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The impact of removing jQuery on our web performance

insidegovuk.blog.gov.uk

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Re: The impact of removing jQuery on our web performance

#31

Post by CJefferson »

rob74 wrote: post #14

> Now I know what you may be thinking, that doesn’t sound like a lot of data, especially compared to images which can be multiple megabytes in size. But when it’s on every page, from a web performance perspective, it equates to a lot of data. Er... the utility of jQuery in 2022 aside, I would say: if it equates to a lot of data when it's on every page (of a single website), you're doing something wrong?! I mean, cach…

The article is talking more about the execution time to read, parse, and execute the library -- that isn't cached at all.

Re: The impact of removing jQuery on our web performance

#32

Post by NohatCoder »

ctrlmeta wrote: post #4

Has anyone noticed how all UK government websites like https://www.gov.uk/ , https://www.nhs.uk/ , https://tfl.gov.uk/ , https://coronavirus.data.gov.uk/ have the same look-and-feel and the same UX? Are there more such examples of countries that have uniform UX for their government websites?

Coming from Denmark I'm impressed that they all use a uk domain, and they even have a system in place to distinguish official government websites from others.

In Denmark we are like: Need a domain for our common ID and login system? How about nemid.nu, where .nu is the TLD of Niue, but "nu" means "now" in Danish, so lol, let's use that. On top of like 7 other domains that users are randomly redirected between during use.

Re: The impact of removing jQuery on our web performance

#33

Post by atoav »

rob74 wrote: post #14

> Now I know what you may be thinking, that doesn’t sound like a lot of data, especially compared to images which can be multiple megabytes in size. But when it’s on every page, from a web performance perspective, it equates to a lot of data. Er... the utility of jQuery in 2022 aside, I would say: if it equates to a lot of data when it's on every page (of a single website), you're doing something wrong?! I mean, cach…

Yeah but for what?

I have been writing vanilla js for years now and aside from the sometimes slightly more convenient syntax I haven't missed a thing where using jQuery would have helped me over not using it.

I don't say anything against loading useful javascript libraries, but too many websites load 1 MB of libraries just to get a result that they could have achieved with a few lines of handcrafted vanilla js.

This is not just about performance, but every piece of code you add increases the attack surface and the number of moving parts that can fail. Not that every webpage has to be minimalist and barebones, but there are tradeoffs to be made and too many people just import the whole world, their neighbour and their dog without a second thought.

Re: The impact of removing jQuery on our web performance

#34

Post by firecall »

p4bl0 wrote: post #13

> But when it’s on every page, from a web performance perspective, it equates to a lot of data. How does browser caching come into play here? Doesn't it make a difference?

Yes, it makes a difference in network requests.

It only needs to get the file from the Internet once, but the browser still has to load the file and work with it on each page load! :-)

How that is handled exactly... I don't know LOL :-)

Re: The impact of removing jQuery on our web performance

#35

Post by petepete »

bennyp101 wrote: post #15
matthews2 wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They're built using the gov.uk design system[0], which is not just a CSS framework! It also has a lot of guidelines and requirements to make sure that the pages you're building are accessible to everyone https://design-system.service.gov.uk/

It's actually a pretty cool thing to browse through - they have some good advice on how to make things accessible and not confuse users. Each pattern tends to have supporting research as to why things should be done like that.

The fun part is the design system backlog[0]. There is an absolute wealth of information in there, along with plenty of opinions for designers in various departments, feedback from rounds of user research, alternative approaches to common problems. I spend a lot of time in there.

This thread on notification banners is an excellent example[1].

I think if this was started today they'd fit into GitHub's discussions better than issues, as that's what they're used for. Eventually, with enough support, these things might make it into the design system.

[0] https://github.com/alphagov/govuk-design-system-backlog/issu...

[1] https://github.com/alphagov/govuk-design-system-backlog/issu...

Re: The impact of removing jQuery on our web performance

#36

Post by youngtaff »

myfonj wrote: post #22

What I miss in this otherwise excellent article is more insight about methodology. There is just murky > We run tests every day on GOV.UK pages using specific simulated devices and connection speeds. Because we can repeat these tests every day, it allows us to monitor what the changes we are making to the site are doing for real users visiting GOV.UK. with no mention whether those were all cold start loads or simulat…

From the post

> For example, for a simulated user visiting the Universal Credit start page on a low specification device and 2G mobile connection, we can clearly see from the graph where the jQuery change was made.

Even if the cost of jQuery can be amortised over multiple page views in a session, someone's still got to have a successful first page view before they can view any more

For a service like Universal Credit that's aimed at the less well off then cheap i.e. slow devices, and mobile connectivity means that the service has to be as easy to access as possible

Re: The impact of removing jQuery on our web performance

#37

Post by marcus_holmes »

3np wrote: post #3
iopq wrote: post #2

When I did web development, I specifically loaded JS lazily so first you got a pure HTML page with just a few lines of code. Those lines of code are normal (not jQuery) JS that loads the rest of the JS lazily in a progressive enhancement. This means the page can start being rendered before the jQuery code loads. But in fact, jQuery is largely not needed since Internet Explorer lost market share and there's less of a…

If done properly this can be nice but a common grief is when interactive elements (input fields/buttons/links, including in flowing text) move around after first becoming visible. The worst is input fields that get cleared or grabbing focus (this is way too common; not stellar to have to password reset due to typing half a password in an auto-complete search field) as part of this process after the user has already s…

this is so infuriating when it happens and I click the wrong thing because between the time I saw the button and pushed the button, the button moved away and another button moved under my finger/cursor.

I would massively prefer to have a blank page, or a page with no buttons, and wait a few seconds for the buttons to appear in their final locations, than this.

Re: The impact of removing jQuery on our web performance

#38

Post by josephg »

p4bl0 wrote: post #13

> But when it’s on every page, from a web performance perspective, it equates to a lot of data. How does browser caching come into play here? Doesn't it make a difference?

Browsers don't share cached assets between different origin domains any more. So the browser cache would only come in to play when you're browsing between pages on the same government website.

But I'm not sure that downloading 32kb on each page load is their biggest problem. It sounds like a lot of the cost of jquery is parsing that javascript on each page load - especially on low specced devices. Javascript parsing traces (as far as I know) aren't reused between page loads at all.

Re: The impact of removing jQuery on our web performance

#39

Post by rozenmd »

magnio wrote: post #16
ctrlmeta wrote: post #4

Has anyone noticed how all UK government websites like https://www.gov.uk/ , https://www.nhs.uk/ , https://tfl.gov.uk/ , https://coronavirus.data.gov.uk/ have the same look-and-feel and the same UX? Are there more such examples of countries that have uniform UX for their government websites?

Yes, this is an example of government design systems, which are becoming popular among developed countries: - The UK: https://design-system.service.gov.uk/ - The US: https://designsystem.digital.gov/ - Canada: https://www.canada.ca/en/government/about/design-system.html - Argentina: https://argob.github.io/poncho/ - Italy: https://designers.italia.it/ - Singapore: https://www.designsystem.tech.gov.sg/ - Estonia: http…

Australia: https://designsystemau.org/

it was the official design system until it got defunded, now I believe it's run by open source

Re: The impact of removing jQuery on our web performance

#40

Post by rmnclmnt »

niea_11 wrote: post #25
magnio wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, this is an example of government design systems, which are becoming popular among developed countries: - The UK: https://design-system.service.gov.uk/ - The US: https://designsystem.digital.gov/ - Canada: https://www.canada.ca/en/government/about/design-system.html - Argentina: https://argob.github.io/poncho/ - Italy: https://designers.italia.it/ - Singapore: https://www.designsystem.tech.gov.sg/ - Estonia: http…

France: https://www.systeme-de-design.gouv.fr/

Will have to inform the french national services about it ("Ameli", "Impôts", "URSSAF"), apparently they are not aware of it!
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