i get the feeling that it was just this sort of fiddling that resulted in "black bands" for rated boats. From there, with a fixed tack height and marked maximum head height, comes the introduction of the cunningham control (which also controls luff tension/draft, but without affecting boom angle).
On many working gaffers i've sailed, the gooseneck is fitted to a sliding post of "crab" immediately abaft of, and attached to, the mast. With the sail down, stropping the ends of the gaff to the ends of the boom lets you haul the whole works up a few feet, raising the rafters, so to speak, for any boom tent.
Few "modern" sliding goosenecks offer such vertical range of motion, but with a halyard and topping lift, it's nice to get the boom and stowed sail up just that little bit higher in port.
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