TheGarage Tech Blog

The new Firefox session restore functionality that popped up a couple of updates ago is quite nice and has introduced a slight improvement to my workflow.

I don’t know about most of you but the minimum Firefox windows I have open is four and the aggregated number of open tabs is near a dozen. And that’s just at start up. After a few hours, not mention a day or two, I may have 30, 40, 50 tabs open in the four windows. Probably not more than 50 but I don’t know for sure.

This hyper surfing results from researching technical issues and when I find applicable information I want to leave it up for reference until the issue is resolved or until the info is deemed not relevant. There is nothing worse than having to waste time re-finding a drop of information in the ocean of technical documentation through which you have been wading for the past several hours, or days.

Well no software is perfect and as good as it is, Firefox and the applications it hosts do leak memory. Some a lot more than others. System requirements at startup are about 400 Meg of available RAM. At the height of a work session, with many open tabs, RAM usage will swell to 600-800M. After a few days without restarting RAM usage will go above a Gig and closing everything but the startup configuration still consumes over 600 Meg. The leakage filled up a 200 Meg barrel.

For this reason, as you all know, you have to restart Firefox from time to time to keep things perky, and operational. This is where the Firefox session restore comes in handy.

What I use to do when I needed to restart was go through every tab and close all the pages that I no longer needed, bookmarking ones that I might need again (which I hate doing because it results in a bookmark nightmare over time.) Then instead of closing Firefox normally — this is the little trick — open the task manager, click the processes tab, and kill the Firefox process. Firefox will immediately close.

When Firefox restarts it thinks it is recovering from a crash and will give you the option to restore the previous session, opening all your windows and pages they way you left them. Pretty sweet huh. There may be another way to accomplish this same thing, but it cant be as easy as this method.

And it just got a little easier with a simple check-box prompt improvement. Now I don’t have to go through the tedious process of closing the tabs I don’t need prior to restarting. At startup after a crash, Firefox now prompts with a selection of pages that were open at the “crash” and you can tick off the ones you don’t want.

Just a little bit sweeter.

In recent posts I poo-poo’d the thinking of current medial moguls vis-a-vis the Google Myspace deal as well as Rupert Murdoch’s plans to charge for their content. Now at least someone is catching on and is not intent on self-destruction as they cling on to the old way of doing things.

Here is what I said in early Nov (and numerous times before):

Content is king on the Internet. Want to improve your traffic, improve your content. Since users create the content at MySpace, it becomes essential to attract users who can consistently generate quality pop content. Even if you have to pay to get them.

Here is what AOL CEO Tim Armstrong said in early December:

Because AOL is content, the brand has to be like content: fluid, flexible, and changeable. It exists as a host for new innovations and new content experiences. In a world where people believe what you do and not what you say, it is these new experiences that will define this brand and people’s perceptions of it. AOL Seed is the first example of this. Here AOL are pioneering the content economy with a publishing platform that will allow budding creatives to publish, find an audience for their work, and make money doing so.

Media outlets that try to own and or control submitted or hosted content to their sole benefit are in for big trouble over the coming years, especially if that tactic is essential to their core business model. Think recording industry.

Yeah, maybe AOL use to suck, but now they plan to share the wealth with those who actually have a talent for creating engaging content. If AOL management can pull it off, don’t be surprised if this model is a raging success.

Rewarding individual talent is preferable to powerful people making tons of money simply because they have power and money. I’m actually quite put out with the latter.

Check out this Wordpress blog that is comprised primarily of nothing but Brad and Beyonce Turkey’s Twitter feeds. Interesting concept, off-beat subject mater. Why are they doing it?

We looked after our Turkeys too well, and got attached. Help us decide which one to keep. The one with the most to live for by Christmas will be saved.

Regular visitors know I love making fun of online job postings. Here’s a good one:

Responsible for complex process automation of the systems management applications as well as integration to create interoperability between other applications. The applications include; HP OpenView for Windows (HPOV) or HP OpenView Operations Manager (OVO) now called HP Operations Manager, software for consolidated event and performance management, HP Network Node Manager (HP NNM) now called HP Network Node Manager i-series which has embedded run-book automation technology for automatic data collection, state verification, and problem fixing, HP Service Center formerly Peregrine, HP OpenView for Internet Services (HP OVIS) now called HP Business Availability Center, HP Reporter for OpenView and HP Operations Orchestrator (OO) formerly known as PAS, formerly IConclude

Sounds like someone changes brands like they change underwear. Nothing like re-branding an entire product line once or twice to encourage confidence from your customers.