Lion - Safari 5.1 - Webprocess

On my 2GB 15" MacBook Pro, running Lion, I just noticed it used 90% of the CPU-power and 830 MB of memory, for minutes and minutes...

No solution yet...

where do you see this webprocess?

Kisuke3

I see it when I look at memory usage in iStat Menus. It's using 432MB of RAM while I'm using Safari. Safari itself is using 187MB of RAM. I'm not really a Safari user but am trying it out. I never saw this webprocess with Safari 5? or 4? running SNL. Am seeing it with Lion.

Joseph

wow this is indeed a problem. I wonder if this is happening in safe mode or another user account

Kisuke3

My problem with it is not that it uses to much CPU. My concern is the RAM usage. Still not a problem because I just upgraded to 8GB of RAM. Just makes Safari a deal breaker for me.

Joseph

Safari 5.1 and “WebProcess”: PROBLEM SOLVED

The culprit is “Little Snitch”

I am running OS 10.6.8 (Lion-ready). Yesterday, I installed the Safari updater from 5.0.5 to 5.1 . . . and am experiencing repeated and annoying pop-up windows for "WebProcessing."

I found the culprit to be the third-party utility "Little Snitch" — which monitors outgoing internet connections. (http://www.obdev.at/products/littlesnitch/index.html).

I solved the problem by upgrading (FREE) Little Snitch v2.0.x to v2.4 (for Snow Leopard and Lion).

PROBLEM SOLVED.

David,

I use LS 2.4 with Lion and it does not solve the problem.

Joseph

@MacJoseph

Hmm. I'm sorry to hear this, i.e., that you're still having the "WebProcess" windows popping up in OS Lion (10.7), even AFTER you upgraded Little Snitch to v2.4.

I was planning to upgrade from 10.6.8 Snow Leopard to 10.7 Lion in August. I might postpone that now, for a while.

Joseph, thanks for your information!

Add a new rule, name it "WebProcess" and in the port put in there 80

add a new rule again, name it "WebProcess" and in the port put in there 443

David

I don't have a webprocess window popping up, but I can see there is a process running called webprocess.

Joseph

Kisuke: How does that help?

@Kisuke3

You wrote:
"Add a new rule, name it "WebProcess" and in the port put in there 80 add a new rule again, name it "WebProcess" and in the port put in there 443."

It might be helpful to those less knowledgeable if you specify the navigation route you used to add the new rules. Likely, this is unfamiliar territory for some.

HERE IS SOME ADDITIONAL INFO that might help with this issue of Safari 5.1 and Lion:

In another Apple Discussion [https://discussions.apple.com/thread/3193055?start=15&tstart=0 -- "Safari 5.1 not working on 10.6.8"] here is a comment originally posted by Brett Stewart, and then slightly amended by me. Although it is directed at OS 10.6.8, it might also apply to OS 10.7:

Brett, your solution worked fine for me, too. THANK YOU!

However, for those who might wish to follow your navigation route, I found it to be correct right up to the name of the app.

Maybe it used to be named "WebProcess.app" . . . but in my OS 10.6.8 it is named "PluginProcess.app".
"PluginProcess.app" is the app that's in the "WebKit2.framework" folder.

So, the navigation route is:

Go to System Prefs/Security/Firewall/ Advanced.

Click the plus button to add an allowed process to the firewall.

Navigate to the PluginProcess.app (boot/system/library/Privateframeworks/WebKit2.framework/PluginProcess.app)

Add this to the firewall's allowed processes.

According to the above, the app in question -- on your computer -- might be named "WebProcess.app" or it might be named "PluginProcess.app." In either case, follow the navigation route shown above, and "Allow" it.
I haven't, as yet, upgraded to 10.7; still using 10.6.8. However, like I said, the above information might be relevant for Safari 5.1 on OS 10.7 as well as on 10.6.8.

--David Purnell

I am not running any version of Little Snitch and my OS X Firewall is turned off. WebProcess is still using pretty much all of my CPU, pretty much constantly.

I'm not sure how allowing it through a firewall is supposed to slow down a process's CPU usage, anyway.

David_Purnell wrote:

Safari 5.1 and “WebProcess”: PROBLEM SOLVED

The culprit is “Little Snitch”

I am running OS 10.6.8 (Lion-ready). Yesterday, I installed the Safari updater from 5.0.5 to 5.1 . . . and am experiencing repeated and annoying pop-up windows for "WebProcessing."

I found the culprit to be the third-party utility "Little Snitch" — which monitors outgoing internet connections. (http://www.obdev.at/products/littlesnitch/index.html).

I solved the problem by upgrading (FREE) Little Snitch v2.0.x to v2.4 (for Snow Leopard and Lion).

PROBLEM SOLVED.

The problem is not Little Snitch as this occurs without Little Snitch.

What you thought fixed it is restarting the system and a new browser session.

This is the same old problem with Safari going back several versions, where it just keeps an ever growing cache / leaking memory until you run out of RAM and start having lots of page-outs and see Safari being less and less responsive. WIth or without the beach ball.

The only difference now is that Apple separated WebProcess off from Safari.

You now no longer have to force-quit Safari, you can just kill WebProcess and your tabs etc remain open, and can continue browsing without losing where you left off.

Once you start a new session, everything is back to normal, but just wait a number of hours or days, depending on how active you are online and see WebProcess grow uncontrollably.

@icerabbit: Thank you for this information. I will keep a copy of what you've written, in the event "WebProcess" begins acting up again. Since I Allowed WebProcess (aka "PluginProcess.app"; see navigation route detailed in my 8/23/2011 post, above) I've had no further WebProcess windows pop up.
--David Purnell