Google Reader ate my memory

[andrewducker]

I noticed at work that Firefox kept taking up large amounts of memory, which it hasn't done for a while (not since the massive improvements in versions 6 and 7)*. So I did some digging in about:memory and discovered that a lot of the memory was eaten up by Google Reader. To be more accurate - by links to Google Plus buttons, which weren't being disposed of over the course of the day.

As I can't even get to Google Plus from work this seemed a tad silly, so I went looking for a solution and discovered that adding plusone.google.com/u/0/_/+1/fastbutton to my Adblock Plus filters** suddenly reduced the memory that Google Reader was taking up from 400MB to 9MB. Where it then stayed for the rest of the day.

*Except for when Firebug is running. That thing eats memory.
**I've never added a filter before, ABP seems to be pretty awesome at spotting ads.

Comments

[davidcook]

Hey, about:memory got more useful since I last looked at it ! Maybe I can find out why my FF keeps heading towards 4Gb (and progressively getting slower and slower along the way). (note, I have 8Gb RAM, there should be plenty free for it ... )

[azurelunatic]

Added! That should help a little, I hope.

[cobrabay.livejournal.com]

I've been getting pretty much the same problem though oddly not with Google Reader (which I use a lot), but the G+1 scripts on various other sites (right now I've got a +1 script on a single 7dayshop.com page using about 40% of my Firefox memory). Loathe to go the Adblock route since I do use the G+ stuff.

[kashandara.livejournal.com]

This might explain why gradually over time my browser starts to eat up so much memory I have to close it all down, leave it 10 minutes and start again. Thank you! :)

[zz]

i have "||apis.google.com/js/plusone.js", because i don't use g+ at all.

[undeadbydawn.livejournal.com]

having quite liked G+, I am now sorely tempted to abandon it for Diaspora.


if only I had compelling reasons to use Diaspora, other than it being really frickin nice.

[andrewhickey.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I had that problem. I've now totally got rid of Google Reader, because without the sharing and commenting it has nothing to recommend it over other online RSS readers, but the G+ buttons were the last straw.
Rsshero.com seems to do all the good stuff Reader does (and soon all the stuff it used to do) and none of the bad...

[andrewducker]

I mostly read via the Android app or FeedDemon, which sync with Google Reader, otherwise that might be tempting.

[skreidle.livejournal.com]

I could never convince Firefox not to a) eat scads of memory, b) never release it properly -- though (a) and (b) were better if I was running MemoryFox -- so I use Chrome. Chrome, however gets pretty slow when I have so many tabs open that it actually underruns the New Window (+) button at the far right. :)

[andrewducker]

I frequently have twice as many tabs open as that :->

Re:

[skreidle.livejournal.com]

I think my max (in two windows in Firefox) was about 125; I don't know my Chrome tab count.

Also, the Sessions addon in Firefox was a lifesaver, far more times than I could count.

Re:

[andrewducker]

Sessions addon? Was this before it was built in?

Re:

[skreidle.livejournal.com]

I'd never seen the ability to save (manually or automatically) sets of tabs in FF, and since it crashed so regularly, it was Very Important that I not lose all the tabs I had open. Part of the reason I changed to Chrome was its built-in ability to do the same -- but mostly the stability. Chrome may get slow, but it rarely crashes.

[andrewducker]

Under Options I have a setting for what to do when FF launches, and I have that set to "show the tabs from last time".

Seems to work just fine for me.

[skreidle.livejournal.com]

That one has failed me before, though -- especially (though not always) when a firefox crash coincided with a firefox software update. software updated, firefox restarted, no tabs.

[kashandara.livejournal.com]

Chrome is my usual browser of choice and I hate that it seems to get choppy or stop altogether as soon as I have more than 4-5 windows open. I guess it might be time to reconsider my choice, but I do really like Chrome except when it breaks.