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zepto
Tux's lil' helper
Joined: 03 Nov 2004
Posts: 129
Location: London
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 Posted: Wed Apr 20, 2005 11:52 am Post subject: Bloated Gnome!? |
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I installed Gnome-2.10_pre0 yesterday and was very surprised by the amount of system memory it used, >600MB?
This is in comparison to firing up a Xfce4.2 session that reported about 150MB being used.
Both set-ups were accessed via a gdm session and consisted of the 'default' applications loaded for each environment. I did however change the backgound image in both environments before noticing the change.
I played around with Gnome for a couple of hours, but wasn't particularly impressed so removed it. This was before I thought that the memory usage might have been excessive so can't confirm my recollection exactly. I'm pretty sure it was 600MB (not 60MB) as I was surprised by how little of the 1G memory there was left after starting the Gnome session.
Just a another side comment. The Xfce4 'applet' that reports 'real-time' memory usage reckons that by default about 88MB memory is used, whereas when using top it reports around 150MB in use. A pretty large discrepency, but again I haven't really checked it out.
So the long and short of it is. If you are using Gnome (particularly 2.10) can you report how much system memory it consumes. Actually which WM do you use and how much system memory does it consume before you load any applications is more appropriate?
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Naib
Watchman
Joined: 21 May 2004
Posts: 6065
Location: Removed by Neddy
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| Posted: Wed Apr 20, 2005 12:03 pm Post subject: |
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there is a big difference between cached memory and used memory.
linux will try to fill up RAM (most efficient place for data).
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jbannon
Tux's lil' helper
Joined: 15 Mar 2005
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Location: Paisley Scotland
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| Posted: Wed Apr 20, 2005 12:10 pm Post subject: |
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2.8.2 seems fine. I am using gdm etc and am currently sitting at about 220MB used of 1GB and no swap used. Processor utilisation can peak at 100% depending on what I'm doing, for instance if I'm running Kdevelop, Kdewebdev or similar, but this doesn't seem to be a particular problem as responsiveness doesn't drop significantly. What I'm currently finding just a bit irritating is I can't seem to add anything to the menu (permissions I think).
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zepto
Tux's lil' helper
Joined: 03 Nov 2004
Posts: 129
Location: London
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| Posted: Wed Apr 20, 2005 12:48 pm Post subject: |
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| Quote: | there is a big difference between cached memory and used memory.
linux will try to fill up RAM (most efficient place for data). |
I'm talking about RAM. In both cases no swap space was utilised.
How do i 'measure' the difference between cached memory and used memory? |
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nimatar
n00b
Joined: 25 May 2004
Posts: 52
Location: Genova - Italy - Europe
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| Posted: Wed Apr 20, 2005 12:58 pm Post subject: |
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| nimbus.ursus wrote: | | Quote: | there is a big difference between cached memory and used memory.
linux will try to fill up RAM (most efficient place for data). |
I'm talking about RAM. In both cases no swap space was utilised.
How do i 'measure' the difference between cached memory and used memory? |
| Code: |
nimatar@polaris nimatar $ free -m
total used free shared buffers cached
Mem: 503 264 239 0 10 111
-/+ buffers/cache: 142 361
Swap: 972 0 972
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real used memory = used - cached - buffers (142M) |
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Lechium
Apprentice
Joined: 04 Apr 2005
Posts: 244
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| Posted: Wed Apr 20, 2005 2:29 pm Post subject: |
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Xfce is a very much lightweight window manager. New one is kinda slow thou -- old one loaded under a second on my comp.
I personally do not like gnome because it eats up memory, while providing little over what Xfce4 does.
Kde has bells and whisles and such, and yet it is more memory efficient than gnome, so go figure...
I use Xfce4, with Gnome-Terminal, becase I'm just used to it... terminal itself takes up almost as much RAM as rest of the system thou, but oh well... |
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wjholden
l33t
Joined: 01 Mar 2004
Posts: 826
Location: Augusta, GA
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| Posted: Wed Apr 20, 2005 4:38 pm Post subject: |
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| Lechium wrote: | | ...Kde has bells and whisles and such, and yet it is more memory efficient than gnome, so go figure... |
I installed the newest KDE just to see what it felt/looked like and was pretty surprised when it was faster than the old one, even with all the new eye candy.
I personally think "bloated" is a buzzword in software. When UNIX first came out everyone said it was bloated because it had so many features that no other "OS" had at the time, therefore UNIX required enourmous system resources for the time. When you compare Gnome and KDE you could say "bloated" when comparing them to Fluxbox and FVWM2 and whatnot, but compare Gnome and KDE to Windows or OS X and you'll see a lightweight, streamlined, conservative environment. When you go around saying something is "bloated" make sure you explain your frame of reference - and while you're at it don't use the term at all, just say "K3b is bigger than GraveMan" or something like that and nobody will argue with you. |
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killfire
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Joined: 04 Oct 2003
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| Posted: Wed Apr 20, 2005 4:42 pm Post subject: |
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i find it hard to belive gnome uses 600 megs... i have a machine with only 512 and it is running gnome 2.10
but yeah, like the above poster said, linux tries hard to throw as much as it can into memory... that way it can work quickly... so everything there is not _necesary_ it just makes it quicker...
for example, on my box, 509 is used, but 384 is cached... that means it is using only 125megs... and that includes firefox.. which is a memory whore (40 megs) whic leaves me at a about 80 megs... that doesnt seem that bad, considering it works quite well....
killfire
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killfire
l33t
Joined: 04 Oct 2003
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| Posted: Wed Apr 20, 2005 4:45 pm Post subject: |
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| destuxor wrote: | | Lechium wrote: | | ...Kde has bells and whisles and such, and yet it is more memory efficient than gnome, so go figure... |
I installed the newest KDE just to see what it felt/looked like and was pretty surprised when it was faster than the old one, even with all the new eye candy.
I personally think "bloated" is a buzzword in software. When UNIX first came out everyone said it was bloated because it had so many features that no other "OS" had at the time, therefore UNIX required enourmous system resources for the time. When you compare Gnome and KDE you could say "bloated" when comparing them to Fluxbox and FVWM2 and whatnot, but compare Gnome and KDE to Windows or OS X and you'll see a lightweight, streamlined, conservative environment. When you go around saying something is "bloated" make sure you explain your frame of reference - and while you're at it don't use the term at all, just say "K3b is bigger than GraveMan" or something like that and nobody will argue with you. |
i think by bloated (at least when i use it) i mean that it has tons of features that i dont need, that waste cpu cycles... for example, a lot of the eye candy in kde (which i know you can turn off, btw)
other places that i would consider bloat, is windows preloading windows media player, microsoft word, and internet explorer into memory.... that is bloat; its a waste of resources...
if it does exactly what id like it to do, in a reasonable ammount of time, i dont really care a bout the reources it uses.. thats what they are there for...
killfire
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wjholden
l33t
Joined: 01 Mar 2004
Posts: 826
Location: Augusta, GA
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| Posted: Wed Apr 20, 2005 4:56 pm Post subject: |
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| killfire wrote: | i think by bloated (at least when i use it) i mean that it has tons of features that i dont need, that waste cpu cycles... for example, a lot of the eye candy in kde (which i know you can turn off, btw)
other places that i would consider bloat, is windows preloading windows media player, microsoft word, and internet explorer into memory.... that is bloat; its a waste of resources...
if it does exactly what id like it to do, in a reasonable ammount of time, i dont really care a bout the reources it uses.. thats what they are there for... |
That's fair. |
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zepto
Tux's lil' helper
Joined: 03 Nov 2004
Posts: 129
Location: London
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| Posted: Wed Apr 20, 2005 9:19 pm Post subject: |
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Having checked out the 'different types' of memory usage I can confirm that I must have been mistaken, i.e. I remembered the amount used, but didn't subtract the cached memory.
Looking at my xfce4.2 session at the moment it reports 664MB used with 321MB being used for cache.
Nim |
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Q-collective
Advocate
Joined: 22 Mar 2004
Posts: 2076
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| Posted: Wed Apr 20, 2005 11:15 pm Post subject: |
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Running: nautilus, xfce session, amarok, xchat, firefox, gaim and an aterm: 142M
Not too bad hey? |
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HydroSan
l33t
Joined: 04 Mar 2004
Posts: 764
Location: The Kremlin (aka Canada)
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| Posted: Thu Apr 21, 2005 2:36 am Post subject: |
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If you think GNOME is bloated, try doing this when initially installing it.
Cuts most stuff out. You can manually emerge other things (such as gnome-media) if you want and still keep it lean.
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wdreinhart
Guru
Joined: 11 Jun 2003
Posts: 569
Location: 4QFJ12345678
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| Posted: Thu Apr 21, 2005 3:13 am Post subject: |
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| There's no glory in having loads of free RAM and 99% idle CPU time if it means running a desktop that would be appropriate for a 386. Empty memory and idle CPU cycles are wasted. *Use* your computer... |
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wjholden
l33t
Joined: 01 Mar 2004
Posts: 826
Location: Augusta, GA
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| Posted: Thu Apr 21, 2005 3:17 am Post subject: |
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| wdreinhart wrote: | | There's no glory in having loads of free RAM and 99% idle CPU time if it means running a desktop that would be appropriate for a 386. Empty memory and idle CPU cycles are wasted. *Use* your computer... |
In the sense of a desktop for productivity I agree, but when I'm gaming I want those extra megabytes of RAM. |
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zepto
Tux's lil' helper
Joined: 03 Nov 2004
Posts: 129
Location: London
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| Posted: Thu Apr 21, 2005 10:54 am Post subject: |
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| Quote: | | Empty memory and idle CPU cycles are wasted. *Use* your computer... |
I do *use* the computer and aggree wholeheartedly.
What I found 'worrying' was the apparently 4-fold decrease in available memory between my Gnome and XFce session. This would have been 'wasted' resources.
As it stands I wasn't aware of the caching memory impact 
Nim |
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superstoned
Guru
Joined: 17 Dec 2004
Posts: 432
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| Posted: Thu Apr 21, 2005 5:33 pm Post subject: |
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| nimbus.ursus wrote: | | Quote: | | Empty memory and idle CPU cycles are wasted. *Use* your computer... |
I do *use* the computer and aggree wholeheartedly.
What I found 'worrying' was the apparently 4-fold decrease in available memory between my Gnome and XFce session. This would have been 'wasted' resources.
As it stands I wasn't aware of the caching memory impact
Nim |
Well, then, try again  |
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EldermysticRazorsnout
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Joined: 06 Mar 2005
Posts: 41
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| Posted: Thu Apr 21, 2005 7:19 pm Post subject: |
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| killfire wrote: | i think by bloated (at least when i use it) i mean that it has tons of features that i dont need, that waste cpu cycles... for example, a lot of the eye candy in kde (which i know you can turn off, btw)
other places that i would consider bloat, is windows preloading windows media player, microsoft word, and internet explorer into memory.... that is bloat; its a waste of resources...
if it does exactly what id like it to do, in a reasonable ammount of time, i dont really care a bout the reources it uses.. thats what they are there for...
killfire |
You obviously have no clue what the hell you're talking about. Features don't use CPU cycles unless you use them. It's a fad these days amongst idiots to think that having crippled software is a good thing, or even easier to use (until you want to do something with it, of course, which no one who uses that kind of software does), precisely because of this myth, as well as the myth that more features requires more memory (apparently some people don't know about paging). Secondly, most operating systems use a 10ms quantum. Unless your eye candy can take longer than that, the CPU burst won't affect your performance in any way that even the computer can measure, much less you. Processes with short jobs get higher priority, so that job will get processed right away anyway. But oh no, you wasted an extra quantum those precious CPU cycles were doing nothing in! Another 10ms of your life was wasted on eye candy that could have been spent doing nothing at all! And again, no, they don't use CPU cycles when turned off. Oh, and Windows does not preload Internet Explorer. It does not preload Windows Media Player. It does not preload Microsoft Word. Word isn't even included in Windows; care to explain how Windows preloads software that is not even there? Because some Windows users might want to be able to access that memory for the free copy of Word that is apparently hidden in Windows. 
And contrary to your meaning, "bloat" actually has a correct meaning as well: when an equivalent piece of software could be made with significantly less code, CPU usage, or memory usage, as well as the tendency of software designers to actually not waste resources on nothing, but instead make their software more capable once technology reaches the point that the resources necessary are widespread.
Last edited by EldermysticRazorsnout on Thu Apr 21, 2005 10:06 pm; edited 1 time in total |
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wjholden
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Joined: 01 Mar 2004
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Location: Augusta, GA
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| Posted: Thu Apr 21, 2005 7:42 pm Post subject: |
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You could have disagreed much more politely.
And what he was saying about Windows preloading applications is correct. Yes, Office is an application inside Windows that does not come preinstalled when you install Windows. However, Office is an integral component of Windows and the desktop lacks a lot when you don't have Office installed. And Office does utilize preloaders -- install XP, install Office 2003, then run HijackThis and you will see a MS Office preloader, an Excel IE "exporter" or whatever, and an Office plugin for IE. All of these you can remove with no functionality loss. These preloaders increase applciation startup performance and lower overall system performance.
And Windows does preload Internet Explorer -- IE is built so closely into the OS that it is a component of Explorer, so explorer.exe has so many IE components that IE is practically preloaded. You're right about WMP not being preloaded AFAIK.
Your "correct" definition of "bloat" can be better expressed as runtime inefficiency. Like I said, best to not use the word "bloat" at all.
Your arguement is decent, but your examples are wrong. Now go back to OTW and troll there. |
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superstoned
Guru
Joined: 17 Dec 2004
Posts: 432
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| Posted: Thu Apr 21, 2005 8:27 pm Post subject: |
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| He said it rude, but yeah, I think he's right. an application is bloated if it could haven been made much faster, smaller and easier to use than it is, while retaining its functionallity. that way, Konsole or gnometerm are no more bloated than xterm - they might be bigger, but also have more features - which are usefull, easy to use, and eficiently coded (altough I think Konsole is, in the regard of efficiency a bit better, gnome terminal is a bit easier to use, so that's even for me). |
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EldermysticRazorsnout
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Joined: 06 Mar 2005
Posts: 41
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| Posted: Thu Apr 21, 2005 10:05 pm Post subject: |
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| destuxor wrote: | And what he was saying about Windows preloading applications is correct. Yes, Office is an application inside Windows that does not come preinstalled when you install Windows. However, Office is an integral component of Windows and the desktop lacks a lot when you don't have Office installed. And Office does utilize preloaders -- install XP, install Office 2003, then run HijackThis and you will see a MS Office preloader, an Excel IE "exporter" or whatever, and an Office plugin for IE. All of these you can remove with no functionality loss. These preloaders increase applciation startup performance and lower overall system performance.
And Windows does preload Internet Explorer -- IE is built so closely into the OS that it is a component of Explorer, so explorer.exe has so many IE components that IE is practically preloaded. You're right about WMP not being preloaded AFAIK. |
Sorry you are wrong here. I have a Windows computer, with Microsoft Office 2003. And sorry, no preloading. Older versions of Office had such things, and even then, that is an Office feature, not Windows. Nor is IE preloaded. This "IE is integrated" claptrap is obviously not understood. IE is a program that uses the MSHTML engine, and it is not loaded. The basic engine that it is modeled around, MSHTML, is integrated into Explorer, but like any code in any operating system with virtual memory, which is every modern OS that matters, it still has to be paged in.
| Quote: | | Konsole or gnometerm are no more bloated than xterm - they might be bigger, but also have more features - which are usefull, easy to use, and eficiently coded (altough I think Konsole is, in the regard of efficiency a bit better, gnome terminal is a bit easier to use, so that's even for me). |
Actually, not including shared toolkits and such, Konsole + konsole_part is a tad smaller than xterm IIRC. xterm is a good example of a bloated application in the correct sense of the word, not to mention an all around horrible program. If you want a good laugh go fetch the xterm source and check out its README for the developers' opinions of its quality. |
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killfire
l33t
Joined: 04 Oct 2003
Posts: 618
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| Posted: Fri Apr 29, 2005 10:36 pm Post subject: |
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| EldermysticRazorsnout wrote: | | killfire wrote: | i think by bloated (at least when i use it) i mean that it has tons of features that i dont need, that waste cpu cycles... for example, a lot of the eye candy in kde (which i know you can turn off, btw)
other places that i would consider bloat, is windows preloading windows media player, microsoft word, and internet explorer into memory.... that is bloat; its a waste of resources...
if it does exactly what id like it to do, in a reasonable ammount of time, i dont really care a bout the reources it uses.. thats what they are there for...
killfire |
You obviously have no clue what the hell you're talking about. Features don't use CPU cycles unless you use them. It's a fad these days amongst idiots to think that having crippled software is a good thing, or even easier to use (until you want to do something with it, of course, which no one who uses that kind of software does), precisely because of this myth, as well as the myth that more features requires more memory (apparently some people don't know about paging). Secondly, most operating systems use a 10ms quantum. Unless your eye candy can take longer than that, the CPU burst won't affect your performance in any way that even the computer can measure, much less you. Processes with short jobs get higher priority, so that job will get processed right away anyway. But oh no, you wasted an extra quantum those precious CPU cycles were doing nothing in! Another 10ms of your life was wasted on eye candy that could have been spent doing nothing at all! And again, no, they don't use CPU cycles when turned off. Oh, and Windows does not preload Internet Explorer. It does not preload Windows Media Player. It does not preload Microsoft Word. Word isn't even included in Windows; care to explain how Windows preloads software that is not even there? Because some Windows users might want to be able to access that memory for the free copy of Word that is apparently hidden in Windows.
And contrary to your meaning, "bloat" actually has a correct meaning as well: when an equivalent piece of software could be made with significantly less code, CPU usage, or memory usage, as well as the tendency of software designers to actually not waste resources on nothing, but instead make their software more capable once technology reaches the point that the resources necessary are widespread. |
I happen to know, for a fact, that IE (at one point or another, I havent used windows for a while) _was_ preloaded. it was how IE was able to claim such fast load times.. Also I have heard mentioned, though do not know for a fact, that wmp was preloaded as well, not sure about xp, i have never used it. word, is partially loaded as well. or was.
also, i happen to think saying i would not notice the speed difference is a complete load of crap. in gnome, when i click on the application menu, it takes a noticable longer time then when i do the same thing in blackbox. also, there are plenty of things that I DO NOT WANT in gnome, kde, etc. and so having them here, wasting memory etc, is a waste. is bloated. bloat in your definition would be a broad, completely impersonal definition. I am talking about usability, and bloat in the opinion of the user. if something is there, that I do not need or want, and it is taking resources, then it is a waste, and, in my ideal world, should be eliminated. also, on a computer I have, i have tried running kde, and when running it, it cannot play dvds. it just cant, it skips like crazy, audio is out of sync, etc. on the very same computer, with no other settings changed, it plays dvds fine with blackbox. so im sorry, but you my friend are wrong. and saying a peice of software that doesnt have a kitchen sink attached is crippled is also very wrong.
perhaps you do know a thing or two, but there is one key thing that you have yet to learn. AS SOON AS YOU ATTACK A PERSON YOU LOS ALL CREDIBILITY IN THEIR EYES. THEY WILL IGNORE ALL FACTUAL DATA THAT YOU HAVE, AND THUS MISS YOUR ENTIRE POINT. IT IS A FACT. POLITICIANS WHO ATTACK THEIR OPPONENT LOSE FOR THE EXACT SAME REASON. so next time, say what you have to say, but leave out the slander, and maybe I, and everyone else, wil listen to you.
killfire
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wjholden
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Joined: 01 Mar 2004
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| Posted: Fri Apr 29, 2005 11:57 pm Post subject: |
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| Don't feed the troll. |
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Lokheed
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Joined: 12 Jul 2004
Posts: 1295
Location: /usr/src/linux
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| Posted: Sat Apr 30, 2005 12:39 am Post subject: |
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| killfire wrote: | | POLITICIANS WHO ATTACK THEIR OPPONENT LOSE FOR THE EXACT SAME REASON |
What the hell are you talking about? ALL politicians attack their oponents. All their messages attack the opposition. When have you heard a politician talk about what they are doing right? Its all about what the other guy is doing wrong...jeez.
nimbus.ursus, something is wrong with your system. I am using GNOME 2.10 since its release (its real release) and have not seen my RAM climb higher than 252MB. This extreme use came from me trying to stress it and had everything available to me open. I have seen GNOME eat up my entire RAM before but that was on Mandrake. No matter the cause, there is a problem and that is not normal GNOME behaviour for sure...
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Lokheed
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| Posted: Sat Apr 30, 2005 12:45 am Post subject: |
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| destuxor wrote: | | Don't feed the troll. |
He's not a troll. Dont use the word unless you know what it means...
The guy has valid points and he is right on a lot of them. Too many Linux heads slam Windows but their last experience with the OS was back in 97 for a 2 month period. Yeah they see XP on their buddies machines but that doesnt mean they know one damn thing about it. Dont pretend to know about Windows just to slam it...way to much of that going on...crash this, BSOD that, and my favorite, lets just start bundling every single thing that runs under the sun on Windows as part of Microsoft and, what the hell, part of Windows too...
While he may not have said it in the most polite manner, it was calling killfires BS...and that doesnt make him a troll at all...
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