Browser Competition

[machinebacon]

Right now I am using TDE, which comes with the Konqueror browser included. Just for fun I opened linuxbbq.org/bbs and checked the RAM usage - let's not care about relative, but absolute numbers:
1) I already have an uptime of 2 days something, so there is a certain amount of RAM already in use
2) TDE is not a heavy DE but not to be compared with a pure WM environment
3) of course I have extensions like uBlock O. in Chrome
4) I don't want to sounds like a scientist, just see it from the POV of a user: how does the choice of software impact performance on this Portege with Intel gfx?

For comparison:
TDE after start, one Konsole window open: Mem: 178 / 2016M -- this Konsole stays open for the next tests

Links running in 2nd Konsole: 182M -- 2nd Konsole closed afterwards

Konqueror blank page: 183M (!) -- so, opening Konqueror did not really change RAM usage

Konqueror on linuxbbq.org/bbs: 191M

Konqueror closed, one Konsole window open: 186M -- means, that Konq is running as a kind of service in the background, probably with a cache of linuxbbq.org/bbs

Google Chrome, blank: 337M

Google Chrome on linuxbbq.org/bbs: 370M

More to come...

[machinebacon]

As next I added conkeror, which pulls in iceweasel. I closed all browsers of the run before. Let's see the latter first:

TDE after start, one Konsole window open: Mem: 180 / 2016M -- this Konsole stays open for the next tests

Iceweasel, standard splash page: 263M

Iceweasel, linuxbbq.org/bbs: 261M -- yeah, I checked twice. The standard splash page of iceweasel (the ugly one, you know) weighs more than our forums

Conkeror: it refused to even start: [JavaScript Error: "TypeError: conkeror.handle_command_line is not a function"] and so on.

To my surprise, Midori is not in the jessie repos. Next up: dwb, uzbl, zombrero

[GekkoP]

Interesting stuff, Jules. Might want to give suckless' surf a try as well.

[machinebacon]

This is quite easy: dwb comes with 199M, uzbl, zombrero and roaster all use exactly 201M no matter if started cold or visiting our forums. Greetings to webkit.

I might do the same comparison later with a X11 environment without WM and anything, and all options disabled in the browsers, something like this:

Code: Select all

#!/bin/sh
# xinitrc for X11

BROWSER=""
x-terminal-emulator -e watch "cat /proc/$(pidof $BROWSER)/status|grep VmSize" &
exec $BROWSER

As for now, these are the stats in TDE:

[ChefIronBelly]

good stuff thanks

[machinebacon]

Interesting stuff, Jules. Might want to give suckless' surf a try as well.

Oh yes, I just noticed your post now, surf will come soon!

[machinebacon]

surprise surprise (not really), surf uses exactly.... <drumroll> 201MB. <rimshot>

Time for the X11 test...

[vic]

Heya, thanks for the omparison, mucho appreciated.

[ChefIronBelly]

Could you toss a Netsurf and Netsurf-fb in there please :)

[machinebacon]

^ Chef, I have finished it already -- not sure if netsurf-fb uses significantly less than the X version

vimb
VmSize: 254848 kB
Iceweasel
VmSize: 480032 kB
Xombrero
VmSize: 169428 kB
dwb
VmSize: 179028 kB
uzbl-core
VmSize: 190996 kB
surf
VmSize: 155148 kB
google-chrome
VmSize: 604656 kB
netsurf
VmSize: 101560 kB
links
VmSize: 5804 kB
lynx
VmSize: 9488 kB
elinks
VmSize: 15176 kB
w3m
VmSize: 7328 kB
edbrowse
VmSize: 33820 kB
xlinks2
VmSize: 13380 kB
links
VmSize: 12540 kB
netrik
VmSize: 2724 kB
dillo
VmSize: 22568 kB

[ChefIronBelly]

^ Chef, I have finished it already -- not sure if netsurf-fb uses significantly less than the X version

tru I was thinking nox embedded kiosk type thing and doesnt belong here.

Thanks for that chart leaves no doubts on browser memory usage.

[machinebacon]

forgot to mention our home-baked roaster:

VmSize: 217256 kB

I expected something like this, after all it is python plus webkit.

[archvortex]

Awesome!! Thanks tons for doing this! I'm doing kind of the same thing with Arch looking for a low usage browser and besides text based, netsurf is leading. Pale Moon and Light Firefox are quick but not that much different from the parent. I'm gonna try Xombrero now and Luakit and then jump back onto Break! and start trying some of your list. Again, thanks for doing this!!

[simgin]

Very nice work Julius, and very scientific!

Archvortex: Thanks for mentioning Luakit, I had utterly forgot about it's existence. Wish I knew Lua though.


cheerio
simon

[machinebacon]

thanks Archie, I did this on Stable so there was no luakit in the repos.

I have usually 2 browsers in use: one for GUI stuff (so: watching porn, looking at ads and popups) and one textual browser (I use links) for quick lookups and reading. netsurf and dillo are nice and everything, but I am not sure how they could fill a niche in my workflow. What I really really like about iceweasel is the Reader Mode, actually this part of it should be standalone and default for some fork :)

[GekkoP]

If you feel "brave", you may want to give this one a try as well: http://linuxbbq.org/bbs/viewtopic.php?f=31&t=2440

[machinebacon]

^ no way, took me ages to clean up :) maybe someday when it's boring at home.
i also skipped qupzilla, konq5, epiphany, arora, chromium for the same bloated reason. hv3 and conkeror are broken.

[dkeg]

fun stuff MB
these are total mb #'s +1 term window

Code: Select all

init─┬─dhclient
     ├─getty
     ├─login───bash───xinit─┬─Xorg───{Xorg}
     │                      └─none─┬─closdck───osd_clock───{osd_clock}
     │                             ├─compton
     │                             ├─fw
     │                             ├─sh───sleep
     │                             ├─sxhkd
     │                             ├─unclutter
     │                             └─wew
     ├─urxvt───bash───pstree
     ├─vimb─┬─{dconf worker}
     │      ├─{gmain}
     │      └─6*[{vimb}]
     └─wpa_supplicant

x - 40mb
start vimb in vimb home page - 54mb
vimb bbq forums - 62mb
second vimb instance on reddit - 88mb
second vimb instance with yahoo.com - 147mb

[machinebacon]

thanks drew, can you check

Code: Select all

watch "cat /proc/$(pidof vimb)/status|grep VmSize" 

from the splash page for me, please?

You can also use

Code: Select all

pmap $(pidof vimb)

[ivanovnegro]

To my surprise, Midori is not in the jessie repos.

Indeed strange but it is in backports.

If you feel "brave", you may want to give this one a try as well: http://linuxbbq.org/bbs/viewtopic.php?f=31&t=2440

It is based on Chromium so I guess something similar to Chrome but maybe with all the tracking disabled it could be lighter.

Drew, this vimb seems to be really an extremely light browser.