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Linux Pipeline Newsletter www.LinuxPipeline.com WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 22, 2006 In This Issue: - Study: Linux Beats Windows In Cost, Complexity - Oracle Faces Tough Sell To Open-Source DB Community - Firefox Users Spar Over Memory-Management Issues - More News... - Firefox Essentials: Getting To Know Your Profile - Former FCC Chairman Powell: Net Neutrality 'Doing Great' - Firefox 2.0: This Time, It's All About The Interface - More Picks... This issue sponsored by Microsoft Visit the Enterprise Server Systems Resource Center, a microsite for your server software needs. Onsite you'll find frequently updated custom-written columns, blogs and resources on the latest in server technology, database server technology, and TCO issues. "http://enterpriseserver.techweb.com/servers" ----------------------------------------- Editor's Note: Firefox Stays Hungry A short work week following a holiday weekend usually means one thing: Slim pickings for the week's newsletter. This week, however, is different: such an embarrassment of riches that had a hard time deciding which stories should get their own headlines. In fact, even this week's advertisement is more interesting than usual (more on that in a moment). My personal favorite among the week's headlines, however, shouldn't be too hard to guess if you're a regular reader: The long-standing, and increasingly peculiar, debate over memory-management issues in Firefox. Back in December, I wrote in this space that Mozilla was finally addressing its browser's growing notoriety as a RAM pig -- and days later, I took it all back after contributing my own experiences with Firefox 1.5 to Scot Finnie's story on this and other glitches in the release. Given this context, you can understand why I found Ben Goodger's comments on the subject to be of great interest. Unfortunately, his explanation -- mass confusion over new page-caching functionality in Firefox 1.5 -- turns out to be useful only if: first, you forget that user gripes about memory usage predate Firefox 1.5 by a year or more; second, you quit picking nits over things like cause and effect; and third, assume that most of the Firefox users who have complained don't know what they're talking about. I might be able to spot Ben two out of three here -- his pick -- but this is stretching things a bit too far. Of course, some folks probably are confusing the new page-caching features in Firefox 1.5 with excessive memory usage. According to the information posted on Goodger's Firefox blog, for example, a PC with 1 GB of installed RAM will keep up to eight additional pages cached, speeding up page-load times considerably in many cases. Again, I read this with great interest: My primary Windows XP system sports 1 GB of RAM. Just a few hours earlier, while starting my work day, I noticed that my system was running very slowly. It had been running for nearly 48 hours since its last restart, and Firefox itself (showing more than four hours of CPU time) had probably been open most of that time, as well. A quick look at Windows Task Manager showed that Firefox, which was using a single tab at the time, was currently holding around 170MB of physical memory -- although it had, at some point, peaked at nearly 650MB of physical RAM. (That's not a typo.) Firefox was also getting jiggy with the virtual memory -- nearly 1.5GB of virtual memory, to be exact. (That's not a typo, either). Maybe Ben Goodger left a few zeros off, and he meant to say that Firefox now caches up to 8,000 pages at a time instead of eight. Otherwise, forgive me for thinking there's a real problem here -- and even if there are extensions, plugins, or other third-party factors involved here, I think Mozilla is making a serious mistake playing this off as anything less than a must-fix issue. In case you're wondering, by the way, the RAM-usage runner-up at the time was the system's SageTV service, which checked in at a little under 16MB. Mad Apple Next, I wanted to sneak in a quick update on our story covering Apple's efforts to -- well, I'm not sure what the company expects to accomplish going after the OS X hackers who have flocked to the product's Intel-based version like ants to a picnic. The OS X genie is, in fact, out of the bottle, and Apple knows perfectly well that's a one-way trip. In any case, the hacker whose whereabouts were unknown at the time the story was written has, in fact, turned up -- free and apparently not all that bothered by whatever Apple's attorneys might have cooked up for him. For the latest on what "Maxxuss" is up to, check out his new blog. A Word From Our Sponsor? Yes, that's a Microsoft ad you see just above this space. I don't sell 'em, I just run 'em. And frankly, if Microsoft wants to support our newsletter with their hard-earned advertising dollars, then who am I to stand in the way? In fact, I would encourage all of you to click on those links and see what the good folks in Redmond are cooking up these days. Microsoft might be so delighted with the results it's getting that it decides to sign up as a permanent sponsor -- and the last time I checked, Redmond's money spent just as well as anyone else's. That's it for now. Have a good week.
Matt McKenzie
Don't let future editions of Linux Pipeline Newsletter go missing. Take a moment to add the newsletter's address to your anti-spam whitelist: linuxed@techwire.com If you're not sure how to do that, ask your administrator or ISP. Or check your anti-spam utility's documentation. Thanks. Top Linux News Study: Linux Beats Windows In Cost, Complexity Open Source Development Labs takes the offensive against Microsoft, citing the results of an OSDL-sponsored report giving Linux an advantage over Windows in both total cost and complexity.
Oracle Faces Tough Sell To Open-Source DB Community
Firefox Users Spar Over Memory-Management Issues
Chinese Net Rules Not Unusual, Says Official
Apple Bites Back Against OS X Hacker
Negroponte Leaves MIT Media Lab
Google Buys Blog Analytics Service
State Department Launches Internet Freedom Task Force Editor's Picks Firefox Essentials: Getting To Know Your Profile Your Firefox profile can take months to create -- and minutes to lose. We'll explain what's in your profile, where to find it, what can go wrong with it, and how to bounce right back from even the most serious profile problems.
Former FCC Chairman Powell: Net Neutrality 'Doing Great'
Firefox 2.0: This Time, It's All About The Interface
Open-Source Oracle: A Sign Of The Times
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This issue sponsored by Microsoft Visit the Enterprise Server Systems Resource Center, a microsite for your server software needs. Onsite you'll find frequently updated custom-written columns, blogs and resources on the latest in server technology, database server technology, and TCO issues. "http://enterpriseserver.techweb.com/servers" ----------------------------------------- We take your privacy very seriously. Please review our Privacy Policy.
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