8 ms·

Internet Explorer 8 runs ten times faster with Google Chrome plug-in

162 points by monkeygrinder 17y ago

josefresco 17y ago
Anyone have real-life applications of this benchmark? Similar to 3D-gaming and CPU/GPU benchmarking in general the results (and winners) depend highly on the parameters of the test. Although at the end of the day nothing matters except real world performance. Can someone point to an application where this performance improvement can be demonstrated?
- ars 17y ago
  Gmail, google docs, pretty much any heavy javascript based site.
seshagiric 17y ago
Without knowing what site was used in the testing and in what manner (rendering speed, javascript speed, xml parsing speed ??) is the chrome plugin 8 times faster, I would rather keep my fingers crossed.
- harpastum 17y ago
  They used the SunSpider benchmark [1], which only tests javascript: "This benchmark tests the core JavaScript language only, not the DOM or other browser APIs." [1]http://www2.webkit.org/perf/sunspider-0.9/sunspider.html http://www2.webkit.org/perf/sunspider-0.9/sunspider.html
- deleted 17y ago
  [deleted]
- ars 17y ago
  If you had read the article, you would know. They tested using the SunSpider javascript benchmark: http://www2.webkit.org/perf/sunspider-0.9/sunspider.html http://www2.webkit.org/perf/sunspider-0.9/sunspider.html
tybris 17y ago
I didn't think anyone would have the patience to make this comparison.
prakash 17y ago
This is not good news. IE is going to stick around a lot longer now -- sigh!
- noodle 17y ago
  no, this is somewhat good news. IE was going to stick around for a long time anyways, because its the default windows browser and there will always be people who don't know better than to use the default. this will just hasten the migration away. its probably not a huge win for anyone with respect to directly converting it into migrations to another browser, because the people who were clueless about switching probably still will be. its just a really nice selling point when you have the ear of someone, trying to convert them.
tjic 17y ago
If I had to rank-order the various humiliations I've seen, this comes near the top. Microsoft: "here's our best stab at what a great browser looks like - and it took us 14 years to get here". Google: "we've been working on a codebase for 2 years. We decided to release it as a patch to your browser. Our brief foray into this area has improved your best effort by 10x". Ouch!
- lamby 17y ago
  This is misleading. Webkit, the core component of Chrome, has been worked on for far more than 2 years.
  - deleted 17y ago
    [deleted]
  - nixme 17y ago
    Except they only benchmarked javascript performance. V8 is only about 2 years old.
    - nostrademons 17y ago
      True, but the guy who did V8 is the same guy who did Beta, Self, and HotSpot. That's like 20 years of experience in writing high-performance VMs for dynamic languages right there.
      - deleted 17y ago
        [deleted]
      - enomar 17y ago
        Microsoft could have hired him or someone like him.
        jackmoore 17y ago
        Great things aren't going to happen by just having him on the payroll, Microsoft would have to make good use of his abilities by giving him resources, time, meaningful work, and not undermine his efforts. If they just throw him into unfocused micro-manged bureaucracy then it's just a waste.
markm 17y ago
Using Moore's law does that mean Google's development is approximately 6 years ahead of MS? (8 times faster code doubles the speed once, doubles the speed twice, and doubles the speed a third time.)
- Shprrrrt 17y ago
  I'd rather say they're lagging regarding Wirth's law. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wirths_law http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wirths_law
- mquander 17y ago
  Moore's law works backwards with software. Google's development is 6 years behind MS.
  - RyanMcGreal 17y ago
    I believe you're thinking of Zawinski's Law.
icey 17y ago
On one hand, I think this is pretty funny. On the other, I think it's a stunning display of just how much muscle Google really has to flex (and perhaps more importantly, how much they're willing to flex). It will be interesting to see how Google continues to treat companies it considers competitors over the next few years. The big guys like Microsoft will be able to handle it; but the smaller guys might have to start getting a little worried.
- Luc 17y ago
  I don't think this is flexing a lot of muscle, though I could be wrong of course. The VM was written by one very talented, experienced guy and his assistant. Let's say it cost $200k. The plugin probably cost a trivial amount (there is for example an open-source IE plugin for Firefox that is pretty small sourcecode-wise: http://ietab.mozdev.org/ http://ietab.mozdev.org/). So all in all a small bet with a large potential upside.
  - icey 17y ago
    I don't think the technical aspect of what they've done is flexing muscle. It's interesting for sure, but in the end, it's a plugin (a very cool one, yes). The muscle flexing is that they're willing to subvert a competitors product instead of just promoting their own product as a superior offering. Can you imagine the outrage if Microsoft had done this and offered a plugin to Chrome or Firefox that would make them render things just like IE does? If you're having trouble imagining such a scenario, think back to the outcry when people discovered the .Net plugin for Firefox, and that wasn't nearly as invasive. Google is drawing a line in the sand that essentially says "You can do things your way or our way, but if you don't like our way we'll find a way to make your users do it our way." To me that seems like a pretty serious escalation.
    - Luc 17y ago
      This is just speculation, but I think it's possible somebody just did this in their free time without much strategic planning, like so many projects at Google (you know, that 20% free time at Google).
mattmaroon 17y ago
Not really very relevant. Anyone who knows what a benchmark is is already running something other than IE. And who would install a Chrome plugin for IE when they could just as easily use Chrome?
- jcdreads 17y ago
  If I were hosting a SaaS offering that was Javascript-heavy, I might deploy the site in such a way that IE users were prompted to download the Chrome plugin, thereby allowing my app to run at a tolerable speed. We recently gave up on GWT at work for precisely the reason that IE6 and friends are waaaay too slow to do anything meaningful in GWT. Had we had this option we might have stuck with GWT instead of rewriting in Flex.
- icey 17y ago
  If they don't realize what it actually is. There are a fair number of people out there who don't want to use another browser because it's confusing to them, or they like IE. A website could just put a big "Speed up this application" button that installs the Chrome Frame plugin, and as far as the end-user is concerned, it's just like installing Flash - and they're still "using" internet explorer. The target audience for this is not the people who are interested in Chrome; it's the people who aren't interested in moving away from IE.
- dhs 17y ago
  Maybe users who must use IE because of the policies of their company?
  - jimmybot 17y ago
    But if that's the case, isn't that likely because they have internal applications that are IE only? It seems more like a marketing thing--Overcome people's inhibitions by letting them feel like they "only" installed a plugin and are still running IE.
    - tjogin 17y ago
      Only websites with a specific meta-tag set are going to use the Chrome rendering engine, every other site will render using the default IE-rendering engine, including any internal IE-only applications. Also, although it is hard to believe, some people actually think IE is a good browser. I don't understand how or why, but some people actually do.
miracle 17y ago
It's only logical to conclude that Chrome standalone must run at least 8 times faster than Internet Explorer 8? Otherwise their gui would be much slower. Why wasn't there a post about this before? This post must be complete bullshit.
fishercs 17y ago
there needs to be a way to force the rendering agent to be used, this would make the plugin agent much more viable instead of having to call cf: in front of a web address. I can see this being a good thing but also could be a bad thing, this doesn't fix the browser vulnerabilities that are still out there, merely your rendering engine. I would hate for people to be misled into thinking their version of internet explorer 6 is the latest and greatest because of the chrome rendering agent.
elblanco 17y ago
~~~cold hearted~~~

162 points by monkeygrinder 17y ago

Anyone have real-life applications of this benchmark? Similar to 3D-gaming and CPU/GPU benchmarking in general the results (and winners) depend highly on the parameters of the test. Although at the end of the day nothing matters except real world performance. Can someone point to an application where this performance improvement can be demonstrated?

ars 17y ago
Gmail, google docs, pretty much any heavy javascript based site.

seshagiric 17y ago

Without knowing what site was used in the testing and in what manner (rendering speed, javascript speed, xml parsing speed ??) is the chrome plugin 8 times faster, I would rather keep my fingers crossed.

harpastum 17y ago
They used the SunSpider benchmark [1], which only tests javascript: "This benchmark tests the core JavaScript language only, not the DOM or other browser APIs." [1]http://www2.webkit.org/perf/sunspider-0.9/sunspider.html http://www2.webkit.org/perf/sunspider-0.9/sunspider.html
deleted 17y ago
[deleted]
ars 17y ago
If you had read the article, you would know. They tested using the SunSpider javascript benchmark: http://www2.webkit.org/perf/sunspider-0.9/sunspider.html http://www2.webkit.org/perf/sunspider-0.9/sunspider.html

tybris 17y ago

I didn't think anyone would have the patience to make this comparison.

prakash 17y ago

This is not good news. IE is going to stick around a lot longer now -- sigh!

noodle 17y ago
no, this is somewhat good news. IE was going to stick around for a long time anyways, because its the default windows browser and there will always be people who don't know better than to use the default. this will just hasten the migration away. its probably not a huge win for anyone with respect to directly converting it into migrations to another browser, because the people who were clueless about switching probably still will be. its just a really nice selling point when you have the ear of someone, trying to convert them.

tjic 17y ago

If I had to rank-order the various humiliations I've seen, this comes near the top. Microsoft: "here's our best stab at what a great browser looks like - and it took us 14 years to get here". Google: "we've been working on a codebase for 2 years. We decided to release it as a patch to your browser. Our brief foray into this area has improved your best effort by 10x". Ouch!

lamby 17y ago
This is misleading. Webkit, the core component of Chrome, has been worked on for far more than 2 years.
- deleted 17y ago
  [deleted]
- nixme 17y ago
  Except they only benchmarked javascript performance. V8 is only about 2 years old.
  - nostrademons 17y ago
    True, but the guy who did V8 is the same guy who did Beta, Self, and HotSpot. That's like 20 years of experience in writing high-performance VMs for dynamic languages right there.
    - deleted 17y ago
      [deleted]
    - enomar 17y ago
      Microsoft could have hired him or someone like him.
      - jackmoore 17y ago
        Great things aren't going to happen by just having him on the payroll, Microsoft would have to make good use of his abilities by giving him resources, time, meaningful work, and not undermine his efforts. If they just throw him into unfocused micro-manged bureaucracy then it's just a waste.

markm 17y ago

Using Moore's law does that mean Google's development is approximately 6 years ahead of MS? (8 times faster code doubles the speed once, doubles the speed twice, and doubles the speed a third time.)

Shprrrrt 17y ago
I'd rather say they're lagging regarding Wirth's law. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wirths_law http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wirths_law
mquander 17y ago
Moore's law works backwards with software. Google's development is 6 years behind MS.
- RyanMcGreal 17y ago
  I believe you're thinking of Zawinski's Law.

icey 17y ago

On one hand, I think this is pretty funny. On the other, I think it's a stunning display of just how much muscle Google really has to flex (and perhaps more importantly, how much they're willing to flex). It will be interesting to see how Google continues to treat companies it considers competitors over the next few years. The big guys like Microsoft will be able to handle it; but the smaller guys might have to start getting a little worried.

Luc 17y ago
I don't think this is flexing a lot of muscle, though I could be wrong of course. The VM was written by one very talented, experienced guy and his assistant. Let's say it cost $200k. The plugin probably cost a trivial amount (there is for example an open-source IE plugin for Firefox that is pretty small sourcecode-wise: http://ietab.mozdev.org/ http://ietab.mozdev.org/). So all in all a small bet with a large potential upside.
- icey 17y ago
  I don't think the technical aspect of what they've done is flexing muscle. It's interesting for sure, but in the end, it's a plugin (a very cool one, yes). The muscle flexing is that they're willing to subvert a competitors product instead of just promoting their own product as a superior offering. Can you imagine the outrage if Microsoft had done this and offered a plugin to Chrome or Firefox that would make them render things just like IE does? If you're having trouble imagining such a scenario, think back to the outcry when people discovered the .Net plugin for Firefox, and that wasn't nearly as invasive. Google is drawing a line in the sand that essentially says "You can do things your way or our way, but if you don't like our way we'll find a way to make your users do it our way." To me that seems like a pretty serious escalation.
  - Luc 17y ago
    This is just speculation, but I think it's possible somebody just did this in their free time without much strategic planning, like so many projects at Google (you know, that 20% free time at Google).

mattmaroon 17y ago

Not really very relevant. Anyone who knows what a benchmark is is already running something other than IE. And who would install a Chrome plugin for IE when they could just as easily use Chrome?

jcdreads 17y ago
If I were hosting a SaaS offering that was Javascript-heavy, I might deploy the site in such a way that IE users were prompted to download the Chrome plugin, thereby allowing my app to run at a tolerable speed. We recently gave up on GWT at work for precisely the reason that IE6 and friends are waaaay too slow to do anything meaningful in GWT. Had we had this option we might have stuck with GWT instead of rewriting in Flex.
icey 17y ago
If they don't realize what it actually is. There are a fair number of people out there who don't want to use another browser because it's confusing to them, or they like IE. A website could just put a big "Speed up this application" button that installs the Chrome Frame plugin, and as far as the end-user is concerned, it's just like installing Flash - and they're still "using" internet explorer. The target audience for this is not the people who are interested in Chrome; it's the people who aren't interested in moving away from IE.
dhs 17y ago
Maybe users who must use IE because of the policies of their company?
- jimmybot 17y ago
  But if that's the case, isn't that likely because they have internal applications that are IE only? It seems more like a marketing thing--Overcome people's inhibitions by letting them feel like they "only" installed a plugin and are still running IE.
  - tjogin 17y ago
    Only websites with a specific meta-tag set are going to use the Chrome rendering engine, every other site will render using the default IE-rendering engine, including any internal IE-only applications. Also, although it is hard to believe, some people actually think IE is a good browser. I don't understand how or why, but some people actually do.

miracle 17y ago

It's only logical to conclude that Chrome standalone must run at least 8 times faster than Internet Explorer 8? Otherwise their gui would be much slower. Why wasn't there a post about this before? This post must be complete bullshit.

fishercs 17y ago

there needs to be a way to force the rendering agent to be used, this would make the plugin agent much more viable instead of having to call cf: in front of a web address. I can see this being a good thing but also could be a bad thing, this doesn't fix the browser vulnerabilities that are still out there, merely your rendering engine. I would hate for people to be misled into thinking their version of internet explorer 6 is the latest and greatest because of the chrome rendering agent.

elblanco 17y ago

~~~cold hearted~~~