Service Workers

#1

Post by andRyanMiller » Tue, Aug 28, 2018, 3:45 AM UTC

Service Workers
frontendian.co

Re: Service Workers

#2

Post by [deleted] » Tue, Aug 28, 2018, 4:42 AM UTC

[deleted]

Re: Service Workers

#3

Post by sbr464 » Tue, Aug 28, 2018, 5:36 AM UTC

Great write up. I’ve been exploring SWs recently to help with downloading and caching data in the background for faster UI.

Question, I’d like to avoid doing large downloads or possibly cap the transfer rate to avoid any potential jank. Is there a best practice or is it possible to monitor the current browser interaction to determine how strategically best to pull data with a SW?

Depending on what a user chooses to cache, it’s JSON data (1-10MB) going to a mix of localstorage and indexedDB.

Re: Service Workers

#4

Post by michaelmrose » Tue, Aug 28, 2018, 6:24 AM UTC

"Imagine being able to respond to push notifications, intercept resource requests, and schedule background syncronization, all without the need for a user to actively have your website open in front of them."

".. by authoring special-purpose JavaScript which you register with the browser."

Why does this seem like something useful for malware and generally annoying me.

Re: Service Workers

#5

Post by dannyw » Tue, Aug 28, 2018, 6:54 AM UTC

I like service workers, but I don't like the lack of control I have.

For example, I want Messenger to send me notifications if I have the tab open, but I don't want the service worker to maintain a persistent connection and send me notifications with the tab closed.

Unfortunately, I am not able to block service workers. My only option is to block notifications entirely, which doesn't even stop the service worker.

Re: Service Workers

#6

Post by slow_donkey » Tue, Aug 28, 2018, 7:10 AM UTC

sbr464 wrote: post #3

Great write up. I’ve been exploring SWs recently to help with downloading and caching data in the background for faster UI. Question, I’d like to avoid doing large downloads or possibly cap the transfer rate to avoid any potential jank. Is there a best practice or is it possible to monitor the current browser interaction to determine how strategically best to pull data with a SW? Depending on what a user chooses to c…

Have you looked into using a fetch event hook? The first thing I thought of was an Axios interceptor if you're using Axios or other http lib.

That should allow you to sum up download sizes.

Re: Service Workers

#7

Post by pmlnr » Tue, Aug 28, 2018, 7:52 AM UTC

Firefox:

    about:config 
    dom.serviceWorkers.enabled;false

Why:

They bite. The generic idea may even be reasonable (offline working web app), but every single time I encounter service workers they make things worse.

If you load a React frontend, it'll, by default, deploy a service worker. Good luck trying to load anything non-react from that resource/server.

I never asked for a web app to work in the background once I closed a site. Nobody should be trained to expect websites work in the background - that is not how they are. If there is no tab open, there should be no notification, no nothing. That is how the web works.

Re: Service Workers

#8

Post by pmlnr » Tue, Aug 28, 2018, 7:53 AM UTC

sbr464 wrote: post #3

Great write up. I’ve been exploring SWs recently to help with downloading and caching data in the background for faster UI. Question, I’d like to avoid doing large downloads or possibly cap the transfer rate to avoid any potential jank. Is there a best practice or is it possible to monitor the current browser interaction to determine how strategically best to pull data with a SW? Depending on what a user chooses to c…

May I ask the justification to download 1-10MB JSON on the user's system without the user being aware?

Re: Service Workers

#9

Post by wakeywakeywakey » Tue, Aug 28, 2018, 8:02 AM UTC

pmlnr wrote: post #7

Firefox: about:config dom.serviceWorkers.enabled;false Why: They bite. The generic idea may even be reasonable (offline working web app), but every single time I encounter service workers they make things worse. If you load a React frontend, it'll, by default, deploy a service worker. Good luck trying to load anything non-react from that resource/server. I never asked for a web app to work in the background once I cl…

> If you load a React frontend, it'll, by default, deploy a service worker.

What?

> That is how the web works.

The web 'experience' has stopped being about fetching static documents in a request/response fashion long ago. Consumers demand rich apps and interactivity, and it appears they're having it their way.

Re: Service Workers

#10

Post by htor » Tue, Aug 28, 2018, 8:03 AM UTC

pmlnr wrote: post #7

Firefox: about:config dom.serviceWorkers.enabled;false Why: They bite. The generic idea may even be reasonable (offline working web app), but every single time I encounter service workers they make things worse. If you load a React frontend, it'll, by default, deploy a service worker. Good luck trying to load anything non-react from that resource/server. I never asked for a web app to work in the background once I cl…

> That is how the web works.

good luck trying to convince google of that. they are shaping the web just the way they want it. push notifications? nobody ever except the marketing apartment thought that was a good idea to add to anything. if we try making everything on the web like mobile apps we're gonna get garbage features like this and false expectations on what the web should be like.