GNOME Shell Magnifier and CPU Usage Under Fedora 16

[Robert Cole <rkcole72984 gmail com>]

Hello, everyone.

I use the htop program at times to monitor processes which are running 
on my system. I am currently running Fedora 16 (along with the latest 
updates), and I noticed something taking place while panning (while 
zoomed) with the GNOME Shell Magnifier.

When the magnifier is zoomed but not in use my CPU usage  on a dual core 
processor is next to nothing (maybe 1% on each core). When I pan the 
magnifier around the CPU usage jumps up to as high as 34% on one core 
for me. Note that I am also using the Nouveau driver (if I am correct) 
which ships by default with Fedora.

Here are the steps to reproduce this:

1. Start the magnifier.
2. From the default magnification level (I think this is zero), invoke 
the zoom-in feature about seven times.

NOTE: I have shortcut keys set for zooming--ALT+Up zooms in and ALT+Down 
zooms out, so I press ALT+Up seven times to reach the optimal level of 
magnification for ease of use for myself.

3. Open up a terminal.
4. If installed, start the htop program.
5. Look for the line which is associated with the command 
"/usr/bin/gnome-shell".
6. Monitor the entry for the CPU% for the command listed in #5.
a) Do not pan the magnifier at all and you will notice that the CPU is 
not really being used.
b) Pan the mouse, and the CPU usage should spike.

Now, I am completely unsure as to how much of the CPU panning should 
use, but I noticed this this evening, and I figured I would post a 
message here in case this is something which should be flagged. If this 
is normal behavior then I apologize for wasting time with this message.

Take caer, and kind regards.