Filed under: Internet, Apple, iPhone, iPod touch
iPhone OS 3.0 brings the speed for JavaScript
Ars is reporting the 3.0 speed improvements to Mobile Safari's JavaScript engine range from 3x to 16x -- a blessed boon to web developers everywhere. No one seems to know if Mobile Safari will be sporting Nitro or SquirrelFish or what, but whatever it is, it'll be faster. If you check out the benchmarks originally posted on Wayne Pan's blog, iPhone OS 3.0 blazes past 2.2 in every category except divisions (the benchmarking tools are available at Craig Hockenberry's blog here).It's nice to see progress, but I don't think anyone expected Apple to let the JS engine in Mobile Safari lay fallow for long. Every day browsers like Opera Mini and Android's WebKit-based browser are getting better. Heck, even WinMo's version of IE is supposed to support H.264, Flash and Silverlight. Will the upgraded js engine and technology like CSS3 and Canvas draw more developers to iPhone web apps? I doubt it, but the speed improvements will make many browser-based services feel more responsive. That's certainly a win for consumers.
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Stephen Lang said 2:49PM on 3-27-2009
Web apps are sweet AND fast!
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JNN said 2:52PM on 3-27-2009
I also noticed that Safari on OS 3.0 gets a 97/100 on acid3 test.
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Risto T said 3:02PM on 3-27-2009
um... Nitro is SquirrelFish Extreme AFAIK
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Crabs said 4:12PM on 3-27-2009
I read somewhere that Nitro is just SquirrelFish Extreme renamed, because Nitro doesn't sound as…um…ridiculous? as SquirrelFish
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SpinThis! said 3:02PM on 3-28-2009
You're close. They are both the same, just how they're used and where is different. Much like Safari is Apple's derived version of WebKit, Nitro is Apple's marketing's term for Squirrelfish Extreme (SFX).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WebKit
Jon said 4:57PM on 3-27-2009
Thank goodness. Safari on the iPhone is long due for a speed increase (or maybe I'm just spoiled with safari 4 beta on my MacBook...)
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Amerist said 1:15AM on 3-29-2009
Jon, I've been using safari 4 exclusively since it came out. Lovinit.
BTW Safari 4 Public Beta passes Acid 3 with 100/100, which is not mentioned in the WikiPedia article for Acid 3
Murphy Mac said 4:58PM on 3-27-2009
Fallow. Nice.
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Charlie said 3:35PM on 3-29-2009
wow thats soooo gurd, alothough the speed is good on the on the iphone but it has alot to be improved
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frank.lowney said 7:45PM on 3-28-2009
Let's not confine our thinking to web apps alone. Already there are a number of applications that can store documents in their own application space. Some of those documents can even be displayed using the same calls used by mobileMail.app for attachments (Office, iWork and other documents). This list includes HTML files laden with javascript and CSS,
So, imagine a more direct approach where mobileSafari had direct access to HTML and supporting media files in its own app space.
Or, imagine a new sort of podcast episode, one that is, in fact, a typical Apple package file as iWorks documents are. Web site as podcast episode!
Not only would this provide for time shifting and place shifting, it would also provide a high degree of network independence. Developing content would also be easier since there are lots of applications such as RapidWeaver that help content creators avoid the distraction of deaing with complex code.
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richbum said 4:50AM on 3-30-2009
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Victor Agreda, Jr. said 9:55AM on 3-30-2009
Yeah, I'm taking a hard stand against SPAM (don't mind people leaving links, but they need to be relevant to the post, not just some random site)