How do browsers work 'under the hood'?

[kbeartx]

Fairly frequently (once, twice a day or more), IE 5.1 will cause my Mac to 'pause' or slow to a crawl.  

I'll be surfing the web, click on a link, and even though I have broadband, the page will take a looong time to load, so I'll get impatient and switch over to something else, such as my email client (Outlook Express) or a Word doc I'm working on.

Sometimes just switching to another open app or even the Finder takes a long time (25-45 sec), and other times the switch takes place almost instantly but then I notice that I can't scroll through the document or email msg w/o a wery noticable lag or delay in response, and when I get impatient with that delay and press the keys to initiate a force quit, the dialog that comes up indicates that the 'foremost' application is still IE, even though it's now hidden by OE, Word, or whatever app I have switched to.

I am not a programmer, but as a Tech Writer, I have worked closely with programmers over the years and been educated in some programming concepts, especially at the processor level, and it's almost as if whatever the browser is doing is an 'uninterruptible' process - waiting for a webserver to send a block of html or a gif or even a bunch of these is somehow set to a higher priority than instructions I give the computer with my mouse or keyboard!

I have been working on a theory for some weeks now that the prob is really with IE 5.1 (it's getting kind of 'long in the tooth') so I updated it to the latest version, 5.1.7 - no diff.  I've tried other browsers (Netscape 6.2, Opera 6.0.2, iCab 2.9.5) but they each have their own different probs that make them undesirable as my 'workhorse' browser.

Izdis likely to be a JavaScript prob?  If so, is there a cure?

Please don't advise me to use OS X - I'm already working on that, and I'll get there when I do (see my other thread, 'Bug in Jag installer').

Any insight into this matter will be appreciated.

 - kbeartx

[tacit]

OS 9 uses what is called "cooperative" multitasking. What this means is that programs in OS 9 keep the processor for as long as they want to, and processor control is passed to another program only when the program that has control explicitly gives it up.

A poorly-written program can hog the entire processor, making the computer unresponsive, if it does not give up the processor when it is in the middle of a loop. Internet Explorer is a poorly-written program.

Explorer hogs the processor and does not give it up whenever it is initializing a Java applet, running JavaScript, or laying out a page (that is, figuring out where to put the elements on the page, how to lay out the type, and so on). On complex pages or pages with complex JavaScripts, Explorer often causes the computer to become unresponsive.

Sadly, there is not much you can do about this.

[krissel]

I sympathize kbear.  I run into the same thing although I have been blaming it on my G4 upgrade processor which, especially with IE, gives me "freezes" that last anywhere from a few seconds to nearly a minute on rare occasions.

For the most part I just busy myself doing something else until I see the clock start counting seconds again. Then I go back to surfing or other work. This may occur two or three times a day. Rather annoying but I've learned to live with it.

 

[giantmike]

You guys could upgrade those machines to X and use Safari

I too have encountered that problem with IE in MacOS 9. The only thing that "solved" it for me was deleting the internet preferences. This helps for like 2 launches of the browser, after which the problem comes right back. It's really pretty annoying, especially when you have PC using firends come over, and want to use IE on your MacOS 9 system for a bit (just to look some thigns up). They get very frustrated, and blame the Mac.