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View Full Version : firefox 3.5b4 speed improvements in linux



xir_
April 25th, 2009, 12:03 PM
Looks like there is some improvements on their way.

http://www.tuxradar.com/content/benchmarked-firefox-35-beta-4

Does anyone know why it is so slow on Linux?

Namtabmai
April 25th, 2009, 12:19 PM
I believe it's because the stock Windows version is built with profile guided optimization and the Linux one isn't. Well there are several other reasons but this difference would probably account for a large part.

xir_
April 25th, 2009, 12:24 PM
I believe it's because the stock Windows version is built with profile guided optimization and the Linux one isn't. Well there are several other reasons but this difference would probably account for a large part.

would compiling from source make much of an improvement?

Namtabmai
April 25th, 2009, 12:27 PM
would compiling from source make much of an improvement?

If you enabled PGO then yes.

RottingChrist
April 25th, 2009, 01:04 PM
Better late than never.

xir_
April 25th, 2009, 01:28 PM
If you enabled PGO then yes.

cheers for the reply, i think you may have already helped me on a research project i have to do this summer.

Sand & Mercury
April 25th, 2009, 01:45 PM
I've never noticed any difference in speed across either platform.

Giant Speck
April 25th, 2009, 02:03 PM
I've never noticed any difference in speed across either platform.

Same here.

Daisuke_Aramaki
April 25th, 2009, 10:33 PM
firefox has always been fast on my machines, and doesn't take up much memory as well. but i am on a source based distro, Lunar Linux, and i built it from source with profile guided optimization. It just took a while to build, otherwise the end result has been pretty good.

xir_
April 25th, 2009, 10:44 PM
firefox has always been fast on my machines, and doesn't take up much memory as well. but i am on a source based distro, Lunar Linux, and i built it from source with profile guided optimization. It just took a while to build, otherwise the end result has been pretty good.

did you happen to try high-level optimisations as well?

speedwell68
April 25th, 2009, 10:46 PM
I've never noticed any difference in speed across either platform.


Same here.

Me neither. Not that I have really used Windows and FF together much in nearly 3 years. The speed of it on my current 3 machines is more than fine.

Namtabmai
April 25th, 2009, 10:51 PM
Give Fabien Tassin's PPA a try, it looks like he ( she? ) already has pre-packaged versions of Firefox with PGO enabled

https://launchpad.net/~fta/+archive/ppa

NOTE: I'm not Tassin, nor do I know him, so use at your own risk.

Daisuke_Aramaki
April 25th, 2009, 10:54 PM
did you happen to try high-level optimisations as well?

like? it is perfectly optimized for my system.

Giant Speck
April 25th, 2009, 11:01 PM
What exactly is PGO? Also, has Firefox 3.5b4 been released yet?

Namtabmai
April 25th, 2009, 11:04 PM
Profile guided optimization. Allows a compiler to produce very fast/optimised code by examining the code it produces ( then producing the optimised version ).

Giant Speck
April 25th, 2009, 11:07 PM
Profile guided optimization. Allows a compiler to produce very fast/optimised code by examining the code it produces ( then producing the optimised version ).

Is it difficult to set up?

Namtabmai
April 25th, 2009, 11:09 PM
Is it difficult to set up?

You just need to enable it when compiling Firefox, I believe the PPA I posted before contains Firefox packages where it has been built with this already set up. If you want to compile it yourself I believe it's just a matter of passing the right flag to configure when building Firefox.

Daisuke_Aramaki
April 25th, 2009, 11:09 PM
Is it difficult to set up?

you can probably check out that ppa page that was linked earlier. if you compile from source, it's rather straighforward. Have a look at this.

https://developer.mozilla.org/En/Building_with_Profile-Guided_Optimization

you have to pass the option in the configure command


./configure --enable-profile-guided-optimization

Giant Speck
April 25th, 2009, 11:12 PM
you can probably check out that ppa page that was linked earlier. if you compile from source, it's rather straighforward. Have a look at this.

https://developer.mozilla.org/En/Building_with_Profile-Guided_Optimization

I try to avoid compiling from source like it's the plague.

collinp
April 25th, 2009, 11:13 PM
I'm using Firefox 3.5b5pre, downloaded from ftp://ftp.mozilla.org/pub/mozilla.org/firefox/nightly/latest-mozilla-1.9.1/ . Noticeable speed improvement in almost every area. Lets hope it just stays that way.

sports fan Matt
April 25th, 2009, 11:20 PM
I imported the ppa's and the keys...I'll see what happens

adamlau
April 25th, 2009, 11:28 PM
I posted some portable, optimized 3.0.9 PGO builds here: http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1137488

xir_
April 25th, 2009, 11:45 PM
like? it is perfectly optimized for my system.

hmm i was just wondering if you had. i have a big project coming up where i need to compile some fairly substantial code using the intel compiler and was just picking your brain :P

Daisuke_Aramaki
April 25th, 2009, 11:51 PM
hmm i was just wondering if you had. i have a big project coming up where i need to compile some fairly substantial code using the intel compiler and was just picking your brain :P

if that is the case you should look at compiling source code in general. for instance, i have custom optimization flags set for my gcc compiler, that is best suited for my machine, so compilation of any program is is well tuned for my computer. in addition, i also build programs, by removing unwanted, unnecessary support, that i know i might never use. this results in programs built precisely for my machine, no more, no less. you will learn a lot if you look up some information on source code compilation and optimization.

xir_
April 26th, 2009, 12:09 AM
if that is the case you should look at compiling source code in general. for instance, i have custom optimization flags set for my gcc compiler, that is best suited for my machine, so compilation of any program is is well tuned for my computer. in addition, i also build programs, by removing unwanted, unnecessary support, that i know i might never use. this results in programs built precisely for my machine, no more, no less. you will learn a lot if you look up some information on source code compilation and optimization.

i think you may have a very good point.

my brief is to try and compile this FORTRAN quantum chemistry code (as im a theoretical chemist) using the intel compiler, unfortunately this code was designed to compile with the portland compiler. But i think it will be a fun challenge.