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> Now, if you just dumped your other ad networks and ran everything through us, I bet it would be load much faster and that badge might magically disappear...

by flukus 7y ago

> Now, if you just dumped your other ad networks and ran everything through us, I bet it would be load much faster and that badge might magically disappear... My experience with everything google has touched lately suggest that this wouldn't improve speed any. Gmail and youtube make continental drift look speedy and even the search page takes 1.4MB and takes over a second to load for me (maybe corporate network issue), that's approaching the size of doom to display a dozen links. Google doesn't have any moral authority when it comes to bloat. Edit - for reference HN takes about the same time to load, but that has to cross the pacific ocean whereas google supposedly has local data centers.

alttag 7y ago
There's a big difference between "done loading" and "appears to be done loading". Google is reportedly very cautious about the latter, and pulls some hijinks to appear faster than it is. Frankly, I'd be happier if more sites paid a similar level of attention. That said, if your search page takes over a second, you're right, it might be an issue with your network.
BLKNSLVR 7y ago
I think the point being made is that it's no longer actually about the speed, it's about the 'badge of shame'. The analogy being used is accurate, in that 'protection money' isn't, and was never, about protection.
Avamander 7y ago
The only PC where I saw Gmail being fast was a Ryzen 9 3900x build, I suspect that if Google devs were given shittier PCs they'd build faster products that would appeal more to the average user.
- cameronh90 7y ago
  I run a Core i5-2500K from 2011 and Gmail runs just fine. Far better than Thunderbird or Outlook ever did, but it does take a lot of memory.
  - zbrozek 7y ago
    I have a Google-issued corporate workstation with 64 GB of RAM and 12 cores. Gmail is really really slow. Like so slow that I if I have to refresh it I'll go get coffee. But I'm on Firefox, and so "I Am Not The User" and all that.
    - cameronbrown 7y ago
      IMO the best way to use Gmail is to open and pin it, only load once a day. It seems optimised for this use case.
- shscs911 7y ago
  Even better, just run Gmail in basic HTML mode. This way you can even open emails in their own tabs. Sure, you lose a bit of functionality, but its well worth the tradeoff, in my opinion.
jfoster 7y ago
Part of the problem is that they place high importance on the first contentful paint (aka FCP) above all else. They're not very much looking at how it performs overall, mostly just how long it takes for a user to see the first bit of content. If that were a bit of text that said "loading" with a spinner that goes for a minute or two, they may consider that fast.
- kaycebasques 7y ago
  This section shows how Lighthouse calculates your overall Performance score: https://web.dev/performance-scoring/#lighthouse-6 https://web.dev/performance-scoring/#lighthouse-6 (Note that the table gets cut off on narrow mobile screens... I’ll file a bug) FCP is 20% of the score. The other metrics capture different milestones in the loading experience. For example Total Blocking Time is intended to bring awareness to sites that may look complete but can’t respond to user input (because the main thread is busy running JS). The metrics overview that we just launched provides more detail about how our metrics were designed to capture the end-to-end loading experience (or at least that’s what we’re working towards): https://web.dev/user-centric-performance-metrics/ https://web.dev/user-centric-performance-metrics/ So in the case of your site-that-just-loads-a-spinner example, yes it might have a good FCP time, but it’s LCP time probably wouldn’t be that good, and therefore the overall Performance score would be mediocre. Long story short, I don’t think it’s as easy to game a good Performance score as you might think Disclosure: I work on web.dev
jefftk 7y ago
> that has to cross the pacific ocean whereas google supposedly has local data centers HN is behind Cloudflare, and so also has local DCs

by flukus 7y ago

alttag 7y ago

There's a big difference between "done loading" and "appears to be done loading". Google is reportedly very cautious about the latter, and pulls some hijinks to appear faster than it is. Frankly, I'd be happier if more sites paid a similar level of attention. That said, if your search page takes over a second, you're right, it might be an issue with your network.

BLKNSLVR 7y ago

I think the point being made is that it's no longer actually about the speed, it's about the 'badge of shame'. The analogy being used is accurate, in that 'protection money' isn't, and was never, about protection.

Avamander 7y ago

The only PC where I saw Gmail being fast was a Ryzen 9 3900x build, I suspect that if Google devs were given shittier PCs they'd build faster products that would appeal more to the average user.

cameronh90 7y ago
I run a Core i5-2500K from 2011 and Gmail runs just fine. Far better than Thunderbird or Outlook ever did, but it does take a lot of memory.
- zbrozek 7y ago
  I have a Google-issued corporate workstation with 64 GB of RAM and 12 cores. Gmail is really really slow. Like so slow that I if I have to refresh it I'll go get coffee. But I'm on Firefox, and so "I Am Not The User" and all that.
  - cameronbrown 7y ago
    IMO the best way to use Gmail is to open and pin it, only load once a day. It seems optimised for this use case.
shscs911 7y ago
Even better, just run Gmail in basic HTML mode. This way you can even open emails in their own tabs. Sure, you lose a bit of functionality, but its well worth the tradeoff, in my opinion.

jfoster 7y ago

Part of the problem is that they place high importance on the first contentful paint (aka FCP) above all else. They're not very much looking at how it performs overall, mostly just how long it takes for a user to see the first bit of content. If that were a bit of text that said "loading" with a spinner that goes for a minute or two, they may consider that fast.

kaycebasques 7y ago
This section shows how Lighthouse calculates your overall Performance score: https://web.dev/performance-scoring/#lighthouse-6 https://web.dev/performance-scoring/#lighthouse-6 (Note that the table gets cut off on narrow mobile screens... I’ll file a bug) FCP is 20% of the score. The other metrics capture different milestones in the loading experience. For example Total Blocking Time is intended to bring awareness to sites that may look complete but can’t respond to user input (because the main thread is busy running JS). The metrics overview that we just launched provides more detail about how our metrics were designed to capture the end-to-end loading experience (or at least that’s what we’re working towards): https://web.dev/user-centric-performance-metrics/ https://web.dev/user-centric-performance-metrics/ So in the case of your site-that-just-loads-a-spinner example, yes it might have a good FCP time, but it’s LCP time probably wouldn’t be that good, and therefore the overall Performance score would be mediocre. Long story short, I don’t think it’s as easy to game a good Performance score as you might think Disclosure: I work on web.dev

jefftk 7y ago

> that has to cross the pacific ocean whereas google supposedly has local data centers HN is behind Cloudflare, and so also has local DCs