Optimize page rendering of Gecko-based browsers

Originally posted on 24.09.2008.

Tips from here.

• nglayout.initialpaint.delay — Set the integer value to 0 if the connection is too slow.
  
  E., 06.12.2010 Edit/Update: The downside is greater CPU usage, so if the computer is slow and/or if there's a slow operating system (Windows 95/98), then don't use this feature.
  
  For example, I have at my wherewithal a 900 MHz computer with 128 Mb RAM and Windows 98SE (the operating system that was supplied by the manufacturer), in which OS the latest Gecko-based browsers can be Mozilla Firefox 2.0.0.20, K-Meleon 1.5.4 and SeaMonkey 1.1.19.
  
  In late 2010 I realized how much more complex have websites become and their rendering really slowed the computer down. Messages about unresponsive scripts have also become more frequent.
  
  The only thoughtful solution to this would be changing the operating system to something lightweight, which supports SeaMonkey 2.0 (such as Linux). More about this in a future post.

ScanDisk tulemused (eestikeelses) Windows XP-s

Märkus: ScanDisk programm on Windows xp-s CHKDSK nimega.

Event Viewer > Application > Source: Winlogon, ava tulemuste vaatamiseks (peaks olema kõige varasem sissekanne peale restarti).

Event Viewer'i (sündmustelogi) avamise eri moodused:
 

• Start > Juhtpaneel > Haldusriistad > Event Viewer
  
• Töölaual või Start-menüüs paremklikk Minu arvuti ikoonil > Manage > laienda puumenüüst Event Viewer
  
• Start > Käivita..., kirjuta eventvwr.msc ning vajuta OK/Enter.
  

Abimaterjali sain siit.

Most important settings in optimizing Mozilla Firefox, K-Meleon and other Gecko-based browsers

Usually these two about:config instructions rarely appear together in any entry about optimizing a Gecko-enabled browser, such as Mozilla Firefox, K-Meleon, SeaMonkey and others.

In about:config —
• network.prefetch-next — toggle to false (can be done with a doubleclick)
• browser.sessionhistory.max_total_viewers — change to 0 on computers with low resources or 2 on friskier machines.
In very modern and very fast machines, the default settings can be kept intact.

Update: 28 Coolest Firefox about:config Tricks — Contains instructions both for Windows and Linux users and those who prefer some of the older Firefox UI features.

E., 18.07.2011. Update: Something I very recently found by chance in a version of Firefox on Knoppix 4.0.2, yet which may well exist in other systems and versions:

browser.related.enabled can be set to false, because the preference does very little specifically in anything that is not SeaMonkey (unless someone is using any What's Related-like extension that uses the preference).

Most of the preferences well apply to older versions of Gecko-based browsers, especially those that use Gecko 1.7, 1.8 and 1.8.1 (upwards to Firefox 2, SeaMonkey 1.1 and K-Meleon 1.5.4).

Firefox 4.0/5.0+ (where 5.0 is actually an incremental development because of rapid development practices now at mozilla.org) are less and less likely to require these modifications, because they're typically installed on modern and very modern computers.

L., 22.10.2011. Update:

browser.sessionstore.max_concurrent_tabs — Set to 0

If you're using multiple tabs, then upon session restore all the tabs are restored, but pages are loaded only on the tabs that you open. If you're using more than one window, the last tabs open before closing will still load.

Applies to Mozilla Firefox/Iceweasel/IceCat 4–8 only
08.01.2012. update: The feature was deprecated in version 9.0 of Firefox and corresponding forks. Users who still have version 8.0.1 at most and are happy with how it performs, should turn off the auto-update feature in Preferences.

Other options can be found from about:config entries at MozillaZine Knowledge Base Wiki.

P., 04.03.2012. Update:
This one should be useful for users of LiveCD-s:

plugins.hide_infobar_for_missing_plugin

This should work in Mozilla Firefox/Debian Iceweasel/GNU IceCat 3.0 and SeaMonkey 2.0 or newer (given that the function was first checked in on 02.10.2007).

P., 05.08.2012. Update: browser.sessionstore.interval — Set integer to more than 10000 (milliseconds; default value means 10 seconds) — I sometimes set it to 34000 or even 60000.

This can be useful if you don't want Firefox to interfere with plugin work. (I won't guarantee that it would work as expected, but in theory it sould improve performance. Apply if you think it may help.)

Uus värdsõna

Uus sõnavärd: "Windowsi õelvara eemaldamise tööriist - September 2008" (KB890830)"

Termini kasutus Microsofti abi ühel eestikeelsel leheküljel.

Täiendus: Sami blogis on veel sõnu.

Non-keyboard characters in Pidgin IM and Windows 9x

This page neatly describes what to do to write non-keyboard characters in Pidgin.

Keep in mind that because the latest major version of Gtk+ for Windows 9x is 2.6, the new input method introduced in Gtk+ 2.10.0 won't work. (Users of Windows 2000 and newer are spared of this).

In Windows 9x, you have to hold down the Ctrl+Shift keys and type a hexadecimal Unicode number for the character.

While the Character Map in Windows 2000 and newer supports showing Unicode character numbers, Windows 9x versions don't.

One workaround is to use the Windows Calculator to get the hex value of a typable character. Open it, select set the calculator view to scientific, type the given Alt+xXXX value and then click on the Hex radio button. This will convert the decimal value to hexadecimal. 0176 or just 176 yields a degree ° sign, the hexadecimal value for this is B0.

Keyboard shortcuts for Dec/Hex conversion in Calculator:
F5 for Hexadecimal (Hex) and F6 for Decimal (Dec).

Multiple instances of Skype in Windows Vista

Multiple instances of Skype 3.x in Windows Vista won't work because of different Runas behaviour. Skype 4 fixes that issue in version 4, which is in beta, using the /secondary command.

For Skype 3.x, some of the runas functionality does work, when the user specified is not part of an Administrators group, but rather that of Power Users.

More in-depth information here.

L., 04.04.2008. Update:
Skype 4.0 has now been released and it does indeed support the /secondary command when using the Runas command:

runas /user:Mart "\"C:\Program Files\Skype\Phone\Skype.exe\" /secondary"

Note that nested quotes (quotes inside quotes) must be escaped with a backslash, as seen above.

Windows Update error 0X80072F89 in Windows 98

If anyone gets their hands on a really old computer with 32Mb of RAM and, of course, a legitimate installation of Windows 95/98 in it, updating that operating system through Windows Update may prove to be a slight hurdle.

Internet Explorer 5.0 on its own is now quite an old web browser, but there are at least two reasons why it's important to download updates through Windows Update:

• After browsing around the web to research the error, the most common suggested remedy was to install Internet Explorer 6 on the computer, but given that as a major next version, a typical installation of IE6 would take more system resources to run on a computer with 32Mb of RAM, than, say, IE5 that's already been installed.
  
• Connecting to Windows Update early is especially useful in cases when the computer keeps acting up because of a software issue that must be fixed first.
  

1. The first useful suggestion I got is to update root certificates for Internet Explorer, as suggested here.
   
2. And this nice Microsoft newsgroup post offers a direct download link for it. Just in case, I'm providing the download link for ROOTSUPD.EXE here, too.

After that, Windows Update should work fine.

So if Internet Explorer 5 has already been installed, Internet Explorer 5.01 Service Pack 2 might also solve the issue, but I can then only vouch for it once I get to update another computer with Windows 98 that's already been installed on a PC. To download IE5.01SP2 and other assorted browser goodies, the browser archive at evolt.org is the best place to start.