According to the usage statistics of user application from Microsoft, 60% of the time people spend on the PC is within the web browser. Google Chrome is a cross-platform web browser developed by Google based on Chromium project. According to StatCounter website stats, by January 2022, the market share of Chrome browser is over 63% across all platforms worldwide. 

Hybrid core architecture combining high performance cores and power-efficient cores became more and more popular, especially after Intel launched the Alder Lake CPU product. Performance cores are designed to provide maximum compute performance, while efficient cores are designed for maximum power efficiency. Usually OS schedulers can manage hybrid core scheduling, but they lack details of application behaviors, like critical paths. It’s difficult for OS schedulers to cover all scenarios. 

We come from the Web Optimization team, and focus on power and performance optimization for Web platforms, mainly Chromium, aiming for better user experience on IA. This article introduces our work to utilize hybrid core capability to schedule specific threads/processes’ execution in Chrome browser to efficient cores, which adopts dynamic policies to reduce power consumption on different levels based on device state. All the analysis and tests below are performed on the Chrome OS platform.

On the hybrid core platform, Chrome can schedule threads to efficient cores to save power consumption. However, putting browser threads on efficient cores all the time is impractical since lots of threads may surge and demand higher performance. So we propose a hybrid core scheduling technology in Chrome browser to apply dynamic throttles on specific non-critical threads through scheduling them to efficient cores to execute. The technology is based on Web runtime scenarios, like background/idle/ads/video, as the importance of threads would change in different scenarios. Moreover, device information, like battery/thermal status and hybrid core information, need to be exposed to Chrome. Based on them, hybrid core scheduling would apply different core allocation policies to balance power and performance. Normally we schedule low priority threads to efficient cores. But when the device is in a critical stage like running out of battery, the scheduling policy would be more aggressive to prolong device usage time. The application of scheduling policy relies on the OS support, and we can use thread priority or QoS mechanism according to the customs of the OS. On Chrome OS, currently we change thread priority and its cgroup association. Whole architecture of the proposal is shown in Figure 1.

Figure 1: hybrid core scheduling in Chrome browser

On the hybrid core platform, Chrome can schedule threads to efficient cores to save power consumption. However, putting browser threads on efficient cores all the time is impractical since lots of threads may surge and demand higher performance. So we propose a hybrid core scheduling technology in Chrome browser to apply dynamic throttles on specific non-critical threads through scheduling them to efficient cores to execute. The technology is based on Web runtime scenarios, like background/idle/ads/video, as the importance of threads would change in different scenarios. Moreover, device information, like battery/thermal status and hybrid core information, need to be exposed to Chrome. Based on them, hybrid core scheduling would apply different core allocation policies to balance power and performance. Normally we schedule low priority threads to efficient cores. But when the device is in a critical stage like running out of battery, the scheduling policy would be more aggressive to prolong device usage time. The application of scheduling policy relies on the OS support, and we can use thread priority or QoS mechanism according to the customs of the OS. On Chrome OS, currently we change thread priority and its cgroup association. Whole architecture of the proposal is shown in Figure 1.

The implementation of hybrid core scheduling technology mainly contains three parts, scenario detection, scheduling policy, and OS support work.

First we need to determine the current scenario of a process based on inputs from various browser components. For example, the Chrome render process has a status about background state, which indicates whether the process is foreground or background scenario. For another example, Chrome has an Ad Tagging mechanism to detect ads and the resources they load in the browser. Ad Tagging works by matching resource requests against a filter list to determine if they’re ad requests. An iframe will be marked as an ad iframe if its url matches the filter list, if the tagged script is involved in the creation of the iframe, or if its parent frame is an ad iframe. If all frames are ad frames, the render process would be tagged as an ad process. The browser collects all these inputs and uses a prioritization mechanism to decide the overall mode for the process. Based on the scenario, we adopt an appropriate scheduling policy next.

The scheduling policy varies based on the device status. As shown in Figure 1, the browser will monitor the power status of the device via APIs provided by the OS, including the battery level, charging status and the thermal state. For hybrid core scheduling, two stages are defined below.

The first one is the normal stage, which means the battery level is over 20% or the device is charging, meanwhile the thermal state is normal. In this stage, the users care more about the performance than power consumption, so we only schedule low priority threads/processes to efficient cores, like the background processes or the threads handling low priority tasks such as logging/profiling.

The second one is the critical stage, which means the battery level is very low without charging, or the device is in critical thermal states, or the web developer explicitly wants to enter power saving mode, like using battery-savings meta tag. In this stage, we’re going to apply more aggressive policies to save more power, prolong device usage time or avoid thermal throttling due to high CPU temperature. Under this circumstance, many threads/processes in normal priority will be scheduled to efficient cores as long as they are not involved in UX critical tasks.

There is some work required to be done to make Chrome utilize OS capability. Battery and thermal status are two important factors to UX. Based on them, Chrome could make appropriate policies to balance performance and power consumption. Previously, there was only battery status exposed to Chrome. Our team has landed a thermal status notification feature in Chrome. In the feature, we introduced 4 thermal levels: Nominal, Fair, Serious, and Critical referring to Apple’s Thermal Hinting API. So that Chrome can get the real-time thermal status. With battery level, charging and thermal status reported, Chrome would decide which stage to enter and apply different scheduling policies.

Furthermore, we have built a bridge between Chrome threads and efficient cores on Chrome OS using the existing cgroup mechanism. Background priority threads are placed in a specific cgroup, which has a specified CPU set. On hybrid core platforms, efficient cores are likely to be allocated for the group. So if we want to schedule unimportant threads to efficient cores to execute, we can lower the thread priority and put them in the non-urgent cgroup. The scheduling is dynamic. When the threads become important (e.g. switch to foreground), we would raise the thread priority to normal right away, hence remove from the specific cgroup.

We use the local build Chromium browser to evaluate the power impact of hybrid core scheduling per each scenario, currently focusing on background renderer processes, ads processes, and idle processes (idle is a state defined in the Chrome RAIL model). According to the experiments performed on Alder Lake Chromebook, we observe 4.2% CPU package power reduction for web browsing when scheduling idle processes to efficient cores, and 3.8% CPU package power reduction when dispatching advertisement processes. At the same time, we use a 4-tab browsing workload to test the power impact of placing background processes on efficient cores, and see 0.9% CPU package power reduction. The power saving would be larger when the number of background tabs and page activities increase.

The experiment data shows that we achieve distinct power reduction by utilizing hybrid core capability in Chromium browser to schedule non-UX critical processes/threads to efficient cores in chosen scenarios, which helps extend device battery life.

We will continue to explore more scenarios, which don’t demand high performance, and corresponding processes/threads can be scheduled to efficient cores. Besides, as for some scenarios like ads and idle, running on efficient cores might have performance impact, we are about to conduct performance evaluation soon and adjust the scheduling policy accordingly. Furthermore, we intend to extend our analysis and hybrid core scheduling optimization to Windows and Linux platforms.

20+ Hack & Tips

20+ Hack & Tips compiled by Palmacedar Limited are listed as follows:

1. Resend your email to people who didn’t open it a few days later. With a different subject line.
2. Spend the time to figure out how to do something faster if you have to do it more than twice.
3. Add an image to your Gmail profile for increased open rates.
4. If you save your PowerPoint presentation in .PPS instead of .PPT, your file goes into slideshow mode when you open it.
5. Want a quick way to unfreeze a frozen phone? Plug it into its charger.
6. Hitting the Spacebar scrolls down a web page; hitting the Spacebar + Shift lets you scroll back up.
7. Laptop batteries can last longer if you charge them up to only 80% instead of the full 100%.
8. Want to play Tetris on Mac? On Terminal, type Emacs then press Enter. Press Esc + X, type tetris and Enter. Use the arrow keys to move and rotate your Tetris blocks.
9. To find the solution to one of your many computer troubleshooting issues, add “Solved” to sift through the results.
10. Saving an Excel file as an .XLSB will shrink the size by half or 75%.
11. Someone’s incessant morning alarm is going off but the owner is refusing to get up and turn it off? Call the phone to turn it off for them.
12. To prevent sending emails to the wrong person, write your email first, and write your recipient last.
13. To paste copied text without the formatting, use Cmd / Ctrl + Shift + V.
14. Can’t watch YouTube videos that have been age restricted but don’t want to sign in to do so? In the URL, delete the “watch?v=” and replace it with “v/”.
15. If you live near a stadium or a hall that hosts public venues, set Google Alerts for the location to avoid being “surprised” by sudden traffic congestion.
16. Want to surprise someone at the airport but don’t know their arrival time or flight number? Google where they’re flying from and to, and the airline they are on e.g.
17. Set important lists e.g. schedule, events, shopping list, errands, as the wallpaper for your phone.
18. The easiest way to crank up your smartphone’s speaker volume is using an empty cup.
19. To delete files or folders quickly without dragging it to the trash bin, just use Shift + Del .
20. Have a lot of tabs open on Chrome? Use Cmd + 1, 2, 3 to go to specific tabs based on their position, or use Cmd + Tab to just cycle through the tabs.
21. Pressing down on Cmd then scrolling on your mouse, zooms in or out of the web page you’re on.
22. In Excel, to highlight the whole row (horizontal) use Shift + Spacebar, and to highlight the whole column (vertical), use Control + Spacebar.
23. Don’t throw away the box your smartphone came in. They are great, sturdy storage spaces to store charging cables and earphones you want to keep with you while travelling.
24. To make sure someone isn’t giving you a fake number, read the number back to them incorrectly and see if they correct you. If they do correct you, then it’s the right number.
25.  Ensure you contact professional cleaning company for the frequent cleaning  of your office or operating environment especially in any environment without air conditioning.

1. Small Dev tools

Link

Handy developer tools with a delightful interface. Provide 20+ tools that help developers with commonly performed tasks like Encoding/Decoding, Minifying, Test Dummy data set, and a lot more.

2. Random Image via API

Link

The most powerful photo engine in the world. The Unsplash API is a modern JSON API that surfaces all of the info you’ll need to build any experience for your users.

3. Carbon

Link

Create and share beautiful images of your source code. Start typing or drop a file into the text area to get started.

4. Peppertype

Link

Generate better content copies in seconds with the power of Artificial Intelligence. Expanding your content for writing blogs is easier than ever before. Get AI-Generated tweet ideas in seconds.

5. Poet. so

Link

Capture and share Twitter posts as beautiful images. You could use this as social proof on your website.

6. Embeddable Widget Apps for Notion

Link

Add 3rd party apps embed or create a custom embed for your Notion Document.

7. SigmaOS

Link

Fly through your work. The browser that makes you faster and better at working on the web.

8. Metatags

Link

Meta Tags is a tool to debug and generate meta tag codes for any website. Tags you can edit and experiment with your content then preview how your webpage will look on Google, Facebook, Twitter, and more!

9. Smart Mockup

Link

• Create stunning product mockups easily and online
• The fastest web-based mockup tool
• No experience or skills needed, super easy-to-us

10. Responsively

Link

Develop responsive web apps 5x faster!

Thanks for stopping by and reading this article, I hope must have learned many new sites which will be helpful to you at some point in time.

Happy learning! 💻 😄

Google has revealed details about the Circle-style — an extra piece of information that gives a new user experience about Google Contact. According to the tech company, this extra information will mostly be used by its Workspace users, which provides the opportunity to learn more about your colleagues.

Just as Microsoft launched the latest version of its flagship OS, Google also previewed the upgraded functions of its Contact platform. The new Contact UI is programmed to display a user’s organization chart as well as the tied history with a particular colleague.

This tool organizes the information which includes both meetings and emails for users to “easily learn more about your colleagues and stakeholders.” Still, this new Google Contact revives the unpleasant nostalgic experience where Google encouraged users to access its default interface where Google Plus sorts feed to every active profile simultaneously.

It has been a decade since Google had to quit and rearrange its default  Google Plus that displays for every user in-depth. Other information that displays include Event spams and Emails — which were just a preview of what Google has reportedly developed.

Google did not disclose if this feature will be available for users with a personal account — the new Contact UI is exclusive for users with Workspace and G Suite account which will be influenced by the user’s level of responsiveness on this platform. While this feature will be updated in Google’s Contact next week.

While the initial Google Plus had to fold due to unusual data Privacy breaches which pushed regulators to probes the existence of the platform. Then Google decided to rebrand the whole thing as Currents — its original user-base still finds this platform enticing.

Nonetheless, Google’s products gradually become generally acceptable where Microsoft’s Store has rebranded to accept Android apps that is likely to function on PC. This upgrade also includes the Amazon app store the software company reserved as an inbuilt platform within its Microsoft Store.