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Mozilla's Project Electrolysis aims to allow tabs and user interfaces to run in separate processes. It has been activated by default in recent nightly builds:
In current versions of desktop Firefox, the entire browser runs in a single operating system process. In particular, the JavaScript that runs the browser UI (also known as "chrome code") runs in the same process as the code in web pages (also known as "content" or "web content"). Future versions of Firefox will run the browser UI in a separate process from web content. In the first iteration of this architecture all browser tabs will run in the same process, and the browser UI will run in a different process. In future iterations, we expect to have more than one content process.
Developer Will Bamberg says the change will bring stability and security improvements. "There are three main reasons for making Firefox run content in a separate process: performance, security, and stability, Bamberg says. "The goal is to reduce 'jank' -- those times when the browser seems to briefly freeze when loading a big page, typing in a form, or scrolling. "In multiprocess Firefox, content processes will be sandboxed. A well-behaved content process won't access the filesystem directly; it will have to ask the main process to perform the request." Bamberg says "well-behaved" content processes needs to access much of the network and file systems. This would be much more restricted under the changes.
Former CEO of Mozilla Brendan Eich has announced a project called WebAssembly that could replace asm.js:
It's by now a cliché that JS has become the assembly language of the Web. Rather, JS is one syntax for a portable and safe machine language, let's say. Today I'm pleased to announce that cross-browser work has begun on WebAssembly, a new intermediate representation for safe code on the Web.
What: WebAssembly, "wasm" for short, .wasm filename suffix, a new binary syntax for low-level safe code, initially co-expressive with asm.js, but in the long run able to diverge from JS's semantics, in order to best serve as common object-level format for multiple source-level programming languages.
Who: A W3C Community Group, the WebAssembly CG, open to all. As you can see from the github logs, WebAssembly has so far been a joint effort among Google, Microsoft, Mozilla, and a few other folks. I'm sorry the work was done via a private github account at first, but that was a temporary measure to help the several big companies reach consensus and buy into the long-term cooperative game that must be played to pull this off.
Original Submission
(Score: 2) by frojack on Saturday June 20 2015, @04:41AM
Yeah, I've been telling myself for a long time that it's time for a major upgrade. I'm not willing to pay the price to replace the bad memory, when little more than double that money will buy a whole new box!
What kind of memory is that expensive? I recently surfed over to Crucial.Com and upgraded the memory in my main workstation, and was amazed at how cheap the stuff had gotten.
Be that as it may, I'm amazed at how long these guys have been getting along with a single thread. What in the world were they waiting for?
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Saturday June 20 2015, @01:47PM
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820614408&cm_re=3200_DDR_SDRAM_ecc_registered-_-20-614-408-_-Product [newegg.com]
DDR2 memory is considerably cheaper, but the old DDR memory is quite expensive in gig or multigig sizes. With the original firmware, I couldn't use anything larger than 1 gig sticks. When I upgraded the firmware, it could use 2 gig sticks, and at that time, I was willing to spend the money for 8 gig of memory. Today - that same memory is more expensive than when I bought my original memory, and it just isn't worth it. If I'm willing to go with an FX chip instead of an Opteron, I can order mainboard, CPU, and memory bundle just about double the price of 2 gig of memory on that page.
I COULD hit Ebay for working server pulls, but sometimes that doesn't work out so well either. Years ago, I bought an Opteron for overclocking - and when I got it, it just would not overclock. Good, solid CPU, at it's rated speeds, but it went freaking bonkers when you tweaked voltage, speed, or anything at all.
Yes, an upgrade is in the near future, I just have to decide whether I'm sticking with an Opteron, or going with one of the FX chips.
(Score: 1) by Francis on Saturday June 20 2015, @01:49PM
It's a more complicated implementation. Chrome processes are completely separate and so it wastes a lot of memory for things like toolbars. The new builds of Firefox should be better thought out.
Or it got in the way of them chasing away the users by making it into a Chrome clone.
(Score: 2) by frojack on Saturday June 20 2015, @09:53PM
Why would toolbars waste a lot of memory?
Multiple windows and processes can use the same code segments, with different data segments. Data for a tool bar is minuscule. Basically a bunch of state switches etc. The visual representation of stuff that makes up a screen is almost totally driven from static code segments with tiny amounts of data behind them.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 1) by Francis on Tuesday June 23 2015, @06:53AM
They don't, but they have to be connected to something, and in this case it's basically everything. Mozilla has spent a lot of time because the toolbar doesn't have to be completely duplicated and connected to everything. That's why RAM is generally better utilized on Fx than Chrome.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday June 20 2015, @01:50PM
What kind of memory is that expensive?
I'm guessing older ECC memory. The price arc for RAM is:
- high when it's new/faster.
- drops as it becomes common in new computers.
- low when it's not the latest tech and the resellers have a lot of it.
- lower when it's at least 2 generations behind and resellers have enough stock.
- increases when it's old enough that it's not readily available.
- higher when it's sold out of most places.
- higher than ever when only a few resellers have it.
tl;dr - supply and demand applies to RAM.
(Score: 1) by Pino P on Saturday June 20 2015, @03:08PM
What kind of memory is that expensive?
The memory that comes with a new motherboard because you've already maxed yours. There are still plenty of compact laptops that won't go higher than 2 GB, including a lot of netbooks and convertible x86 tablets.