Mozilla designer touts tricks to give Firefox the illusion of speed
6/19/2010 01:16:00 AM
kenmouse
, Posted in
Google's Chrome uses gimmicks to make it seem fast at start-up, says designerAn interface designer interning at Mozilla has suggested that the company mimic gimmicks in Google's Chrome to make users think Firefox starts up faster.
In an entry on his personal blog that was reposted to Mozilla's über-blog, Planet Mozilla, John Wayne Hill, an Indiana University master's student interning this summer at the open-source company, spelled out changes that would give users the feeling that Firefox starts quicker.
"Firefox is fast, no doubt about it. But for many people it feels pretty slow when starting up," said Hill, who is studying human-computer interaction and design. "Chrome, while only marginally faster than Firefox at starting, feels much faster. By analyzing videos of these start-up processes we can start to understand what makes Firefox feel slow."
Along with Alex Faaborg, a Firefox principal designer, Hill put Firefox and Chrome through speed trials that showed Google's browser finished most start-up tasks milliseconds faster than Firefox, in some cases because the former skipped steps. Hill then compared how both browsers handled specific start-up tasks or informed users of start-up progress.
and hopefully share a kiss in the rain
What can’t Pixar do? The Emeryville, Calif.-based movie studio that has transformed movie animation has done it again with Toy Story 3, the sequel that’s destined to be Pixar’s 11th straight hit. The movie, a reunion of the characters that began the now-legendary studio 15 years ago, may actually break some records and become the company’s highest-grossing movie ever. It would have to exceed Finding Nemo — which in summer 2003 earned $340 million — but with the higher ticket prices for the 3-D flick, that outcome is surely possible. The movie will open in 2,463 digital 3-D locations of its 4,028 overall locations and could bow to triple digits this weekend. It doesn’t have anything to compete with. Unfortunately for Warner Bros., the Josh Brolin-Megan Fox-starrer Jonah Hex is looking like a huge disappointment. It’s one of the few movies I’m told that has lost traction with audiences over the past few weeks. Read on for my predictions.