find & the use of stat

[Brent Rogers]

As mentioned in the README file concerning stat:

To gain speed, GNU find avoids statting files whenever possible.
It does this by:
1. Checking the number of links to directories and not statting files 
that it knows aren't directories until it encounters a test or action 
that needs the stat info.
2.  Rearranging the command line, where possible, so that it can do 
tests that don't require a stat before tests that do, in hopes that the 
latter will be skipped because of an OR or AND.  (But it only does
this where it will leave the output unchanged.)

Where can I get a list of the options to "find" that do use "stat"?

I am running find on large directory trees containing a small number of 
files per directory and wish to return results to the user as fast as 
possible.  I want to be able to determine (for what I am doing) what the 
fastest command line options order would be.

I can't use locate since the information returned needs to be "real 
time" based on current directory tree contents.

I use options like -type f, -ls, etc and | to xargs -i {}

Thanks,

Brent Rogers