Re: [ResourcePriorities] Scripts and integration with HTML spec

On Tue, Mar 18, 2014 at 10:38 AM, Ian Hickson <ian@hixie.ch> wrote:
> On Mon, 17 Mar 2014, Arvind Jain wrote:
>>
>> It definitely makes sense to spec this straight in the HTML spec. Ian,
>> would you take it over then?
>
> I'm happy to work on this kind of thing in HTML. My first priority in this
> space will be related to scripts.
>
> I would encourage authors and implementors to describe their needs and use
> cases on the WHATWG list (http://www.whatwg.org/mailing-list#specs). In
> particular, I'd like to hear what exactly are the problems with today's
> HTML that need solving.

The things I'm most excited about are:
* Being able to specify that an image/video should only be downloaded
"on demand" (aka "lazily"), i.e. when it's in view, or about to be in
view. Use case is both to lower bandwidth in cases of long pages where
the user doesn't always scroll to the bottom, as well as make sure to
fill the network pipe with the most important resources first.
* Being able to specify that a stylesheet should not block rendering.
Use case is to preload stylesheets that will be used by content that
isn't rendered in the initial view, but that might be rendered later.
* Being able to specify some form of prioritization for resources like
(non-blocking) stylesheets, (non-blocking) <script>s, images, video,
iframes etc. Use case is making sure to fill the network pipe with the
most important resources first. Possibly a simple prioritization like
"needed for initial rendering/not needed for initial rendering" is
enough, possibly there are needs for more finegrained prioritization
like "needed for initial rendering/needed for page feature X that is
commonly used, needed for other".

/ Jonas

Received on Tuesday, 18 March 2014 22:20:10 UTC