Google's revamped JavaScript engine cures Chrome's stutters Google has begun testing a new version of its V8 JavaScript engine for the Chrome browser that improves application performance by executing and compiling JavaScript code at the same time. "Concurrent code compilation is another step towards reducing latency in Chrome and is part of various ongoing efforts to deliver more …
I would be a moron be all [citation needed] (because how hard is it to post a frigging link to prove your claim, the burden if proof is on you at this point) but then again I would also point our that benchmarks are easily swayed. Either way If your decision to use any browser hinges on benchmarks you need to re-think some major life decisions.
This engine is the major line of defence against attack.
I hope they ensure it performs as before otherwise we get the added unknowns of Windows type systems.
Those other more low level access systems are resorting to locking out protection so as to appear safe. Out of sight out of mind is that feel good policy crap.
So if the V8 / Crankshaft engine only does the optmized double compilation on code that it thinks is run often, then to speed up my javascript apps I should call all functions a few thousand times (like warming up an engine) before the app starts, to force the browser to apply the optimized compilation to everything.
A page takes a few seconds to load, so maybe I should spend those seconds on looping through function calls while I wait for assets to load?
Also, I wonder if it can detect the same library version (say a version of jQuery) when it is included on multiple tabs or URLs, and use the same optimizations, rather than having to reanalyze it several times.
Interesting..
call all functions a few thousand times (like warming up an engine) before the app starts, to force the browser to apply the optimized compilation to everything.
That would likely be very naive - a bit like adding indexes to every column in a database. I suspect that Google's engineers will have designed it with various heuristics that mean it will only ever perform optimisation for a subset of your code and to only consume a relative proportion of resources. You might be able to encourage optimisation of a few of what you consider performance critical sections of your code, but like all such optimisations it will be highly dependent on how the V8 engine is implemented. You'd be much better off trying to simplify your code rather than trying to game one particular JavaScript engine.
Yes I agree.
But as with indexes on database columns, or manually inlining functions, it would be nice to have some control of where the optimization is done. There are many functions (say collision detection in a game) that don't get called all the time but would nice to keep super optimized and fast.
Sounds like the same principles used in Java's HotSpot virtual machine. It performs further optimisation on code that is being called frequently, although in the case of Java bytecode it's working on a much lower abstraction than JavaScript code. That said, with things like GWT, JavaScript is becoming more of an "intermediate" language than something you program directly in.
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