Re: Need to: "preload" CSS and JS

> IE has, for a long time, supported a "preloading" behavior on the <script> 
> element itself. IE will begin downloading a resource once a dynamic script 
> element's `src` attribute is set, but it will not execute that script 
> (even once it finishes downloading) until after the script element has 
> been directly appended to the DOM. In that way, a script can be 
> "preloaded" by creating a script element but not appending it to the DOM, 
> and then it can later be executed on-demand by appending it to the DOM.
>
> The `readyState` technique would probably be useful for this overall 
> use-case (even for CSS if extended to the <link> tag as well), if it were 
> standardized and available in all the browsers.


HTML Spec, 4.3.1, 'Running a script' algorithm
http://www.w3.org/TR/html5/scripting-1.html#running-a-script

Specifically, in step 12 (which is about fetching a `src` URL):

"For performance reasons, user agents may start fetching the script as soon 
as the attribute is set, instead, in the hope that the element will be 
inserted into the document. Either way, once the element is inserted into 
the document, the load must have started. If the UA performs such 
prefetching, but the element is never inserted in the document, or the src 
attribute is dynamically changed, then the user agent will not execute the 
script, and the fetching process will have been effectively wasted."

This seems to be the spec stating that browsers may do what IE's behavior on 
scripts does, which is to start fetching the resource once the `src` 
property is set, but not execute it until the script element is inserted 
into the DOM.

It would seem then that browsers could/should be petitioned to consider 
implementing this suggestion, perhaps taking the `readyState` implementation 
from IE as guidance.

The above wording, without guidance on how to detect the state (such as, 
with `readyState`) is not overly useful to a developer for the "preloading" 
use-case. But if an author can determine that the "preload" has finished by 
examining a `readyState` property, then a resource loader can use that for 
the use-case very effectively.

Would the spec consider adding wording to this section to codify how IE's 
`readyState` behaves in this circumstance?


--Kyle

Received on Monday, 20 December 2010 14:23:29 UTC