Firefox 1.5 Problems
I ran into a link today reporting that Firefox 1.5 has memory issues; at least when running it on Windows. Ever the skeptic, I did some more research and came across other blogs and forums where users had documented high memory use by Firefox. But I also found a fair number of follow-up posts by people with no issues on their Windows machines. How is it that the same program runs fine on one machine but not another?
It would seem to me that there might be a memory leak of sorts with respect to Firefox. But perhaps the leak could be a result of a plugin? Or perhaps it happens when a certain website is visited? Or perhaps it’s most common when you’ve let Firefox run for 7 days straight. I don’t know. But the point is that neither do any of the users reporting this problem. And most of them seem happy to complain about it and recommend that you not try Firefox 1.5.
Yes, you say, but that is what users do. They expect software to work and when it doesn’t, those users complain. I agree; they should expect it to work. But if you are a writer for a publication (either in print or on the net, such as the person who wrote the linked article above), this no longer applies. If you are going to write that Firefox 1.5 uses up a lot of memory and that you should hold off, then I highly recommend that you do yourself and, more importantly, your readers a favour and do some research before you write your complaints for all to see. I spent 10 minutes cruising around and came up with a link to a reported bug on the Mozilla bug site. Within that page are several helpful things to try as none of the firefox developers seemed to be able to replicate the bug (at least as of December 5th). That not to say that it’s not happening, just that it’s not easily replicable on another machine.
And for those who care, Firefox 1.5 on my Linux laptop uses up about the same amount of memory as it always has. Just another reason to go with Linux on the desktop.
Wed, 14 Dec 2005 22:51
