Timing, Turning off Checks
Originally the new checking method was meant to replace manual checks only. But the more I worked on it, the more I wanted it to replace the automatic checks, too. It wasn’t easy, but eventually I figured out a way to do that and—in the process—significantly reduce the amount of network activity and CPU cycles required by LiveClick. As an added bonus, several features suddenly became very easy to implement, most of which have been longstanding goals of mine.
Turn off automatic, startup checks
Starting with LiveClick 0.4.0.0, you’ll be able to turn off automatic checks. That means the Live Bookmarks service won’t consume your computer’s resources while you’re browsing. If you want your Live Bookmarks updated, you can manually request a check from the Live Bookmarks menu or LiveClick’s toolbar button.
LiveClick 0.4.0.0 also allows you to turn off the startup check. This will help people who frequently use Firefox for quick sessions (e.g. doing a simple search on Google or checking their email) and hate the Live Bookmarks service getting in the way.
Both of these settings can be enabled via LiveClick’s Options.
Turn off checks
Turn off startup, automatic checks via LiveClick’s Options.
Suspend automatic checking
Live Bookmarks can also be bothersome when you’re using Firefox to compose a blog post, watch a video, or anything else that requires your complete attention. With LiveClick 0.4.0.0, you’ll be able to temporarily suspend automatic checking by clicking the option from the Live Bookmarks menu or LiveClick’s toolbar button. Simply click the option again to resume checking. Automatic checks also resume when you next start Firefox, so you don’t need to worry about forgetting to turn them back on.
Additionally, LiveClick will suspend automatic checking when you enter Private Browsing and resume upon exiting it.
Suspend
Suspend automatic checking from the LiveClick toolbar button.
Between LiveClick’s new checker and these new features, I’ve had to explore and expand on the timing of the checks. Firefox depends on two variables to run the default checking mechanism. First, the global refresh interval tells Firefox how often to attempt a check. This can be set in about:config as browser.bookmarks.livemark_refresh_seconds. Second, each Live Bookmark has an expiration time, identifying the earliest date and time Firefox can request an update from that Live Bookmark’s feed.
For the most part, LiveClick manages to emulate this behavior, but with several key differences.
Startup check
Default Firefox behavior: Five seconds after Firefox starts, the expired Live Bookmarks are identified and each Live Bookmark is reloaded one at a time [1]. If a Live Bookmark successfully loaded, its new expiration time is set at one hour. If it failed, its expiration time is set at ten minutes. The next Live Bookmark must wait at least three seconds [2] before it attempts its reload. This process continues until all expired Live Bookmarks have been reloaded.
[Notes: 1, 2] These settings can be customized in about:config as browser.bookmarks.livemark_refresh_limit_count and browser.bookmarks.livemark_refresh_delay_time, respectively.
LiveClick 0.4.0.0: Fifteen seconds after Firefox starts, the expired Live Bookmarks are identified and queued for a check. Multiple checks may occur at the same time, but only one check is requested per second. Live Bookmarks are only reloaded if its respective check detects new items. Once all checks and reloads have been performed, new expiration times are set. If a Live Bookmark successfully loaded, its expiration time is the default interval (set through LiveClick’s Options) or its custom interval (set through the Live Bookmark’s properties dialog). If it failed, its expiration time is set at ten minutes.
LiveClick can also disable the startup check. If the startup check is disabled, but automatic checks are enabled, the initial check occurs five minutes after Firefox starts.
Automatic check
Default Firefox behavior: Every 60 minutes, the expired Live Bookmarks are identified and reloaded as defined above in the default startup check.
LiveClick 0.4.0.0: LiveClick attempts a check as soon as a Live Bookmark expires. Any Live Bookmarks that expire within a minute of that time are also queued for a check. At this point, checking proceeds like LiveClick 0.4.0.0’s startup check.
Resuming from suspend
Default Firefox behavior: N/A. Firefox can’t suspend automatic Live Bookmark checking.
LiveClick 0.4.0.0: LiveClick calculates when to schedule the next check based on the closest expiring Live Bookmark.
A few questions for you all:
1) Some of LiveClick 0.4.0.0’s times are arbitrary, some mimic Firefox’s timing. Do any of these—particularly the startup times—need to be changed?
2) The Live Bookmark properties dialog is getting a facelift in LiveClick 0.4.0.0, with the custom interval setting being changed from an unlimited textbox to a dropdown menu of predefined choices, pictured below. Are the timing options too many or too few?
Custom Intervals
Predefined choices for custom update intervals.
3) In order to implement these changes, LiveClick had to drop support for Firefox 3.0. For those of you still using Firefox 3.0, what’s keeping you from upgrading to Firefox 3.5 or 3.6?
Posted on Apr 28 2010 at 02:48 PM
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I’ve got a question since you mentioned 4.0 will have an option to have Firefox check at startup or not.
Will you be able to set a “startup delay” even if it’s only implemented as about:config option?
I’d love to have a startup delay of 3 minutes since startup before LiveClick kicks off Live Bookmark updates.
Posted by Ngamer01 on 04/30 at 11:31 AM
Oh sorry for the double post. One other thing: I’m trying out the Lorentz build since I’m tired of Live Bookmarks lagging Flash.
The bad news: Live Bookmark updates may be causing keyboard/mouse input lag in Flashes.
The good news: Flash animations no longer choke during Live Bookmark updates.
If LiveClick can help Lorentz out so that I can play Flash games without problems it would be awesome.
Posted by Ngamer01 on 04/30 at 11:34 AM
@cyruz: To be clear, LiveClick 0.4.0.0 will handle all checks (including the startup) one Live Bookmark at a time and will never attempt to reload them all at the same time. There are currently only the two options for updating, as pictured above, but I think they handle what you want. You’ll get a chance to test it soon and I expect you’ll let me know if more options are needed.
@Ngamer01: I am seriously considering an about:config preference for that. One of the reasons I wrote this post was because I was having a lot of trouble deciding on the exact timing of checks, so I might end up letting users set their own startup delay.
I can’t say whether Lorentz w/ Live Bookmarks is any improvement. I know the core issue still exists (Live Bookmarks is pretty demanding on the system, regardless of any isolated/prioritized tasks). I’m hoping to see some progress on this, but I haven’t heard much on the specific topic lately.
On the other hand, Flash games are a perfect test case for LiveClick’s new Suspend feature.
I’m trying to get LiveClick 0.4.0.0 ready for a beta run next week. It’s still a few days away. Thanks for the comments!
Posted by protejohnny on 04/30 at 01:25 PM
Awesome. I sure will, thanks for the reply. Looking forward to it. (:
Posted by cyruz on 04/30 at 01:28 PM
The menu almost has enough options. Most of my live bookmarks are webcomics which update at most once a day. Could you include an option to check once every 20 hours? 20 is better than 24 for daily checks because I don’t always start up Firefox at the same time every morning. With a 20 hour interval, if I check my bookmarks at 10AM on one day, then the next day when I check them at 8AM, they will still all load.
Posted by Michael Hurd on 05/09 at 08:35 AM
Michael: Unless there’s a sudden vocal demand for more options, I anticipate only using predefined intervals of between 10 minutes and 6 hours. For any other interval, you can select “Custom,” which lets specify another time in minutes, e.g. 1200 (20 hrs * 60 minutes).
Thanks for the input! Any other questions or suggestions, just let me know.
Posted by protejohnny on 05/10 at 08:07 AM
Wow, that’s a lot of work you put in. Thank you very much for that.
At the moment I am a little confused though: will I be able to have LiveClick set to immediately check for new items on startup, ideally using the new method of checking one entry at a time instead of all at once? I’d appreciate a short list of the settings I’ll have to check in order to get this done.
Do you have an ETA for 0.4?
About the questions: 1) Sounds fine to me, I’d have to try and see how it works out to confirm. 2) I think that menu is just fine, not too many, not too few choices. 3) I am already on 3.6.
Posted by cyruz on 04/29 at 02:43 AM