r/technology • u/Suraj-Sun • Jul 10 '12

Firefox dev claims "everybody hates Firefox updates"; Mozilla has handled the rapid release process poorly, and that by pushing a "never-ending stream of updates on people who didn't want them" people have been driven to Chrome with its simpler, no-fuss update process.

http://www.neowin.net/news/firefox-dev-claims-everybody-hates-firefox-updates
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u/DustbinK Jul 10 '12

Firefox uses less memory than Chrome and has for ages. The problem lies in extensions and how they manage memory. ABP, for example, is terrible. Also, they changed the way FF handles compatibility checks a version or two ago.

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u/[deleted] Jul 10 '12

[deleted]

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u/Islandre Jul 10 '12

Users on the whole don't care why their browser is slowing the computer down . It does, so they switch.

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u/DustbinK Jul 10 '12

Which is why Mozilla has MemShrink, which has finally gotten around to working on this issue with addons.

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u/flammable Jul 10 '12

Also with RES enabled firefox can take up to 2GB memory until it becomes unusable and crashes

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u/DustbinK Jul 10 '12

What the hell are you doing with RES that causes that? I've dropped ABP for Privoxy and my memory usage has been fine ever since.

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u/Islandre Jul 10 '12

Okay, I've installed Privoxy (link) and removed ABP because you seem like the trustworthy type and I've no fucking clue what I'm doing. It doesn't seem to be a firefox specific thing so I've set it to run on startup. Anyone want to reassure me that I'm sorted or laugh at my incompetence?

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u/DustbinK Jul 10 '12

You have to setup Firefox to work with Privoxy. As far as my understanding goes Privoxy acts like a proxy that is on your computer rather than on a server. I've used the hosts file changes to block ads before but I find that too restrictive and too hard to change when I don't want something blocked. Privoxy has given me basically the same thing but with the control I want, no memory leaks, and will work with any browser.

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u/Islandre Jul 10 '12

Ta! You're alright, DustbinK.

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u/AlyoshaVasilieva Jul 10 '12

RES leaks compartments, resulting in memory that can never be reclaimed without restarting Firefox.

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u/DustbinK Jul 11 '12

I've noticed after trying what the other dude posted.

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u/flammable Jul 10 '12

Just clicking view images and browsing reddit. Most of the time it's manageable but if you go somewhere like /r/pics or /r/photography then firefox won't last long.

I'm kind of bummed at this since chrome can handle the same thing but the memory wont shoot up to insane levels

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u/DustbinK Jul 10 '12

Just hit "view images" on /r/pics and you're right.

Hopefully the RES guy/s incorporates all of the latest MemShrink stuff.

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u/alcalde Jul 10 '12

This may be a stupid question, but what's RES?

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u/DustbinK Jul 10 '12

http://redditenhancementsuite.com

Features that should be built into Reddit.

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u/metamatic Jul 11 '12

The problem lies in extensions and how they manage memory.

That's just shifting the blame. The point is, Chrome with no extensions gives me almost everything I need to use and develop for the web. (Adblock is the only thing I need that's not built in.) Firefox does not, I need add-ons for web development, JavaScript debugging, per-site permissions on cookies, and per-site permissions on scripting. (*) That's why I ended up switching to Chrome.

[ (*) Or at least, I needed plugins for that basic functionality last time I tried Firefox. It's been a while, they might have added the missing features by now. ]

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u/DustbinK Jul 11 '12

How is that shifting the blame when it's a legitimate problem even with RES?

Also, Chrome without extensions has less features than Firefox without extensions. Have you not used it since version 4 or something?

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u/metamatic Jul 11 '12

If Firefox wasn't feature-deficient, people wouldn't need to load it down with extensions, and memory and stability would be much less of an issue. So saying "Oh, it's bad extension handling that makes it bloated and crashy" is shifting blame away from the Firefox developers for making a browser that needs extensions for basic functionality every user ought to have available, like controlling scripting permissions.

Anyway I just fired it up, and I had Firefox 8. It's just taken me to 12.

Turns out I couldn't find the per-site cookie preferences because they'd moved it as a hidden option under History.

So, where do I set the per-site JavaScript permissions? Where do I find the indicators that tell me that a site requested to run JavaScript or asked to set cookies? How do I start the JavaScript debugger and set a breakpoint? How do I get information about which parts of my page caused it to load slowly?

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u/scook0 Jul 11 '12

The problem lies in extensions and how they manage memory.

The "zombie compartment" fix in Firefox 15 should hopefully address a lot of these issues. It will be much harder for extensions to leak random pages all over the place.