Joe Velez began developing for the web in 1998. He is an avid vBulletin user and volunteers his services as a vbulletin.org administrator. He currently spends his time maintaining and developing allnurses.com.
The first few seconds when visiting a site is important. You need to grab the reader's attention immediately. So, if your site is slow to load - you have a problem.
[rft]Success is based on
how the reader
perceives your site.[/rft]
Complaint I Members complain that your site takes forever to load.
Complaint II Members complain that some parts of your site takes forever to load. For example, the body will load but the column navigation is slow (delayed).
If you heard any of the above complaints and you wondered why - then continue reading.
Introduction
This 6 part series will focus on a few key areas that affect performance on the client-side. Our focus is specifically on first-time visitors as their experience determines if they become a member.
Let me clarify a few terms before we continue:
Performance - the reader's overall experience when visiting your site
Design - the generated page (everything - not just the eye-candy)
What Affects Performance
The following affects performance:
Progressive Rendering
HTTP Requests
Style sheets / Javascript Files
Size of Page / Objects
Other
Progressive Rendering
Progressive rendering is the act of displaying each object as it is downloaded.
There are 2 popular browsers right now: Internet Explorer and Firefox.
Both support progressive rendering but they differ on how they render tables. Hence, your choice of design and the reader's choice of browser can affect performance.
HTTP Requests
An HTTP Request is a request from a browser to a server. A request can be made for an HTML page or any object included within the page. Too many requests can affect performance.
Style sheets / Javascript
Style sheets describes how an object on a Web page are presented. It's a means of adding style such as font, color, position, etc to objects on a Web page. There are 3 methods you can use when styling an object: inline, internal, or external. The method that you use, it's location, size, and number can affect performance.
JavaScript is a client-side scripting language. It enables Web authors to create interactive sites. Size, location where JavaScript is embedded, and the number of files (external) can affect performance.
Size of Page / Objects
The size of an object can affect performance.
Location of an object can affect performance.
By understanding what affects performance, you can create a better user experience. Visitors who have a good experience will spend more time on the site. The longer a visitor stays on your site the more revenue you can earn and the more members you will have.
Very good! Design is very critical to a site's performance. Most people consider design as visual when actually most of the site's design is the backbone and can make or break the site.
i use YSlow to chick my design and site
it give me: A complex page means more bytes to download, and it also means slower DOM access in JavaScript. Reduce the number of DOM elements on the page to improve performance.
10-17-2007, 10:00 PM
10-18-2007, 07:43 PM
