Comments for Nicholas Nethercote http://blog.mozilla.com/nnethercote Thu, 23 Feb 2012 08:59:28 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.1 Comment on The McAfee Site Advisor add-on has an appalling memory leak by Nicholas Nethercote http://blog.mozilla.com/nnethercote/2012/02/17/the-mcafee-site-advisor-add-on-has-an-appalling-memory-leak/comment-page-1/#comment-5400 Nicholas Nethercote Thu, 23 Feb 2012 08:59:28 +0000 http://blog.mozilla.com/nnethercote/?p=1768#comment-5400 The new version is 3.4.1.195. https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=727938#c36 suggests that it's available at www.siteadvisor.com. I've also heard that older versions should auto-update within a week or so, but I can't guarantee that. Note however that the new version still has leaks, just not nearly as many. See https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=729608. Does you girlfriend like the add-on? If not, just disabling it is an option. The new version is 3.4.1.195. https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=727938#c36 suggests that it’s available at http://www.siteadvisor.com. I’ve also heard that older versions should auto-update within a week or so, but I can’t guarantee that.

Note however that the new version still has leaks, just not nearly as many. See https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=729608. Does you girlfriend like the add-on? If not, just disabling it is an option.

]]> Comment on The McAfee Site Advisor add-on has an appalling memory leak by AC http://blog.mozilla.com/nnethercote/2012/02/17/the-mcafee-site-advisor-add-on-has-an-appalling-memory-leak/comment-page-1/#comment-5399 AC Thu, 23 Feb 2012 07:59:33 +0000 http://blog.mozilla.com/nnethercote/?p=1768#comment-5399 Nicholas, As I was the person that started the whole McAfee Site Advisor discussion I feel that I should ask, how do I update my girlfriend's laptop from 3.4.1 to make sure that it isn't leaking memory from now on? Does the software autoupdate? Is there a link I can follow to download the latest version and install it over the top of the current version. Please advise me. It would be silly for me not to take corrective action after diagnosing the problem. Nicholas,
As I was the person that started the whole McAfee Site Advisor discussion I feel that I should ask, how do I update my girlfriend’s laptop from 3.4.1 to make sure that it isn’t leaking memory from now on? Does the software autoupdate? Is there a link I can follow to download the latest version and install it over the top of the current version. Please advise me. It would be silly for me not to take corrective action after diagnosing the problem.

]]> Comment on MemShrink progress, week 36 by Nicholas Nethercote http://blog.mozilla.com/nnethercote/2012/02/22/memshrink-progress-week-36/comment-page-1/#comment-5392 Nicholas Nethercote Wed, 22 Feb 2012 19:58:01 +0000 http://blog.mozilla.com/nnethercote/?p=1782#comment-5392 The hard part is knowing which add-ons are worth looking at and finding their code. AMO add-ons are easy in this respect; non-AMO add-ons are much harder. Possibly a more useful crowdsourcing technique is to just test add-ons to see if they create zombie compartments when exercising their basic functionality. That's faster and easier than looking through the source code. If you want to do this you could just start with the most popular ones on AMO -- even though each AMO add-ons will eventually be tested for leaks when new versions are reviewed, it wouldn't hurt to have someone look at them sooner. If you find any leaks, please file bugs! The hard part is knowing which add-ons are worth looking at and finding their code. AMO add-ons are easy in this respect; non-AMO add-ons are much harder.

Possibly a more useful crowdsourcing technique is to just test add-ons to see if they create zombie compartments when exercising their basic functionality. That’s faster and easier than looking through the source code. If you want to do this you could just start with the most popular ones on AMO — even though each AMO add-ons will eventually be tested for leaks when new versions are reviewed, it wouldn’t hurt to have someone look at them sooner. If you find any leaks, please file bugs!

]]> Comment on MemShrink progress, week 36 by Nicholas Nethercote http://blog.mozilla.com/nnethercote/2012/02/22/memshrink-progress-week-36/comment-page-1/#comment-5391 Nicholas Nethercote Wed, 22 Feb 2012 19:50:25 +0000 http://blog.mozilla.com/nnethercote/?p=1782#comment-5391 The garbage collector is a standard one, and just works for JavaScript data. But Firefox allows references between JavaScript objects and C++ objects, and the cycle collector is needed to break cycles between JS-land and C++-land. The garbage collector is a standard one, and just works for JavaScript data. But Firefox allows references between JavaScript objects and C++ objects, and the cycle collector is needed to break cycles between JS-land and C++-land.

]]> Comment on MemShrink progress, week 36 by Dan Neely http://blog.mozilla.com/nnethercote/2012/02/22/memshrink-progress-week-36/comment-page-1/#comment-5390 Dan Neely Wed, 22 Feb 2012 15:36:40 +0000 http://blog.mozilla.com/nnethercote/?p=1782#comment-5390 What're the differences between the cycle and garbage collectors? What’re the differences between the cycle and garbage collectors?

]]> Comment on MemShrink progress, week 36 by smaug http://blog.mozilla.com/nnethercote/2012/02/22/memshrink-progress-week-36/comment-page-1/#comment-5389 smaug Wed, 22 Feb 2012 14:46:13 +0000 http://blog.mozilla.com/nnethercote/?p=1782#comment-5389 Honza's addon is now https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/cycle-collector-analyzer/ (Waiting for review still) Honza’s addon is now
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/cycle-collector-analyzer/
(Waiting for review still)

]]> Comment on MemShrink progress, week 36 by pd http://blog.mozilla.com/nnethercote/2012/02/22/memshrink-progress-week-36/comment-page-1/#comment-5378 pd Wed, 22 Feb 2012 10:29:08 +0000 http://blog.mozilla.com/nnethercote/?p=1782#comment-5378 Is there any reason why the crowdsourcing (for want of a better term) approach cannot be taken to identifying add-on leaks? I remember reading somewhere about references to the window object being a big source of leaks. Is it as simple as reading through the source code of an add-on and looking for such references then seeing if they get unreferenced? It may sound very laborious but I'd enjoy doing that if it helps to make Firefox better. Having a web developer background, add-ons are more my scene in terms of any coding I could do to help the project. More so than C++ and so on, for example. Is there any reason why the crowdsourcing (for want of a better term) approach cannot be taken to identifying add-on leaks? I remember reading somewhere about references to the window object being a big source of leaks. Is it as simple as reading through the source code of an add-on and looking for such references then seeing if they get unreferenced? It may sound very laborious but I’d enjoy doing that if it helps to make Firefox better. Having a web developer background, add-ons are more my scene in terms of any coding I could do to help the project. More so than C++ and so on, for example.

]]> Comment on MemShrink progress, week 36 by Nicholas Nethercote http://blog.mozilla.com/nnethercote/2012/02/22/memshrink-progress-week-36/comment-page-1/#comment-5375 Nicholas Nethercote Wed, 22 Feb 2012 09:25:16 +0000 http://blog.mozilla.com/nnethercote/?p=1782#comment-5375 Thanks! Thanks!

]]> Comment on MemShrink progress, week 36 by Caspy7 http://blog.mozilla.com/nnethercote/2012/02/22/memshrink-progress-week-36/comment-page-1/#comment-5374 Caspy7 Wed, 22 Feb 2012 09:13:10 +0000 http://blog.mozilla.com/nnethercote/?p=1782#comment-5374 I had a thought - valuable or not I do not know. Would it be helpful to add a link at the bottom of about:memory to about:compartments? This might be a good place for other memory related 'about:'s should they arrive. Pages such as about:compartments is memory related but doesn't fall in the scope of about:memory's features. It could be a help to someone trying to troubleshoot/explore memory stuff. I had a thought – valuable or not I do not know. Would it be helpful to add a link at the bottom of about:memory to about:compartments?
This might be a good place for other memory related ‘about:’s should they arrive. Pages such as about:compartments is memory related but doesn’t fall in the scope of about:memory’s features. It could be a help to someone trying to troubleshoot/explore memory stuff.

]]> Comment on MemShrink progress, week 36 by Girish http://blog.mozilla.com/nnethercote/2012/02/22/memshrink-progress-week-36/comment-page-1/#comment-5373 Girish Wed, 22 Feb 2012 07:01:04 +0000 http://blog.mozilla.com/nnethercote/?p=1782#comment-5373 In your documentation https://developer.mozilla.org/en/Extensions/Common_causes_of_memory_leaks_in_extensions you have used the unload() function in the section meant for removing event listener for bootstrapped add-ons. It would be better to provide the unload function also, as user would think that it is a predefined function. Or do not use it at all ? For the record, I am editing and providing a link to the gist for the unload function. Hope it helps. In your documentation https://developer.mozilla.org/en/Extensions/Common_causes_of_memory_leaks_in_extensions you have used the unload() function in the section meant for removing event listener for bootstrapped add-ons.
It would be better to provide the unload function also, as user would think that it is a predefined function. Or do not use it at all ?
For the record, I am editing and providing a link to the gist for the unload function. Hope it helps.

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