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Firefox got faster for real users in 2023

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Re: Firefox got faster for real users in 2023

#161

Post by lrem »

qup wrote: post #24
rs_rs_rs_rs_rs wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why would you think that? Rust is certainly a little bit slower than C/C++

Everything I've read says that you're right in theory, but in practice, rust rewrites tend to outperform. At Mozilla's level, though, I wouldn't necessarily expect that to hold water. They should be able to write great code in either language.

Eh, no. A rewrite is pretty much always better. You now know the problem you’re actually facing. Drop all the little wrong assumptions. And in general are better equipped than the last time.

I vaguely remember reading here about a company that slapped a backend together in Python. When they took off, the compute costs stung, so they rewrote in Go. Saved most of the bill. Some time later that started creaking, so they rewrote again. In Python, but managed to save most of the bill again.

Re: Firefox got faster for real users in 2023

#162

Post by A4ET8a8uTh0 »

ceejayoz wrote: post #119
user3939382 wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's some of it but not all of it. If you uncheck those and proxy FF when it's starting you'll see the chatter. I have the doc page I'm talking about somewhere but I have no idea where it is. Fully disabling it is a long complex process involving about:config. * Found this: https://github.com/K3V1991/Disable-Firefox-Telemetry-and-Dat... I haven't compared their list to the one I've used before but it's along the sa…

Those largely appear to affect local collection of telemetry. https://www.reddit.com/r/firefox/comments/7k3r9u/mozilla_is_... > Telemetry data is stored locally by default. As long as the relevant options in the settings' UI are unchecked, or datareporting.healthreport.uploadEnabled is set to false in about:config, this data won't be sent. https://medium.com/georg-fritzsche/data-preference-changes-i... > There's like…

If there is one thing we should have learned over the past decade, it should be that if the data is collected, it will be sent.

I followed the argument and I understand what you are saying. What I am saying is that it was not that long ago that FF decided to disable plugins remotely ( I think we even discussed it on HN[1]). What makes you think they won't one day push an update to just upload that local data?

[1]https://lapcatsoftware.com/articles/2023/7/1.html

Re: Firefox got faster for real users in 2023

#163

Post by lolinder »

ad404b8a372f2b9 wrote: post #147
lolinder wrote: post #145

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A vastly larger variety of different computers and computer setups than they could have come up with on their own.

(Sorry I edited my comment before I saw your reply.) That doesn't seem very useful for the metrics shown in that article. For hard to find bugs sure, for 95th percentile calculations and so on you can just buy a few computers at a retail store and get the same information.

That can get you 95th percentile calculations for brand new computers that you bought from the store in 2023 that are running Firefox alone, but that doesn't help you understand what your performance will look like when you're running on a 10-year-old machine running Windows 7 while the user is also running Microsoft Word, Excel, and Outlook at the same time. Your P95 numbers aren't especially meaningful if you've only tested ~10 different PC configurations.

Re: Firefox got faster for real users in 2023

#164

Post by michaelmrose »

user3939382 wrote: post #89
Doches wrote: post #2

> We’ve been motivated by the improvements we’re seeing in our telemetry data, and we’re convinced that our efforts this year are having a positive effect on Firefox users. Mozilla gets a lot of flak (especially around here!) for their sometimes heavy-handed usage analytics, but it's nice to see that used for its stated purpose! Great use of data here.

I just don't like being bullshitted. Constant marketing about privacy while they're phoning home a bunch of data when you start and stop the browser. I did at some point find a doc page with a zillion steps to disable all of it but that doesn't remediate the hypocrisy IMHO.

Click the menu button Fx89menuButton and select Settings. Select the Privacy & Security panel. Scroll to the Firefox Data Collection and Use section. Deselect the Allow Firefox to send technical and interaction data to Mozilla checkbox.

You can get directly there by copying into the url bar

about:preferences#privacy

Re: Firefox got faster for real users in 2023

#165

Post by IainIreland »

pipeline_peak wrote: post #141

I don't know what their definition of a "real user" is. But everyone I've met who uses Fiercefox does so for philanthropic or political reasons. I have a hard time believing some non techie in Minnesota has noticed performance improvements. Idk, the data looks very pseudo sciencey, just feels like another marketing ploy from the blue haired people.

Generally we say "real users" internally as a comparison to benchmarks, as in "this improves JetStream by 5%, but I don't think it will make any difference to real users".

Re: Firefox got faster for real users in 2023

#166

Post by sillyalbatross »

Unfortunately Firefox still has a lot of issues when it comes to font rendering on macOS. For example, it's been two years and it still renders San Francisco incorrectly: https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1721612

Not to mention all fonts appearing bolder than they should compared to Chrome and Safari. It might seem like a small thing but I'm a stickler for typography and it really stands out on a Mac.

I hope they get around to fixing these issues but two years is a long time for such an obvious bug. What confuses me is how few people have noticed given that it seems to affect all Apple silicon devices.

Re: Firefox got faster for real users in 2023

#167

Post by bee_rider »

kortilla wrote: post #144
StressedDev wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What telemetry are you objecting to? Telemetry has good and bad uses. For example, sending in automatic crash reports helps companies find bugs. It can also expose sensitive information which was in ram at the time of the crash. Another example is usage telemetry tells developers what part of the app is being used and can help them focus popular features or on working to let people know about useful but under used po…

If “being useful” is your argument for it, I don’t think you’re ever going to see eye to eye with people who don’t want it. It’s like you’re arguing about the good things the church does when it’s a discussion on separation of church and state.

Religion seems like a needlessly incendiary example that is going to bring up some strong rhetoric.

But I mean I’m an atheist and I think religion is, on net, bad. But we’ve allowed a sort of less dangerous version of it to persist in most advanced countries, in the form of separation of church and state. If it was really just all bad, I suppose we’d ban it altogether.

I think people can generally see that there are some pros to things they don’t like. Not engaging with the aspects of something that are inconvenient to your case puts you in the realm of propaganda and rhetoric, not good faith discussion.

Re: Firefox got faster for real users in 2023

#169

Post by wodenokoto »

sillyalbatross wrote: post #166

Unfortunately Firefox still has a lot of issues when it comes to font rendering on macOS. For example, it's been two years and it still renders San Francisco incorrectly: https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1721612 Not to mention all fonts appearing bolder than they should compared to Chrome and Safari. It might seem like a small thing but I'm a stickler for typography and it really stands out on a Mac. I ho…

> Not to mention all fonts appearing bolder than they should compared to Chrome and Safari.

No they don't. https://imgur.com/a/p9V4GdN

Re: Firefox got faster for real users in 2023

#170

Post by ceejayoz »

A4ET8a8uTh0 wrote: post #162
ceejayoz wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Those largely appear to affect local collection of telemetry. https://www.reddit.com/r/firefox/comments/7k3r9u/mozilla_is_... > Telemetry data is stored locally by default. As long as the relevant options in the settings' UI are unchecked, or datareporting.healthreport.uploadEnabled is set to false in about:config, this data won't be sent. https://medium.com/georg-fritzsche/data-preference-changes-i... > There's like…

If there is one thing we should have learned over the past decade, it should be that if the data is collected, it will be sent. I followed the argument and I understand what you are saying. What I am saying is that it was not that long ago that FF decided to disable plugins remotely ( I think we even discussed it on HN[1]). What makes you think they won't one day push an update to just upload that local data? [1] htt…

> What makes you think they won't one day push an update to just upload that local data?

I'd imagine it's a buffer; presumably someone using Firefox for a decade with telemetry off won't accumulate ten years worth of telemetry pings.

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