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Startup and shutdown profiling

September 22, 2010 · by Petter Nilsen

This snapshot introduces our new startup and shutdown profiling. This is a tool for us to get an overview on what is causing slow startup and shutdowns for some users. We hope this tool will let us gather some data on where we should focus our efforts on further improving startup performance.

If the below instructions seem difficult then you probably should not attempt it. But if your comfortable with running the commands, and Opera is slow to startup or shutdown, then please follow the below instructions.

Instructions for Windows
  1. Press Windows key + R
  2. Drag the Opera shortcut from your Desktop or the opera.exe and drop it on the Run dialog
  3. Append "-profilinglog c:\log\opera.txt" after the path (as shown below)
  4. Wait for Opera to fully startup before you quit it
Instructions for Mac OS
  1. Run the Terminal application (locate using Spotlight)
  2. Drag the Opera application to Terminal
  3. Append "/Contents/MacOS/Opera -profilinglog ~/Desktop/opera.txt"
  4. Wait for Opera to fully startup before you quit it

Instructions for Linux
  1. Run "opera -profilinglog ~/opera.txt"
  2. Wait for Opera to fully startup before you quit it

You can then submit your unmodified log file as a text file attachment to DSK-314250@bugs.<yourfavoritebrowser>.com. Make sure to include it as an attachment and not in the mail body as attachments will be easier for us to process in volume.

No personal information is stored in the logs. Full logs submitted as blog comments will be deleted.

WARNING: This is a development snapshot: It contains the latest changes, but may also have severe known issues, including crashes and data loss situations. In fact, it may not work at all.

Download

Changelog
Desktop
  • Startup and shutdown profiling through "-profilinglog" argument

Mac
  • DSK-313808 (Some dialogs hides the main window when loosing focus)

Readers' comments

Comments left by My Opera members under the original post: the first 50, as archived.

  • decodedthought22. September 2010, 14:38

    Opera uses alot of RAM on ubuntu compared to that in Windows :(
    say I open 11 tabs and then close 6 of them, it uses around 500MB+ but it is not the same case with Windows !

  • bachokocho22. September 2010, 14:45

    Hi, Petter!
    Could you tell us more about the info that this tool will gather?
    In case somebody doesn't want you to know what kind of naked people he/she likes to watch but still would like to help the desktop team :lol:

  • yossariane22. September 2010, 14:46

    I don't have win key ;)

  • Tamil22. September 2010, 14:47

  • Joel22. September 2010, 14:49

    The first time I ran the installer, I got this error:

    Error 1722. There is a problem with this Windows Installer package. A program run as part of the setup did not finish as expected. Contact your support personnel or package vendor. Action SetDefaultBrowser, location: ... \opera.exe, comman...

    After running the installer again, it looks like it installed correctly though.

  • Daniel Aleksandersen22. September 2010, 14:50

    Originally posted by bachokocho:

    Could you tell us more about the info that this tool will gather?
    In case somebody doesn't want you to know what kind of naked people he/she likes to watch

    “No personal information is stored in the logs.” You can open the text file in your favourite editor to see what is included. It is just a list of different modules inside Opera and how long they take to start.

  • pursanovd22. September 2010, 14:51

    Originally posted by bachokocho:

    Could you tell us more about the info that this tool will gather?


    Open the log file and see all yourself. The profiling tool is really good thing for debug, hope it wont slow down the overall browser :) You sure need more such tools like Test Pilot from Mozilla's team.

  • Nico22. September 2010, 14:51

    I will definitely do this, once I am back home.
    All in all, I have no real issues with Opera's startup and shutdown time, but the cold start could be a little bit faster, so I'll participate.


    Good luck with gathering the data!

  • Robert9022. September 2010, 14:53

    Is this profiler permanent or is it a temporary "tool" to debug the startup and shutdown problems? I can imagine the profiler makes the startup also slower because it has to time and log everything so it would be counter effective if it stays in after the problems are solved.

  • HyaeneLeipzig22. September 2010, 14:54

    Originally posted by spadija:

    The first time I ran the installer, I got this error:

    Error 1722. There is a problem with this Windows Installer package. A program run as part of the setup did not finish as expected. Contact your support personnel or package vendor. Action SetDefaultBrowser, location: ... \opera.exe, comman...

    After running the installer again, it looks like it installed correctly though.


    +1
    Win XP service pack 3

  • Daniel Aleksandersen22. September 2010, 14:58

    Originally posted by Robert90:

    Is this profiler permanent or is it a temporary "tool" to debug the startup and shutdown problems?

    It is only initialized with the -profilinglog argument. Starting Opera without it (normal startup) will not initialize the tool, make a log, or affect startup time.

  • Roman22. September 2010, 14:58

    Mod edit: Off-topic comment removed. Please do not use this blog post to ask for help.

  • prd322. September 2010, 15:05

    Mod edit: Off-topic comment removed.

  • ahgdipsd22. September 2010, 15:06

    speculations? FU!! mods are idiots!! what i post is FACTS. if you are too idiots to understand go hang your selfs!! check how chrome handles the images and learn..
    Mod edit: Off-topic comment removed. Please post logs rather than speculation.

  • nimu_chan22. September 2010, 15:07

    Oh. Thanks :happy:
    Now downloaded.

  • porneL22. September 2010, 15:09

    Easier way for Mac:
    open -a Opera --args -profilinglog ~/Desktop/opera.txt


    Moderator comment: Please don’t use this method if you have more than one Opera.app anywhere on your system.

  • Penge22. September 2010, 15:19

    Originally posted by daniel:

    It is just a list of different modules inside Opera and how long they take to start.


    Sometimes the software environment and the Windows event log also would be useful to the developers.
    Or is it wouldn't be so significant in terms of bugfixing?

  • Gousti Fruit22. September 2010, 15:20

    Ok, log sent :-) But Opera starts and shutdowns fast for me...

  • Enrico22. September 2010, 15:25

    Originally posted by spadija:

    Error 1722. There is a problem with this Windows Installer package. A program run as part of the setup did not finish as expected. Contact your support personnel or package vendor. Action SetDefaultBrowser, location: ... \opera.exe, comman...

    After running the installer again, it looks like it installed correctly though.


    I had the same problem :)

  • vasstr22. September 2010, 15:25

    opera sturtup slow when profile/cache is big, especially after crash opera will clean this dir and it take time.

  • Roman22. September 2010, 15:25

    Please do not use this blog post to ask for help.



    i wasn't asking for help. the question was if this behavior is a bug..
    did you read that posting before deleting?!

    thought this here is the place for bug hunting
    :irked:

  • Penge22. September 2010, 15:26

    Originally posted by spadija:

    Error 1722. There is a problem with this Windows Installer package. A program run as part of the setup did not finish as expected. Contact your support personnel or package vendor. Action SetDefaultBrowser, location: ... \opera.exe, comman...


    Confirmed (Win7 x64)

  • Arayn Nyara22. September 2010, 15:34

    I wonder if the profiling takes windows caching into account...

  • Zotlan22. September 2010, 15:36

    Outstanding idea, startup has been very slow for me on Linux for some time now. Will submit some logs.

  • Jimmy Tsatsos22. September 2010, 15:41

    Originally posted by spadija:

    The first time I ran the installer, I got this error:

    Error 1722. There is a problem with this Windows Installer package. A program run as part of the setup did not finish as expected. Contact your support personnel or package vendor. Action SetDefaultBrowser, location: ... \opera.exe, comman...

    After running the installer again, it looks like it installed correctly though.


    +1 Windows 7 x64

  • Luis Tar Quince22. September 2010, 15:42

    "Error 1722. There is a problem with this Windows Installer package ..."

    +1 Windos XP SP3

    http://img521.imageshack.us/img521/5820/opera10709049inexeerror.png

  • joshas22. September 2010, 15:45

    Something changed in JS - this http://www.phoboslab.org/biolab/ game doesn't work. Looks like a problem with image loading.

  • MasterPhW22. September 2010, 15:45

    Originally posted by spadija:

    The first time I ran the installer, I got this error:

    Error 1722. There is a problem with this Windows Installer package. A program run as part of the setup did not finish as expected. Contact your support personnel or package vendor. Action SetDefaultBrowser, location: ... \opera.exe, comman...


    Win7 x64... but it seems it installed correctly.

  • Mark22. September 2010, 15:53

    Can someone explain the tag "Damer"?

  • Art Vandelay22. September 2010, 15:54

    Interesting tool. It showed me that loading my history took quite some time (slightly more than 1s) so I lowered Max Global History Lines to 20,000 (from 50,000) and now it starts up slightly faster.

    Perhaps the profiling log should contain that kind of performance-sensitive config settings?

  • Kai Ockendorf22. September 2010, 15:58

    log sent :up:

  • Enrico22. September 2010, 15:59

    Sent :yes:

  • fmbb22. September 2010, 16:03

    391 ms - + gadgets

  • r2151422. September 2010, 16:03

    What about Windows XP SP1 and less support?

  • RSD22. September 2010, 16:05

    Do you want us to start Opera and close it? Or should we use Opera as always before we close it?

  • Luchio22. September 2010, 16:06

    Should we sent logs even if Opera is not that slow to load?

  • Charles Schloss22. September 2010, 16:07

    Mac Intel build 9050

    Open Apple n does not work (for a new window, it is a grey box)

    but when I click the grey area I get the speeddial window

  • Dr0N22. September 2010, 16:09

    Originally posted by spadija:

    The first time I ran the installer, I got this error:

    Error 1722. There is a problem with this Windows Installer package. A program run as part of the setup did not finish as expected. Contact your support personnel or package vendor. Action SetDefaultBrowser, location: ... \opera.exe, comman...

    After running the installer again, it looks like it installed correctly though.


    Confirmed. Win7 x86 Ult. I tried run MSI installer and overwrite 9050 build.

    Sorry for my bad english.

  • Cutting Spoon22. September 2010, 16:11

    Opera spends an inordinate time cleaning the cache and releasing memory on shutdown. With more than 100 tabs open, we're talking minutes. If there were some way to restructure the processing of cache files (like in the background while Opera is running...?), both startup and shutdown would be faster.

    EDIT: Though honestly Opera is quite fast to load with so many tabs open, a fact I was happy to see echoed in Tom's Hardware's heavy-load test.

  • Penge22. September 2010, 16:13

    New bug or feature:

    1: Open the Notes panel
    2: Click to any existing note item.
    3: Click to the empty area of notes list.
    4: New note item created.

    Works also with left and right mouse click.

    If it's feature it really annoying. Anyone confirm?

  • Joel22. September 2010, 16:16

    Originally posted by joshas:

    Something changed in JS - this http://www.phoboslab.org/biolab/ game doesn't work.


    That started with 9046. Already reported as DSK-313659 and I got an email back from Daniel Davis saying the report would make its way to the right developers to be fixed.

  • Daniel Aleksandersen22. September 2010, 16:23

    Originally posted by Luchio:

    Should we sent logs even if Opera is not that slow to load?

    This is not necessary. The logs would not show anything interesting.

    Originally posted by Chas4:

    Open Apple n does not work (for a new window, it is a grey box)

    but when I click the grey area I get the speeddial window

    Known regression that started one or two builds ago.

  • sebt22. September 2010, 16:26

    Since build 9046 under Windows XP SP1 I am getting this error box when running Opera:

    Failed to load Opera.DLL because:
A dynamic link library (DLL) initialization routine failed.

    Opera does not load after OKing this error. Opera 10.62 release and earlier builds work just fine on the same machine. What's up?

    Seb :)

  • Muhammad Ubaid raza22. September 2010, 16:29

    Log sent... :yes: now do it quickly... :p

  • Uesuauos22. September 2010, 16:33

    "The first time I ran the installer, I got this error:

    Error 1722. There is a problem with this Windows Installer package. A program run as part of the setup did not finish as expected. Contact your support personnel or package vendor. Action SetDefaultBrowser, location: ... \opera.exe, comman...    "

    idem (win XP SP3) and moreover I got an error message (windows couldn't open this program...) after having added "-profilinglog c:\log\opera.txt" after the path and validated.

  • belthur22. September 2010, 16:42

    Log sent :)

  • belthur22. September 2010, 16:43

    Tried. Unable to duplicate.

  • OperaDrBruce22. September 2010, 16:43

    So, [email protected]?

    :lol: Log sent.

  • Roman22. September 2010, 16:48

    switching languages doesn't work for folder names in panels like 'history' or 'notes' (ie. trash can) + tool tips on panel. it applies after restarting opera..
    and does not work at all for widgets.
    can someone confirm?
    (debian, lenny, x64, e17)

  • Cutting Spoon22. September 2010, 16:55

    Originally posted by WillYum:

    more crashes then a teen who discovers an abandoned beer truck.


    I assume that like any good teen, this person discovered the truck by running into it with a car stolen from the neighbor?

About this article

Published inDesktop Team blog
DateSeptember 22, 2010
AuthorPetter Nilsen
Tagsperformance, snapshot, damer, 10.70
OriginalInternet Archive

The Red O » Developers » Desktop Team blog » Startup and shutdown profiling

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