[Bug 7428] Safari 4 preloads media and FF 3.5 doesn't in <audio> tag; perhaps HTML5 sections 4.8.10.5 4.8.10.8 are unclear or need a 'preloading' attribute added.

http://www.w3.org/Bugs/Public/show_bug.cgi?id=7428





--- Comment #4 from Steven Rowat <steven_rowat@sunshine.net>  2009-08-27 00:39:52 ---
(In reply to comment #3)
> The spec says:
> > The autobuffer attribute provides a hint that the author expects that
> > downloading the entire resource optimistically will be worth it, even in the
> > absence of the autoplay  attribute. In the absence of either attribute, the
> > user agent is likely to find that waiting until the user starts playback before
> > downloading any further content leads to a more efficient use of the network
> > resources.
> 
> The latter sentence is encouraging UAs to do what Firefox does.

Right, I missed that. It's in a different section in the spec. Thank you. But
apparently Safari developers either missed it also or choose to ignore it.
Perhaps that idea could be repeated in the sections I quoted? 


 (In reply to comment #3)
>the browser is in the best position to know what the user's network
> conditions are --- whether it's on a phone, or loading content over a very
> high-speed network or even the local file system, etc. User preferences are
> also relevant here. This does need to be ultimately controlled by the browser.

Agreed that the browser is "in the best position to know" about the network
conditions. But it's a machine after all and can't know what the conceptual
framework of the page is; at least, not until a metadata language is widely
implemented. Until then at least, the author is in the best position to know
whether or not preloading of LARGE NUMBERS of media files should even be
attempted. That is, unless the browser can intelligently decide that the
network is too slow or too crowded or the CPU/RAM insufficient. But apparently
Safari can't (or doesn't). 

I'm curious, and it seems relevant here: -- can Firefox? Are there situations
where Firefox slows or stops preloading of media when there is danger of the
page user losing the ability to interact because of lack of bandwidth/cpu?  


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Received on Thursday, 27 August 2009 00:40:04 UTC