Please take me off the CC list for this thread.
At Fri, 13 Jun 2025 20:34:59 -0400 (EDT) Vladimir Dergachev <volo...@mindspring.com> wrote: > > > > On Sat, 14 Jun 2025, Carsten Haitzler wrote: > > >> > >> This is a Dell, it has an integrated Intel GPU and and NVidia one. I > >> usually don't use NVidia GPU - too much heat and no visible benefit. > >> > >> The NVidia chip is Geforce MX 130, 2 GB RAM. > > > > what intel chip/gpu? > > Intel Core i7-8550U > > >> > >> I found that restarting kwin and restarting plasmashell helps, and also > >> occasionally I kill firefox and restart it. The latter is a nuisance, > >> because while it does try to restore windows and tabs it does not restore > >> all of them. > > > > this smells of some kind of leak? where? ... dunnos. > > Could be a leak, could be entropy (like fragmentation in memory). > > > > >> Btw, if you have the same problem there is a setting in about:config > >> that lets you increase timeout for reaching website. When you restart > >> firefox and it tries to open 300 windows with 10-15 tabs each, the urls > >> will timeout too early in default configuration. Change that setting fixes > >> it (mostly). > > > > i never restore tabs... when i close my browser.. i'm done. :) > > Except that nowadays you cannot easily run more than one browser instance. > > Somehow there is a drive to turn every app into an operating system. > Firefox has "about:processes" to let you find out what each window and tab > are doing because it all gets lumped irregularly by top. > > >> What's your screen resolution? Mine is 3840x2160, so a single full screen > >> buffer should be 33MB. A few hundred buffers and you would be out of RAM > >> on discrete GPU (and way earlier on my NVidia chip). > > > > 2560x1440. i do have 16gb ram on the card - but ... how many windows do you > > have normally around... and are they all "maximized" ? as it's a window that > > consumes a buffer. > > Firefox is usually maximized. I think right now I have around 120 Firefox > windows. > > > > >>> what's your working style? put 50+ windows on a single desktop and > >>> "alt+tab" > >>> between them? > >> > >> I got 8 virtual screens, and a bunch of windows on each of them. Most are > >> firefox. > > > > and how many ffox windows? > > > >> What happens is that I work on something and it usually involves 10-20 > >> windows, but then I have to pause or wait for one reason or another and > >> I switch to something else. > > > > 10-20 is not too much. and at your fullscreen 33m per window that's > > ~300-700m - > > so not a problem for memory usage. even if you run out of vram the gpu can > > migrate some buffers/textures to system ram and map them over the pcie bus > > as > > render targets. its a bit slower. it might not migrate and just alloc new > > buffers there never migrating lesser used ones off. that'd be a "poor > > caching > > algorithm" :) > > It's 10-20 times the number of different things I work on. So it adds up. > > > > >> It is very convenient that I just leave things as they are and then I just > >> come back and pick up where I left off. Often I minimize the windows > >> because I only got 8 virtual screens - its a compromise for space in KDE > >> panel. > >> > >> Looking at xrestop right now, kwin has 69 pixmaps and uses 2.7GB RAM, > >> while firefox has 276 pixmaps and only 300MB RAM. There are a bunch of > >> other windows, mostly konsole. Compositing is on right now. I am pretty > >> sure firefox has a lot more than 69 windows. > > > > you said like 10-20 windows above? > > No, no, not 10-20 total, but 10-20 at a time. So I am using 10-20 windows, > and another 100 or more I'll return to later. > > I think I counted around 120 firefox windows right now (not tabs, many of > the windows have multiple). I am travelling, so fewer than usual. > > > > 69 windows? or 69 tabs? i just opened 18 > > Actually I got it wrong - the KDE Plasma has 69 pixmaps, kwin has 199. I > don't know what kwin uses pixmaps for, but I would imagine it needs at > least one per window. > > > maximized terminals. also have this email client (2 windows) plus hexchat + > > chromium ... e uses about 330m with 25 pixmaps but reality is pixmaps are > > really only for the windows and nothing else - everything else is rendered > > inside the compositor with gl (or software) and thus is part of texture > > atlases etc. nvtop says e uses 440m of video memory which makes sense > > (2 screens, each 2560x1440). it'd be 270m just for the terminal textures > > mapped > > in (shared between x and the client and compositor), as well as wallpaper, > > other icons/buffers and backbuffers for rendering (90m for backbuffers for > > both > > screen if triple buffered). so all in all 440m doesn't sound wrong to me. > > 18 terminals are too small a test. Does it work if you open 1000 ? > > It makes sense that if you expect users to have no problem handling 100 > windows, you need to test with at least an order of magnitude more. > > >>> > >>> they are the same really as a composited x11. no real difference at all. > >> > >> Naively, if all the windows always have a buffer than 8GB GPU can only > >> afford 242 4K windows. And you don't get more memory in consumer GPUs > >> because they will then compete with AI market devices. > > > > ??? the default for consumer gpu's is 16g these days. 8g is a low end "cut > > price" gpu. the latest gen of gpu's is now more pushing towards 24/32g. > > They are all "cut price" right now - you cannot buy 24/32gb, at least in > stores near me. The companies do this on purpose for market segmentation. > > And on a notebook the RAM and bandwidth are even smaller. > > Also, right now Microsoft is very busy alienating a lot of people with > computers without TPM that cannot upgrade to new Windows version. > > Those people are happily installing Linux and we should not impose > requirements of more than 8GB video RAM just to open some webpages. > > >>> if its a 1-off "screenshot then display a copy of it and just scale that > >>> up" > >>> then there are wayland protocols for that - but the idea is that > >>> screenshotting protocol access will be limited and a compositor may do a > >>> very android/ios thing of ask you to grant permission first. > >> > >> I hate the permission stuff on android. The worst is that they've taken to > >> removing permissions from apps when you don't use them. So you have some > > > > so you're happy with rogue games you run screenshotting your browser with > > banking details and sending it back to home? :) > > This problem only arises on Android and IOS because they are designed for > closed source apps and for controlling the user. > > On Linux there is no such problem as long as you use software you can > examine. > > On Android you could improve things immeasurably if open source apps were > installed with complete user access to app directory (to check which > binary actually shipped) and no permission restrictions. > > > > > that's the point of this. the point is that the display system should stop > > being a leak of info/security. it cant force you to sandbox apps... but it > > can > > STOP being the problem that makes sandboxing ineffective. > > I would actually argue that X is very secure, and gotten more secure over > the years. > > Why? Because before 2000 you often had multiple users on the same system. > And now I have several systems and I am the only user. They are on the > same network that I control, and there is no way to access those sessions. > > The only potential problem comes from Firefox, and is really mostly due to > javascript. And, as I see, Firefox developers (and authors of uBlock > and noScript) are on top of it. > > > > >> app that you use once a month and then you have to debug why it does not > >> work. Especially sucks if you need to take a quick snapshot with a thermal > >> camera or a similar tool. > > > > and this is the current problem area - how to grant permission AND keep it > > granted persistently. > > It is a very simple problem - you have an xmag/kmag like app. You examine > code. You see it does not send screenshots to some random IP or random > country. You install it and use with no restrictions. > > Same goes for screenshot app, WaylandVNC (if it exists), screen recorder > and so on. And you can let Neko run around your screen as well. > > >> A lot of it is pointless anyway - the apps that do shady stuff will find a > >> way anyway, and the users of good apps are just getting annoyed. > > > > and on the flip side if you go to a lot of effort to sandbox an app in a > > container or a smack label (read up on them) that then quite effectively > > limits > > that app - the display system is a massive leaking hole you cant plug... and > > this is one of the things wayland wants to address and does. > > My number one step now after installing Kubuntu is to "de-snap" Firefox > and install a debian package. > > >> Screenshot is not perfect - you really want a video, so you can play an > >> animation. > > > > a screenshot is just 1 frame of a video... that is how zoom, teams and every > > video conf app works now today. they keep taking screenshots repeatedly and > > quickly. that's how they can "share my screen" over that video conference... > > they grab these frames then encode them into a video stream - on the fly. > > they > > do that in x11 today... > > Yes, but ideally you could do it in such a way as to guarantee a frame > every 1/N seconds and also guarantee that a frame is fully rendered to > avoid tearing. This is something that I think X cannot do right now. > > > > >> Another useful tool is screen recorder like vokoscreenNG - with it you can > >> record your talk to be played back later. Again, you want the ability to > >> record a video of the screen. > > > > guess how those work too... :) see above :) > > I was just giving an example of apps you want to have full screen access. > > > > > then this is certainly something your vnc viewer should support IMHO. as how > > much you want to scale THAT session may vary from target to target it is > > connecting to... and it should remember such scale settings machine by > > machine > > you register/connect to. the compositor has no clue what is inside that > > app's > > window. in wayland or x11. it's the app's business. > > Not really - I just run x11vnc on the remote and connect to it. I don't > start a new session, and I don't change fonts. Very handy, both to help > someone else and to use your desktop when you are away. > > best > > Vladimir Dergachev > > > -- Robert Heller -- Cell: 413-658-7953 GV: 978-633-5364 Deepwoods Software -- Custom Software Services http://www.deepsoft.com/ -- Linux Administration Services hel...@deepsoft.com -- Webhosting Services
