[thelist] optimizing your website

[Jack Timmons]

On Thu, Feb 11, 2010 at 2:30 PM, Meshack <meshack at hrts.org> wrote:
> Just wanted to let you all know about this article I wrote recently:
> http://www.meshack.com/web-design/2010/01/11/9-tips-to-slim-down-your-websit
> e/

You wrote it a month ago. How is that recent? :/

> For 2 reasons... I'd like feedback so I can finetune some of the points in
> the article. For instance, I think so far it could really benefit from some
> case studies. And also because I think it may be helpful to people here on
> theList.
>
> The article started as research I was doing into the page load sequence of
> the Web Browser while trying to trouble shoot a javascript I was writing. I
> found the page load sequence accounted for maybe 80% of the total time it
> takes a page to load, so of course the most effective optimization
> techniques should tackle that front end process. Anyway, hope this is
> helpful.
>
> -Meshack

/********  Brutality Ahead! ********\

Disclaimer: All of this is personal opinion and not to be taken
personally. You're about to get a little bit of what my staff gets
working with me, and they've come to understand this, so I hope you
can, too.

1) I've seen that Wordpress theme. A lot, actually. I've even used it
to suck a few gullible people into going 'Wow'. I believe, though, it
has horrible readability, especially near the title.

2) Firebug also shows you all of your HTTP requests.

3) No mention of HTML Tidy? Code condensers? Are you just starting at
the very basic of compression operations? How about Gzip?

3.5) HTMLTidy would be good in the HTML cleanup, too. I've actually
never used it because <strong>I write impeccable HTML that is never,
ever flawed</strong> (lies bolded for emphasis in a text-only email)

4) You mention Firebug later on for CSS, but not the HTML requests. Odd.

5) "Javascript is unique among other programming languages in that the
source code is downloaded, parsed and executed with every pageload."
This is not true. It can be cached, also.

6) Thanks for the video link! I had lost it.

7) "Externalize Javascript and CSS" Should you have said this earlier,
and grouped the related material together?

8) "LINK instead of @import CSS" Is this something that still needs to
be addressed? Maybe I'm out of touch with my roots.

9) "Place scripts as low as possible" and "Sometimes it isn’t
possible, but in many cases a script can be placed just before the
part of the DOM where they are required." Perhaps I'm spoiled from my
recent working, but shouldn't you be waiting to run Javascript until
after the page has loaded?

10) "Set the Cache Controls". +1

11) "Avoid Dynamic Properties (CSS expressions)" +3, especially if
people are actually using it.

Now, I'm off to home to argue with the wife about who cares less what
we have for dinner.

-- 
-Jack Timmons
http://www.trotlc.com
Twitter: @codeacula