skip processing html and page

Question

From a module, I want to output "hello world" simply as a string as efficiently as possible when i call /mymodule/helloworld.

ofcourse, using hook_preprocess_html and hook_preprocess_page i can assign nearly empty templates. the html template should contain <?php print $page; ?> and the page template <?php print render($page['content']); ?>, and the content could be the string 'hello world'.

however, drupal will still go through all the processes of generating $css in html or $page['sidebar_first'] in the page. Even if I override template_process_html it seems $variables['page']['page_top'] has already been populated.

How can I skip all the content processing and go straight for the output ?

[EDIT] had some usefull comments here, but still not what I want. I forgot to mention, I do want to use a template to print 'hello world'. So as I can override it in a theme, for example.

1. Yes, I can change the delivery callback (either in hook_menu or in hook_page_delivery_callback_alter), but what the callback method receives is a render array. I do want to use a node template to render the content as html. I'd have to write my own delivery callback, I guess

2. Yes, I can print out the html and call drupal_exit(), but then I wouldnt have the luxury of using a node template either

So, still looking.

*-pike

Answer 1

based on comments above and my own edits, i came up with this

function my_page_callback() {
    $output =  array(
        'template' => array(
            'data'      => array('dummy'=>true),
            '#theme'    => 'my_theme'
        )
    );
    print drupal_render($output);
    drupal_exit();
}

that goes straight for the beef: print the output. it does however use the templating system to create that output. it does not, i think, do all the preprocessing that would otherwise happen.