666586 - High memory usage (+1GB) on gmail with many add-ons

Status: RESOLVED INVALID

(Firefox :: General, defect)

Description

[Leandro Santiago]

User-Agent:       Mozilla/5.0 (X11; Linux x86_64; rv:5.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/5.0
Build Identifier: Mozilla/5.0 (X11; Linux x86_64; rv:5.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/5.0

After some hours os even minutes opening and closing tabs, firefox consumes lots of memory. In this point, it becomes slow (it's being hard type this text, it freeze everytime).

The extensions I have installed: 
- firebug
- firepicker
- session manager
- global menu bar integration (unity)
- grafx bot
- jsonview
- lesschrome hd
- open in browser
- password exporter
- search preview
- test pilot
- spelling check "verificador ortográfico para o portugues do brasil"
- web developer

And I also have other extensions installed, but they are disabled.

Now I have only three tabs opened; gmail, about:memory and this bug report. The htop command says about firefox consumed memory:

VIRT    RES     SHR
2242MB  1269MB  31260

The about:memory output says:

Memory mapped:
1,281,359,872
          
Memory in use:
1,234,261,300

Other Information
Description       Value

malloc/allocated 1,234,269,492
malloc/mapped 1,281,359,872
malloc/committed 1,281,359,872
malloc/dirty 2,064,384
js/gc-heap 307,232,768
js/string-data 19,880,526
js/mjit-code 22,211,916
storage/sqlite/pagecache 13,132,184
storage/sqlite/other 1,905,488
storage/extensions.sqlite/LookAside_Used 496
storage/extensions.sqlite/Cache_Used 528,784
storage/extensions.sqlite/Schema_Used 11,184
storage/extensions.sqlite/Stmt_Used 193,264
images/chrome/used/raw 0
images/chrome/used/uncompressed 334,952
images/chrome/unused/raw 0
images/chrome/unused/uncompressed 0
images/content/used/raw 25,076,448
images/content/used/uncompressed 25,382,436
images/content/unused/raw 0
images/content/unused/uncompressed 0
storage/permissions.sqlite/LookAside_Used 25
storage/permissions.sqlite/Cache_Used 99,584
storage/permissions.sqlite/Schema_Used 2,056
storage/permissions.sqlite/Stmt_Used 6,776
layout/all 27,242,036
layout/bidi 320
gfx/surface/image 14,678,112
storage/addons.sqlite/LookAside_Used 266
storage/addons.sqlite/Cache_Used 297,664
storage/addons.sqlite/Schema_Used 6,968
storage/addons.sqlite/Stmt_Used 75,680
storage/search.sqlite/LookAside_Used 16
storage/search.sqlite/Cache_Used 99,568
storage/search.sqlite/Schema_Used 2,000
storage/search.sqlite/Stmt_Used 1,960
storage/formhistory.sqlite/LookAside_Used 325
storage/formhistory.sqlite/Cache_Used 198,632
storage/formhistory.sqlite/Schema_Used 2,664
storage/formhistory.sqlite/Stmt_Used 105,928
storage/content-prefs.sqlite/LookAside_Used 35
storage/content-prefs.sqlite/Cache_Used 198,632
storage/content-prefs.sqlite/Schema_Used 4,024
storage/content-prefs.sqlite/Stmt_Used 9,632
storage/places.sqlite/LookAside_Used 785
storage/places.sqlite/Cache_Used 4,624,992
storage/places.sqlite/Schema_Used 78,392
storage/places.sqlite/Stmt_Used 439,896
storage/cookies.sqlite/LookAside_Used 41
storage/cookies.sqlite/Cache_Used 1,453,224
storage/cookies.sqlite/Schema_Used 2,960
storage/cookies.sqlite/Stmt_Used 12,752
storage/downloads.sqlite/LookAside_Used 30
storage/downloads.sqlite/Cache_Used 99,576
storage/downloads.sqlite/Schema_Used 2,824
storage/downloads.sqlite/Stmt_Used 6,704
storage/signons.sqlite/LookAside_Used 147
storage/signons.sqlite/Cache_Used 297,664
storage/signons.sqlite/Schema_Used 4,520
storage/signons.sqlite/Stmt_Used 36,432
storage/webappsstore.sqlite/LookAside_Used 136
storage/webappsstore.sqlite/Cache_Used 1,816,752
storage/webappsstore.sqlite/Schema_Used 6,352
storage/webappsstore.sqlite/Stmt_Used 64,984
storage/chromeappsstore.sqlite/LookAside_Used 130
storage/chromeappsstore.sqlite/Cache_Used 198,976
storage/chromeappsstore.sqlite/Schema_Used 6,352
storage/chromeappsstore.sqlite/Stmt_Used 64,184
content/canvas/2d_pixel_bytes 7,605,376
storage/urlclassifier3.sqlite/LookAside_Used 329
storage/urlclassifier3.sqlite/Cache_Used 2,806,904
storage/urlclassifier3.sqlite/Schema_Used 4,240
storage/urlclassifier3.sqlite/Stmt_Used 100,944

Reproducible: Always


Actual Results:  
Firefox consumes more than 1GB of memory

Comment 1

[Tyler Downer [He/Him]]

Can you please create a fresh profile, 
http://support.mozilla.com/kb/Managing+profiles and test there?

Comment 2

[George Carstoiu]

Mozilla/5.0 (X11; Linux i686; rv:7.0a1) Gecko/20110630 Firefox/7.0a1

Leandro, did you get around to try what Tyler suggested in Comment 1?

Comment 3

[Nicholas Nethercote [inactive]]

I wonder if bug 656120 will help here.

Comment 4

[George Carstoiu]

Mozilla/5.0 (X11; Linux i686; rv:8.0a1) Gecko/20110720 Firefox/8.0a1

Considering the high number of addons that you have installed it's normal to have a high amount of memory occupied, although not as much as you've reported.

I think bug 656120 will help in this department. From what I see the its patch has already landed so you could see a memory improvement in Firefox 7, which is in Aurora right now.

Please try a Fx7 build and report back.

Thanks!

Comment 5

[Leandro Santiago]

I "resolved" this problem:
- exporting my bookmarks;
- creating a new profile,
- importing the exported bookmarks
- installing the previous addons in the new profile.

Now firefox is working almost fine (without the memory leaks). Many people recomended to do it as a solution, but I don't think it's a good solution. Not for most users.  My sugestion (do I need do open a new widh report?) is: every firefox major change, a new profile is created and the previous configurations (bookmarks, history and addons) reinstalled. Automatically, not manually.

As now mozilla is releasing new firefox version in few weeks, I don't think most users will accept the idea of creating a new profile and reinstall their addons each few weeks.

Comment 6

[Leandro Santiago]

(In reply to comment #2)
> Mozilla/5.0 (X11; Linux i686; rv:7.0a1) Gecko/20110630 Firefox/7.0a1
> 
> Leandro, did you get around to try what Tyler suggested in Comment 1?

Yes, I tried (and sorry for the delay). It resolved my problem.

Comment 7

[Tyler Downer [He/Him]]

You shouldn't need to create a new profile, that isn't normal behavior. What I suspect is perhaps one of your addons corrupted the old profile. We are working on tolls to clean and repair and migrate profiles however. But no, there is no need to create a new profile for every major version. But I am glad that resolved the issue for you. njn, should we close or do you want to investigate further?

Comment 8

[Nicholas Nethercote [inactive]]

Let's close this.  I'm pretty sure there's other work going on to fix the profile problems.