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How web bloat impacts users with slow devices

danluu.com

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Re: How web bloat impacts users with slow devices

#591

Post by zilti »

rokkamokka wrote: post #372
zilti wrote: post #354

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It usually requires less time, not more, to create a slim and efficient page.

Definitely not true in my experience, and I would think if it were true, most pages would be "slim and efficient". Where is the business value in doing anything else at that point?

The "business value" is that it is easier and cheaper to find a handful of scriptkiddies who think everything has to be done in JS, run after the latest hype, and don't even know you can send a form using plain HTML, than it is to get competent, educated devs who know when JS or even a frontend framework is the right tool for the job.

Re: How web bloat impacts users with slow devices

#592

Post by geraldhh »

gcanyon wrote: post #566
throwaway2037 wrote: post #557

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> (insert doofenshmirtz nickel quote) I had to Google for it: IMDB.com has the quote: > Dr. Heinz Doofenshmirtz : Wow, if I had a nickel for every time I was doomed by a puppet, I'd have two nickels - which isn't a lot, but it's weird that it happened twice.

I thought about including the whole thing, but then I decided that doofenshmirtz being as google-able as it is, anyone who was curious could easily find it.

lowering the barrier to entry as to no overtax curiosity seems sensible in this crowd

Re: How web bloat impacts users with slow devices

#593

Post by geraldhh »

andai wrote: post #480
p_l wrote: post #478

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People who never worked with some of the bloated sites often forgot third party in the bloating. Marketing team mandating inclusion of at least one "Tag Manager" (if they are especially bad, there will be multiple ). A "Tag Manager" is a piece of JS that is installed together with an API key in the site... and then it downloads whatever extra JS that was configured for given API key. The actual site developer often h…

So marketing department is responsible for web being such a sad and painful experience?

money is the top reason for ppl doing stupid shit, yes

Re: How web bloat impacts users with slow devices

#594

Post by geraldhh »

GIFtheory wrote: post #163

Using https://www.mcmaster.com/ makes me wish I were a hardware engineer. Makes every other e-commerce site feel like garbage. If amazon were this fast, I’d be broke within days. Why haven’t other sites figured this out?

wow! that was a refreshing experience

> Why haven’t other sites figured this out?

i suspect that most ppl cannot appreciate efficiency

Re: How web bloat impacts users with slow devices

#595

Post by jcagalawan »

freddie_mercury wrote: post #436
bluquark wrote: post #66

Dan's point about being aware of the different levels of inequality in the world is something I strongly agree with, but that should also include the middle-income countries, especially in Latin America and Southeast Asia. For example, a user with a data plan with a monthly limit in the single-digit GBs, and a RAM/CPU profile resembling a decade-old US flagship. That's good enough to use Discourse at all, but the exp…

> For example, a user with a data plan with a monthly limit in the single-digit GBs I live in a poor Southeast Asian country. People with small data plans don't use data from efficient websites, they use wifi which is omnipresent. 30GB of data on a monthly plan is $3.64. Which is about 4-6 hours of minimum wage (minimum wage is lower in agricultural areas). But more to the point, people don't use data profligately li…

> Every single cafe, restaurant, supermarket, and mall has free wifi.

I live in a major city in the Philippines, and free WiFi is becoming more of a rarity nowadays. Not even Starbucks and other big chain restaurants, malls, and cafes offer WiFi anymore because of how widely available data is. They expect you to bring your own data and tether if you want to browse or do some work.

In more rural areas, WiFi is definitely not widely available. On the rare chance it’s even offered, it’s usually “piso WiFi” paid by the minute.

Re: How web bloat impacts users with slow devices

#596

Post by BehindBlueEyes »

qingcharles wrote: post #547
bluquark wrote: post #66

Dan's point about being aware of the different levels of inequality in the world is something I strongly agree with, but that should also include the middle-income countries, especially in Latin America and Southeast Asia. For example, a user with a data plan with a monthly limit in the single-digit GBs, and a RAM/CPU profile resembling a decade-old US flagship. That's good enough to use Discourse at all, but the exp…

These phones aren't just in the Developing World, though. This is a USA problem too. I work with parolees and they get the free "Lifeline" phones the federal govt pays for. You can get one for free on any street corner in the poor 'hoods of the USA. They are the cheapest lowest spec Android phones with 15GB data/month. That data is burned up by day 3 due to huge Web payloads and then the user can't fill out forms he…

I’m curious how quickly the data would be used up if only using it for the intended forms/jobs/welfare. I wouldn’t be surprised if the data lasted barely any longuer due to bloat.

Re: How web bloat impacts users with slow devices

#597

Post by ragall »

dleink wrote: post #525
eric__cartman wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have noticed with two 7 year old Snapdragon 835 devices that RAM and running a recent Android version makes a huge difference. I daily drive a OnePlus 5 running Android 14 through LineageOS and the user experience for non-gaming tasks is perfectly adequate. This phone has 6GB of ram, so it's still on par with most mid-range phones nowadays. My only gripe is that I had to replace the battery and disassembling phones…

I want to research this route more but the camera is an important component to me. I suspect their is a model of phone from 5-10 years ago that has a an under-the-radar stellar camera and I would find "perfectly adequate". ("perfectly adequate" is my favored state for most tech solutions.)

The Huawei P10+, released in 2017, has very good Leica optics, on par with much newer iPhone or Galaxy devices.

https://www.gsmarena.com/huawei_p10_plus-8515.php

Re: How web bloat impacts users with slow devices

#598

Post by BlueTemplar »

mardifoufs wrote: post #202
zozbot234 wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> That's good enough to use Discourse at all, but the experience will probably be on the unpleasantly slow side. ... an alternate "lite/basic" mode Why does this need to be the "alternate" choice though? What does current Discourse provide that e.g. PhpBB or the DLang forum do not? (Other than mobile friendly design, which in a sane world shouldn't involve more than a few tweaks to a "responsive" CSS stylesheet).

I like the scroll view in discourse. Makes it super easy to follow a thread. The subthreads and replies are also easier to use. The search is better, the ability to upvote makes it better for some use cases, and in general phpbb is a mess in terms of actually being able to see what's useful and what threads are relevant. I think flipping the question makes more sense, why do you think some forums switched to or start…

Discourse still offers a worse experience than phpBB though, even if you use a fast device.

Re: How web bloat impacts users with slow devices

#599

Post by BlueTemplar »

keybored wrote: post #456
freddie_mercury wrote: post #436

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> For example, a user with a data plan with a monthly limit in the single-digit GBs I live in a poor Southeast Asian country. People with small data plans don't use data from efficient websites, they use wifi which is omnipresent. 30GB of data on a monthly plan is $3.64. Which is about 4-6 hours of minimum wage (minimum wage is lower in agricultural areas). But more to the point, people don't use data profligately li…

I mean not using Data Plan here in Northern Europe was me 11 years ago… and me using it sparingly because video or songs would blow through the Data Plan instantly was me eight years ago.

Yeah, I still remember when I started massively using the cellular Web : at the time it cost 1024€/Go, which I found to be cheap !

Re: How web bloat impacts users with slow devices

#600

Post by qingcharles »

BehindBlueEyes wrote: post #596
qingcharles wrote: post #547

Earlier quoted context omitted.

These phones aren't just in the Developing World, though. This is a USA problem too. I work with parolees and they get the free "Lifeline" phones the federal govt pays for. You can get one for free on any street corner in the poor 'hoods of the USA. They are the cheapest lowest spec Android phones with 15GB data/month. That data is burned up by day 3 due to huge Web payloads and then the user can't fill out forms he…

I’m curious how quickly the data would be used up if only using it for the intended forms/jobs/welfare. I wouldn’t be surprised if the data lasted barely any longuer due to bloat.

When I had one of these the data only lasted me 4 days. I didn't even purposely watch any videos, but I did read a lot of news articles and many "magazine" style sites have huge video payloads that load (and sometimes play) in the background if you're not running something like uBlock. I found some sites with 250MB home pages :(
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