I have a hypothesis that A Blog Around the Clock, one of the Scienceblogs.com blogs, crashes some browsers. In particular, I think it crashes blogers that use certain libraries in Linux. If you are a Linux user, I wonder if you could help me test this hypothesis.
Save your work, bookmark the sites you want to visit, etc. ... in other words, prepare for a crash... and visit Bora's site, A blog Around the Clock by clicking this kitten:
If you experience a crash, please let me know, and if you have any ideas why, tell me that too. I'm tired of not being able to read Bora's site with the wreckless abandon I usually read it with.
Remember, don't click the kitten unless you are ready to crash. Seriously.
Comments
It's all working here (unfortunately all i had available to test was links on gentoo)
Posted by: Tacticus | November 10, 2008 10:58 PM
No problem here (Firefox 3.0, Ubuntu 8.10).
A hell of a lot of javascript, though - youtube, theonion, metacafe, google, comedycentral, clocklink, authorstream, amazon, brightcove, scienceblogs, mcstatic, friendfeed, google-analytics, sharethis, quantserve, doubleclick.
One of those or the objects they load could be messing with your browser, I suppose.
Posted by: strech | November 10, 2008 11:10 PM
Ubuntu Hardy Heron, Firefox 3.0 Beta. The site did not crash the browser right away, but when I opened (in new tabs) five individual (different) posts from the same site in sequence the browswer closed unexpectely. But there is no crash report, so that is unusual.
Posted by: xavier | November 10, 2008 11:19 PM
Don't hurt the kitten!
Posted by: AnnieT | November 10, 2008 11:22 PM
Tried clicking on the kitten a couple of times. No crashes. Tried Firefox 1, 2, and 3. No crashes.
However - I adblock the tons and tons and tons of garbage coturnix attaches to his site.
Posted by: llewelly | November 10, 2008 11:23 PM
I'm browsing with Firefox 3.0.3 on a Mac with no crashing problem. However even after the Blog Around the Clock front page appears to be completely loaded, I get a message that shifts between "Transferring data from s3.amazonaws.com"/"Waiting for s3.amazonaws.com" in the status bar, as if it's still trying to load something.
Posted by: Peggy | November 10, 2008 11:26 PM
My guess (like strech mentioned above) would be the volume of widgets on his page. I've had FF crash on me while I was multi-tabbing MSNBC's election widgets, and I'm not using Linux. Could be a pure FF thing.
Posted by: John Moeller | November 10, 2008 11:26 PM
It's the widgets. I've had it completely tie up my G3 iBook for several minutes while loading, so it isn't just Linux. I only look at it from my desktop now.
On a side note, I have a friend who is strictly forbidden to get a Scottish Fold, because it would be the world's most overfed kitty ever. Between those eyes and those ears....
Posted by: Stephanie Z | November 10, 2008 11:41 PM
Ffox 3 with Ubuntu Heron, plus FlashBlock, no crash. Tried twice. Maybe 3'd time would have crashed.
Posted by: george.wiman | November 11, 2008 12:16 AM
I wouldn't go so far as to say it's broken, but there's definitely something wrong with it in Firefox 2/MacOS X (10.2 and 10.3). It seems to drag.
Posted by: Brian X | November 11, 2008 1:07 AM
Yeah, there's something screwy with it. Firefox 3.0.3 on Kubuntu 8.04 (x86) went into meltdown mode (which it does rather a lot): Both CPU-time and VM-size zoom upwards. strace(1) implies it's in some kind of a wacky loop doing zillions of gettimeofday(2)'s, and occasionally trying to talk to itself(?) on fdesc 3 (a socket). Hasn't actually crapped out yet, but when this seems to be the signature of the numerous Firefox 3 crashes I've been suffering. (Setting a breakpoint on gettimeofday() and checking the call stack points a finger at a lot of different libraries.) Closing the tab seems to stop the rot.
Konqueror seems better behaved, albeit something called nspluginviewer (don't have a clew what that is) has gone apeshite. (Haven't investigated what it's doing.) Closing the tab didn't (took longer than I was willing to wait). Noticed Konqueror kept flashing up messages to the effect of download something from some odd site (tim.nl, as I recall: Damn messages flashed by too fast to read!)
Opera 9.27 appears to be happy.
Posted by: blf | November 11, 2008 1:15 AM
Opens fine in Ibex with FF 3.0.3,opens links etc as well,no crashes.
May i suggest that its the embedded JS/Flash etc crap that does it?
I didnt try it without flashblock and adblock plus,so maybe thats where the problem is.
Posted by: clinteas | November 11, 2008 1:33 AM
I was expecting this new, even more virulent strain of Flash that's infesting the web to be the culprit; that's what's been crashing Safari for me lately (and if people try to tell you Firefox is immune, they're wrong.)
Surprise, though, the page loaded even under Safari--it's just very, very, very long and takes forever to load. I'm guessing that's the problem.
Allow me to recite my mantra, even f it doesn't strictly apply: "Die, Flash, Die! Die, Adobe, Die!"
Posted by: Lurkbot | November 11, 2008 3:12 AM
FF 3/KDE4.1/OpenSUSE 10.3/Intel i586. All OK here.
Mind you, I've noticed the Firefox thrashing issue with lots of tabs open myself, but it's not Bora-specific. However, AdBlock Plus is incredibly great - not only no ads, but I can operate quite happily with 50-odd tabs open. It must get rid of a hell of a lot of js/flash adcruft.
Posted by: Alex | November 11, 2008 5:00 AM
Firefox 3 on WinXP opens it fine, although it does take a while to complete. I agree, Flash+widgets is likely the problem.
Posted by: Luna_the_cat | November 11, 2008 5:34 AM
One or more of the common video player widgets throws quite a few Linux+Firefox+Flash errors with Flash 9.
You might add driftglass.blogspot.com to your test suite. As others have mentioned, it's not just /clock.
Posted by: Matthew Platte | November 11, 2008 7:19 AM
Latest versions of FF and Ubuntu, and I'm getting no crashes even with NoScript and AdBlockPlus turned off and multiple instances of the page open. I agree with others though that there is tons of JavaScript on it. When I'm designing web-sites, my philosophy is "simple as possible, complex as necessary".
Posted by: MH | November 11, 2008 7:20 AM
Although FF works fine for me, I also tried opening the site in Opera and Epiphany. Even when the page has finished loading, the processor sticks at 55% and 40%, respectively. Something is wrong for sure.
Posted by: MH | November 11, 2008 7:44 AM
Firefox, Adblock, Mac OSX, no hassle at all.
Please don't encourage breeding sad cats with genetic cartilage diseases. Moggies FTW.
Posted by: Cath the Canberra Cook | November 11, 2008 7:46 AM
Firefox 2.something, the Xandros variant that comes on a Linux EeePC. Everything seems fine
Posted by: Matt Heath | November 11, 2008 7:48 AM
I have Ubuntu Ibex with Firefox 3.0.3 and it works fine for me. Though the site takes awfully long to load. I tried with and without the NoScript extension activated, and it's definitely better with it.
Posted by: Irene Delse | November 11, 2008 9:02 AM
If you are a Linux user... change! *ducks*
Posted by: Martin | November 11, 2008 9:12 AM
Latest Ubuntu and FF on an EeePC with eeepc kernel. Page loads fine but pegs CPU utilization around 60% with 1 tab. 5 tabs activate the fan :D
Posted by: Ale | November 11, 2008 10:20 AM
No crashes with Firefox 3.0.3, on an older MacBook Pro running Mac OSX Tiger. However, both Coturnix's and Grrl's blogs take a long time to load. When I was using the default Safari browser, both blogs would routinely cause it to crash. Abel's blog (another favorite) has also been loading more slowly for me lately.
Posted by: Barn Owl | November 11, 2008 10:49 AM
I'm using Firefox 3. Most of the time Bora's blog loads ok. But it definitely seems to crash on Bora's blog more than on others. I was wondering if this was simply due to confirmation bias/ human tendencies to see patterns where none exist. Your post and the comments thread suggest otherwise.
Posted by: Joshua Zelinsky | November 11, 2008 11:05 AM
The only problem I've ever had on my old XP machine is how long it takes to load his site on all browsers. I bet the problem that some people have has to do with how insanely long his page always is.
Posted by: jake | November 11, 2008 11:11 AM
It's not broken, it just loads really, really slow. I tested it with Safari 3.1.2 on an Intel Mac, OS 10.5.5.
I agree with Stephanie Z., it's probably all the giant widgets and large images.
Posted by: Sandra Porter | November 11, 2008 11:32 AM
Ubuntu Ibex 8.10 and FF 3.0.3, No issues at all.
(Oh how I LOVED saying that! Ubuntu! NoDoze for me! yayyyyyy!!!!!)
Posted by: JanieBelle | November 11, 2008 12:37 PM
Worked fine for me. Firefox 3, Ubuntu 8.10 (Intrepid).
Posted by: C. Chu | November 11, 2008 1:24 PM
Bora is sadly missed as the site either crashes or loads, loads, loads at a glacial pace. Too much stuff there vs. other Scienceblogs pages.
Safari 1.3.2 on 10.3.9 just plain crashes. Firefox 2.0.0.14 loads, eventually, and that's with Flashblock helping.
But bloat is so last century. Is the waiting forever for the page to load some kind of in joke about matters circadian? At least we can easily access Greg, PZ, Jonah and Mo.
Posted by: Luci | November 11, 2008 2:15 PM
@JanieBelle
It really is a good feeling isn't it. It's like being able to say that you've quit smoking or escaped religion.
If you've just started using Linux, expect some frustrations as you get used to it, but the Ubuntu community is very large and supportive.
Have fun!
Posted by: MH | November 11, 2008 3:00 PM
MH: ROFL, you are so right.
And it is just plain fun watching JanieBelle get all hot over Linux.
Posted by: Greg Laden | November 11, 2008 3:20 PM
Excuse you, Greg.
hotTER, thank you very much. :)
(Now if I can just locate the folder with the FF search plugins so I can use an example to replicate my old plugin...)
(Frakking Mozdev deleted it because it bypassed the safe search filter... bastards.)
Posted by: JanieBelle | November 11, 2008 3:31 PM
Yep, MH. It's a lot like that.
(Oh, and it's a Flickr Creative Commons search plugin, by the way.)
Posted by: JanieBelle | November 11, 2008 3:34 PM
When you were putting up tons of video on your blog just before the election, Konqueror was locking up tight. Most cpu and memory was going to nspluginviewer. Killing that plugin would free up Konqueror but would also inactivate the video links.
I am seeing progressively sluggish system response as I open more tabs at clock but, as mentioned above other scienceblogs can lock Konqueror for me as well.
I haven't put any effort into isolating or diagnosing any of the problems. Frankly, I was thinking it might be related to Konqueror or Ubuntu so have been preparing to repartition and crank up a basic Debian with fvwm and Iceweasel to see how that would work.
Might I suggest w3m for your future browsing needs? Text good, pictures less so, video bad, sound good. ;)
But to answer your basic question, the lions cousin's baby didn't bit me.
Posted by: Notagod | November 11, 2008 3:34 PM
I think my laptop just had an orgasm. Just so y'know.
Posted by: JanieBelle | November 11, 2008 3:38 PM
No crash here, using firefox 3.0.3 (with the latest flash 10, not the ubuntu package) on 8.04 for i386.
Posted by: deBunk | November 11, 2008 4:37 PM
No crash for me:
$ uname -a
Linux brahe 2.6.24.5-smp #2 SMP Wed Apr 30 13:41:38 CDT 2008 i686 Intel(R) Pentium(R) 4 Mobile CPU 1.70GHz GenuineIntel GNU/Linux
$ ldd `which firefox`
not a dynamic executable
$ firefox --version
Mozilla Firefox 2.0.0.14, Copyright (c) 1998 - 2008 mozilla.org
Posted by: James McCann | November 11, 2008 10:14 PM
Okay, I didn't click the kitty. But I didn't need to, it seems that my problem occurs when I have a lot of pages open, and then go to your page and try to play a video.
All I ever hear is a recurrent wah, wah wah wah wah, or maybe it's a wan, wan, wan wan. The video plays but the sound doesn't run properly.
If I ctrl-alt-backspace, everything works fine as long as I open scienceblogs pages first. However, if I open other pages, and then go to scienceblogs I get the short repeating wah annoyances again.
Posted by: mikey.duhhh | November 11, 2008 11:31 PM
So, what's the verdict? One widget that needs to go off the sidebar? Several of them? Putting all the movies under the fold? Asking people not to use Linux when checking out my blog? Quit blogging so much?
Posted by: Coturnix | November 12, 2008 10:13 AM
Coturnix: I don't think we can come to any firm conclusions yet. This is just exploratory ... now we have to do more controlled experiments. Knockout blog experiments and such.
I did run some additional tests last night and came up with some spectacular results that I can't explain but would like to replicate and capture with a movie camera...
Earlier tests (that I emailed to you) seemed to rule out the left sidebar, as you will remember.
Unscientifically, I think one can say this: The total number of posts that you have displayed on your home page is large. You might want to decrease that if you can.
Posted by: Greg Laden | November 12, 2008 11:33 AM
The MT options are not very flexible - it is either too few posts (so they get off the page to quickly) or too many (making it difficult for some to load the blog). There is no middle solution.
Posted by: Coturnix | November 12, 2008 1:44 PM
Maybe the upgrade will be better.... After 40 years in this stinking desert we deserve it.
Posted by: Greg Laden | November 12, 2008 1:58 PM
LOL ;-)
Posted by: Coturnix | November 12, 2008 2:02 PM