What makes browser configs so storage hungry / how to minimize?
 

Unlike a Windows user, my configs are in ram, 10s of mb each browser. Why are they so large? Do they contain unnecessary data?

Well, we cannot even tell what you are asking about.

What OS and version? What browser and version? What hardware and how much RAM? How do you know the browser is using all the ram? Configs do not remain in ram, they tell the app how to operate but do not themselves take space.

If you really want assistance then provide enough info to be actually informative and usable.

Why don't you look? Reference the numerous other threads you've posted about browsers and 'security':
https://www.linuxquestions.org/quest...ta-4175705618/
https://www.linuxquestions.org/quest...el-4175705017/
https://www.linuxquestions.org/quest...id-4175701934/
https://www.linuxquestions.org/quest...rs-4175700926/

Not sure what you're trying to ask/accomplish with such questions, or why you can't provide any sort of details.

Taking a chance...

I am operating from the premise of common knowledge, the same way people in the same culture make a bunch of assumptions.

I also do it in plainspeak, so if you're in a more advanced culture, anything I write should be easy for you.

Browsers are browsers, and every full-featured one I use has configuration data -- a lot of it. I happen to usually use a distro where that data is stored on a ramdisk by default, but that is inconsequential because it could be anywhere. I can move it if I am willing to run the browser as root. Either way there is too much of it.

So there's no need to be really specific. Take any of the top 10 distro families. If they dispense with or minimize browser config data, that would be a useful insight.

There's nothing working abnormally, it's just inefficient and seems technically unnecessary. It's also not anything broken that demands fixing.

If you work on a high spec machine, this phenomena persists and is still wasteful, but you won't notice it.

My firefox profile folder takes 98,351 bytes. That's approximately one tenth of one megabyte, not tens of megabytes.

What exactly are you talking about, maybe if you're more specific someone can guess...

Just out of curiosity what distributions do you usually use?

As a frame of reference of the distributions I run I typically use firefox and nothing is stored in a ramdisk.

The default profile is located at /home/username/.mozilla/firefox

The cache is located at /home/username/.cache/mozilla/firefox

My profile is 336M but that depends on how many bookmarks and passwords etc you have saved and the cache is about 1.1 GB at the moment. The size of the cache can be changed.

To see how much RAM is being used for both tabs and extensions you can view it at about:performance

firefox can at times be a memory or CPU hog so here are a few things to check:
https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb...-cpu-resources

I am seeking 'already know, got it' knowledge here specifically.

(as opposed to someone trying to wrap their head around my problem)

This is my Firefox config directory with ZERO surfing. I just ran the browser.

It's 13.4 MB, and that's low. I normally have to deal with a multiple of that, per browser.

If you have all your config settings saved in < 100k that doesn't balloon, that is what I want.

If you can attest your experience is normal, I live on another planet.

Most of the time I am in a version of Puppy. The default DE is JWM, but unlike most others I also use XFCE half the time.

Ramdisk is how Puppy frugally installed works. It's brilliant, but not foolproof.

Alas, I am not concerned about the location of the config, but its size.

Apples:Apples I hope we're comparing the same data. I don't know how your profile would be so large. My profiles at moment are in ram, so 336M would be choking this 2G 32-bit machine.

I have massive configs in Tor but not Firefox. Browser profiles are usually in the 10s of MB.

Well, I guess that your hardware is really the issue. 2G ram and running puppy in a ramdisk on a 32 bit machine makes things extremely tight. That is an obscenely small device by today's standards and you have to tailor your apps to the resources available.

Just because you are using that old a machine does not mean that browsers are using too much storage. There are several browsers that easily run with limited resources (ram) although they are also limited in performance and may not function well with all web sites that are designed for modern browsers. Firefox is obviously one to avoid when limited in available ram. I don't use any of those archaic browsers so cannot give pointers, but in general I can say your choice of hardware is the limitation and not the browser.

Well, bookmarks, cookies, browsing history, site data, form history etc are all stored in that directory. If that is what you mean by config data then yes it will normally grow depending on your browsing usage and sites you visit. You can check the settings to see which sites store the most amount of data and block them but I don't know if it is possible to turn it off completely.

Your question is

• imprecise: "each browser" - we need to know which browser(s).
• vague: "my configs" can mean anything. I suppose you mean the profile folder & the cache, but why should I play guessing game with you?
• misleading: "in ram" - unless you specify that you're using puppy, which loads most of the OS into RAM afaik (possibly not a good idea if you have so little RAM), the statement "in ram" is just confusing
• too broad: there's no clear answer (esp. given the other points above) to your actual questions.

You did clarify now, but only after being pressed, and you snapping at the person(s) who requested additional clarification.

And this is a pattern with all your threads.
____

FWIW, my Firefox' cache is about 370MB, my profile folder is 485MB and it currently uses close to 1GB of RAM.
Unfortunately this is considered normal nowadays, for all major browsers on all OSs.

Really, you should consider getting a better machine. It doesn't have to be new; at least in my country, it would be easy to get something significantly newer & more powerful for free, or just a few credits.

BTW, I think you have a persecution fetish.
Nobody is out to get you, or "cyber-harrassing" you.
You really need to chill.

In my experience, YouTube.

The issue is that the browser cache simply grows as you browse and usually exists in RAM and on disk - e.g. when you click "back", it doesn't access the browser cache on disk, but the one in RAM. In your case, it's all in RAM due to your specific configuration - and the main persistent cache just grows and grows. You will run out of memory quickly with that setup.

By contrast the actual configuration data is probably a few MBs, but that varies as well.

As per your other thread regarding the CPU fan - the problems you have are specific to your ageing low end, 16 year old hardware and OS configuration (to use a ramdisk).

Cache and config are separate directories.

The extensive data compromising a browser config is the issue.

I'll have to look into what comprises "site data", but overall I can't see what would use up 10s of megabytes. Bookmarks, forms, and cookies don't seem like they could be that data hungry.

In my current Firefox config I can see .so library files into the MB, and there's one .sqlite database file that's 15MB, or about 45% of the total 34MB config.

Seems like the chief culprit are databases and libraries, which doesn't surprise me as repository databases can be large like that. It also doesn't seem to be common knowledge what they're for.

Aside: Is there a way to block the mobbers so they don't see my posts and/or I don't see theirs? They don't have a will to answer my questions but ad hominem criticize what they don't like or understand.