Page Load Performance Evaluation for Mobile Browser on a Cloud Computing Platform

Abstract

More and more network data flows of the Internet are nowadays contributed by wireless access which is initiated from mobile devices, such as smartphones and tablets. As a result, the performance of mobile browser applications integrated in software stacks of these portable devices draws more and more attentions. In order to meet the needs of software engineering and benchmarking among various device vendors particularly, it is getting increasingly important to evaluate the performance of mobile browser accurately and efficiently. However, due to the distinct hardware and software characteristics, conventional measurement methods which are widely deployed in desktop browsing are not so applicable for mobile browsers.

This study tries to solve this problem by finding out a practical approach to evaluate the page load performance of mobile browsers without additional software and hardware measurement investments. Several measurement models are therefore introduced, discussed and evaluated in order to point out the accurate and efficient one. As a benchmarking tool, an online measurement application is designed and implemented in the experimental part of this study. Verification data are then analyzed and discussed.

The implementation of such a web application and its context of the evaluation model provide an outline of an ideal approach to benchmark page load performance of mobile browsers. This optimized approach not only reduces the complexity of configuring a measurement environment for mobile devices, but also provides relatively accurate measurement results for continuous evaluation of mobile browsers' page loading speed, which is useful for developers to increase mobile browser's performance incrementally. The collected measurement results using such a measurement model are also useful as a reference for benchmarking various mobile browsers from different manufacturers.

Our research found out also possible factors which may influence to the performance of mobile browsers. The practice targeting of these factors, such as the design of web pages, will help users of mobile devices to achieve better user experience when surfing the Internet.