Mozilla Firefox was awesome when it first came out. At the time, it was really the only tabbed based browser around. Well, the only one worth a damn. But with today’s browser technology, it’s being surpassed.
As some of you may know, I’m updating the core coding to webmodelsindex.com to use less server resources, and to speed up response time. Especially during peak days and hours. I’m doing this by reducing the number of calls to the MySQL server, as well as creating a cache of the pages on the site. Not all the pages will need to be cached. But the main ones, the ones that use MySQL more than the others, will be cached. I’m glad to report that the coding framework is done, and works exactly the way I want it to.
This is where Firefox comes in. When I load a page that has not be cached yet in Firefox, it loads the way it should. I get the same results with Google Chrome, Opera, Safari, Internet Explorer and SeaMonkey. However, once the page is cached (meaning, it does zero database calls. It loads the page as if it’s just basic html), and compressed before being sent to the browser, Firefox is way behind in load times.
A cached and compressed page being sent through Chrome, Opera, Safari, IE and SeaMonkey, all load in under 120ms. That’s a little less than 1/8th a second in speed. But in Firefox? That evil little bastard takes it’s time, and won’t actually display the page until everything is loaded. That means all javascript, images, etc.. Making it 13 times slower than other browsers out today.
Solution? Don’t use Firefox when browsing my site. Besides, Google Chrome blows it away anyways. Even Internet Explorer performs better than Firefox does these days, and that’s saying a lot.
So here’s a small screen shot of the new version of the site. Click it for a larger version.
All of you who don’t actually have a free account on webmodelsindex.com, you’ll notice some numbers on the top left of the images. Those are the ratings. Though I’m sure that was kinda obvious 
The new version of the site will open up voting for everyone. Pretty much like the original version of the site. Of course people were asshats back then, and would connect with proxies and such just to be able to vote over and over and over, to cheat the system and put the models they liked the most on top, and downgrade any model above them in votes. I expect we’ll have the same problem again, but hey, don’t care. Though I could just disable the vote system for anyone who connects via a proxy. Which more than likely I’ll do.
When the new version goes live, all current accounts before the transition will automatically be promoted in rank. So if you haven’t signed up yet, now’s the time. Besides, it’s free. No reason not to.
Anyways, I’m curious about what browsers you guys use. Leave a comment below with what browser you currently use the most, and why you use it. As for me, I mainly use Chrome. It’s clean, fast, secure, AdBlock works for it, has great debugging options, and even has a task manager.
