ../nixpkgs/pkgs/development/haskell-modules/hackage-packages.nix
Time (mean ± σ): 376.6 ms ± 1.0 ms [User: 345.8 ms, System: 30.5 ms]
Range (min … max): 374.5 ms … 379.1 ms 50 runs
Benchmark 3: nix eval --raw --impure --expr 'with import <nixpkgs/nixos> {}; system'
Time (mean ± σ): 2.922 s ± 0.006 s [User: 2.707 s, System: 0.215 s]
Range (min … max): 2.906 s … 2.934 s 50 runs
# after
Benchmark 1: nix search --offline nixpkgs hello
Time (mean ± σ): 570.4 ms ± 2.8 ms [User: 561.3 ms, System: 8.6 ms]
Range (min … max): 564.6 ms … 578.1 ms 50 runs
Benchmark 2: nix eval -f ../nixpkgs/pkgs/development/haskell-modules/hackage-packages.nix
Time (mean ± σ): 375.4 ms ± 1.3 ms [User: 343.2 ms, System: 31.7 ms]
Range (min … max): 373.4 ms … 378.2 ms 50 runs
Benchmark 3: nix eval --raw --impure --expr 'with import <nixpkgs/nixos> {}; system'
Time (mean ± σ): 2.925 s ± 0.006 s [User: 2.704 s, System: 0.219 s]
Range (min … max): 2.910 s … 2.942 s 50 runs
pennae
72f42093e7