[thelist] disabled javascript

[.jeff]

david,

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> From: David Kutcher
>
> > spiders also don't make image requests either so it's
> > doubtful they're actually affecting the stats for
> > thecounter.com since they do their tracking with the
> > loading of an image.  in other words, that 12% is
> > probably all browser-usage.
>
> This is not entirely true.  There are many spiders out
> there that "catalogue" the 'net.  These spiders make
> image calls and store/cache the results.
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not spiders.  spiders follow links and index text.  even google, who offer an image search don't need to make image requests to allow their cataloging and searching.  they're simply indexing the names of the images they find in the html content.  there's simply no point in actually retrieving the image itself.  there's nothing usable in the binary content of the image.

the portion of hits that's not been discussed, as of yet, is proxies.  these could actually be resulting in the non-javascript percentage being lower than it really is.  that's because the proxy server will make a request, grab a page and all it's media (minus any media that's sourced in via scripting).  that request by the proxy will result in one hit to thecounter.com as a non-javascript browser.

now, a user behind that proxy that has javascript enabled hits the cached version on the proxy, reads the javascript, forms a request to thecounter.com for an image (not the cached one because it's got a query string and therefore won't be cached), and pushes the javascript percentage up.

meanwhile, a user behind the proxy that does not have javascript enabled hits the cached version on the proxy, ignores the javascript (like the proxy), forms a request to the image that the proxy cached when it initially cached the page, the image request never makes it thecounter.com, and the non-javascript percentage isn't appropriately pushed up.

just a thought,

.jeff

http://evolt.org/
jeff at members.evolt.org
http://members.evolt.org/jeff/