Add-on performance

[Argus]

Most people who use add-ons with Firefox know that it can happen that one of them doesn't work with a site, for some reason. If it's an important site we can, in the short run, disable and enable them to track down the culprit.

But what about speed and add-ons? Again, most people know that using many, plenty, of add-ons can have an adverse effect on Fx start-up time; but it depends on the add-ons and how many they are (then of course start-up times also depends on the hardware, OS, and start-up page, if any, etc.).

Mozilla has started to test add-ons for performance. At first they focus on Fx start-up time, but they will include some sort of load time index for pages in the future.

See: Improving Add-on Performance Mozilla Add-ons Blog.

Mozilla has created a list of add-ons that have the biggest impact on Fx start-up time.
https://addons.mozilla.org/sv-SE/firefox/performance/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[Bigaldoc]

Good one, Argus! Thanks for posting the link. I've duly bookmarked it for future reference.

I now use AdBlock, Personas, and WOT which are all in the additional screen (which I take to mean a lesser problem). Just for the heck of it I think I'll test my load speed with and without.

Funny thing is, other than load speed, I have no complaints about Fx speed once it's running and operational. The most "slow site" loading that I encounter is USUALLY because of an overabundance of ads. That's why I initially installed AdBlock.

[Argus]

Yes. I think we'll see updates as the add-ons are updated over time, so it is a rather dynamic list. I agree with you about Fx, once it's running, I have no problems. In fact I don't have any with the start-up time as well, the main focus of the list as it is now. However, as a long time user you know that the first Fx start, after PC start-up, is always a bit slower than subsequent starts. I also notice that if there’s been an update to the AV/AS software.

To be fair the browser is usually running for such long periods that start-up time isn't that interesting, but it would of course be nice if the first start-up also was a bit quicker. I haven't looked closer at the issue; I only use a few add-ons, NoScript, Adblock Plus, Greasemonkey and some dictionary; and I don't use huge filter lists with Adblock Plus, I create my own filters. As for page loads; with a fast connection page load time isn't much of an issue. But then again, I don’t use that many add-ons that it could have an adverse effect instead of the opposite, the intended, a speed and security boost.

They mentioned in the blog post that this is part of a change in Fx 4, it’s based on "real-world performance data"; that is, they have modified the daily add-on check to also include Firefox's latest start-up time. Guess they have to get the data somewhere.
http://blog.mozilla.com/addons/2011/02/ ... t-up-time/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;