5 ms·

> this means that my battery is going to last 4-5x longer with Safari Well it might last 4-5x longer if you run safari in the background, since that is what yo

> this means that my battery is going to last 4-5x longer with Safari Well it might last 4-5x longer if you run safari in the background, since that is what you tested. But wouldn't the real test be running both browsers as the active window and comparing those results? One thing that Safari is incredibly good at (and its' engineers are proud of) is the ability to reduce resource consumption for non-active tabs and windows to nearly zero. This is really good when running on battery because it is a shame to dedicate resources to things that aren't even visible on screen. But this could make the results far more dramatic through your test. I would hypothesize that Safari still wins your performance test (if you were to re-test using them both as "active" windows), but probably not as dramatically as in the inactive window test.

freediver 7y ago
I used that use case because I usually have multiple windows with multiple tabs in the background. I measured it with active windows now. Screenshots: - Both in background - Safari Actie - Firefox Active https://imgur.com/a/4L64ShP https://imgur.com/a/4L64ShP Conclusion: it gets even worse for Firefox. Edit: At the time of test Safari had 7 more windows open with probably 70+ tabs from my previous session that I didn't close.
- devit 7y ago
  You are not running uBlock Origin, so ads might be taking up all the CPU cycles they can get their hands on.
ebg13 7y ago
> But wouldn't the real test be running both browsers as the active window and comparing those results? No matter what you're doing, all but one of your tabs will be in the background at any given moment.
- jdironman 7y ago
  What about 4 windows, 2 for safari, 2 for FF in windowed mode? But I guess only window can be active at a time.
tomaskafka 7y ago
> One thing that Safari is incredibly good at (and its' engineers are proud of) is the ability to reduce resource consumption for non-active tabs and windows to nearly zero. I understand this is rare, but I just have a very very hard time understanding what is so hard about this. Page not visible? Just stop it. Stop the layout engine, stop the javascript VM. If there was a transfer in progress, let it finish, a page might get the callback when it's active again ... (I know there are some tricky cases, a lot of them, but there just isn't any reason why a browser with 30 tabs should be consuming over 1 % cpu...)
- pmontra 7y ago
  YouTube music video running in another tab. Should it stop render the video and keep playing the audio? Maybe feasible but it should keep receiving both the video and audio data. Stop all of it? Not what I wish to happen.
  - dwaite 7y ago
    The javascript engine and rendering engines are what are generally affected by being backgrounded. So yes, generally the media library will continue receiving the combined video/audio stream and not bother rendering the video frames
    - baby 7y ago
      What about a timer running in a different tab?
    - tass 7y ago
      Does HTML video need to catch up based on the most recent keyframe? If they don't render while backgrounded, how do they do that without being noticeable?
      - vrodic 7y ago
        Chrome does this for a long time now and I don't consider it an issue. You see a frozen version of the last decoded keyframe until the next one is decoded. Elegant solution IMO.
HunOL 7y ago
> One thing that Safari is incredibly good at (and its' engineers are proud of) is the ability to reduce resource consumption for non-active tabs and windows to nearly zero. This is really good when running on battery because it is a shame to dedicate resources to things that aren't even visible on screen. But this could make the results far more dramatic through your test. Does it mean that page in background isn't updated in Safari?

freediver 7y ago

I used that use case because I usually have multiple windows with multiple tabs in the background. I measured it with active windows now. Screenshots: - Both in background - Safari Actie - Firefox Active https://imgur.com/a/4L64ShP https://imgur.com/a/4L64ShP Conclusion: it gets even worse for Firefox. Edit: At the time of test Safari had 7 more windows open with probably 70+ tabs from my previous session that I didn't close.

devit 7y ago
You are not running uBlock Origin, so ads might be taking up all the CPU cycles they can get their hands on.

ebg13 7y ago

> But wouldn't the real test be running both browsers as the active window and comparing those results? No matter what you're doing, all but one of your tabs will be in the background at any given moment.

jdironman 7y ago
What about 4 windows, 2 for safari, 2 for FF in windowed mode? But I guess only window can be active at a time.

tomaskafka 7y ago

> One thing that Safari is incredibly good at (and its' engineers are proud of) is the ability to reduce resource consumption for non-active tabs and windows to nearly zero. I understand this is rare, but I just have a very very hard time understanding what is so hard about this. Page not visible? Just stop it. Stop the layout engine, stop the javascript VM. If there was a transfer in progress, let it finish, a page might get the callback when it's active again ... (I know there are some tricky cases, a lot of them, but there just isn't any reason why a browser with 30 tabs should be consuming over 1 % cpu...)

pmontra 7y ago
YouTube music video running in another tab. Should it stop render the video and keep playing the audio? Maybe feasible but it should keep receiving both the video and audio data. Stop all of it? Not what I wish to happen.
- dwaite 7y ago
  The javascript engine and rendering engines are what are generally affected by being backgrounded. So yes, generally the media library will continue receiving the combined video/audio stream and not bother rendering the video frames
  - baby 7y ago
    What about a timer running in a different tab?
  - tass 7y ago
    Does HTML video need to catch up based on the most recent keyframe? If they don't render while backgrounded, how do they do that without being noticeable?
    - vrodic 7y ago
      Chrome does this for a long time now and I don't consider it an issue. You see a frozen version of the last decoded keyframe until the next one is decoded. Elegant solution IMO.

HunOL 7y ago

> One thing that Safari is incredibly good at (and its' engineers are proud of) is the ability to reduce resource consumption for non-active tabs and windows to nearly zero. This is really good when running on battery because it is a shame to dedicate resources to things that aren't even visible on screen. But this could make the results far more dramatic through your test. Does it mean that page in background isn't updated in Safari?