Is JavaScript slowing down the web?

Filed under: Design, Developer, Internet, Blogging

Is JavaScript slowing down the web?

by Jason Clarke Aug 19th 2007

Read/WriteWeb has a great article up that claims that JavaScript and - more to the point: all of the widgets that JavaScript powers - are ruining the web by slowing down websites to a crawl. The surprising information here is that JavaScript is a single-threaded language, meaning that in most cases nothing can happen on a website while a given piece of JavaScript code is being run. While this isn't a big deal for small or fast code, anything that your site is loading from a 3rd party that isn't optimized could be drastically slowing your site down.

Some tips are included with respect to how to optimize your pages to be minimally impacted by potentially slow JavaScript, however there is no easy solution. Maybe simply using moderation when determining which widgets to add to your site is the best advice.

Tags: JavaScript, Read Write Web, ReadWriteWeb, slow JavaScript, SlowJavascript

Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)

ahoier said 10:38PM on 8-19-2007

Try gmail (I use(d) HTTPS version.....). Start with "Web Clips" enabled, and "standard with chat" enabled.

Surf around your mailbox a little bit.

Now, go and disable Web Clips, and switch to standard without chat (or hell, why not basic HTML? hehe) - surf around your inbox.

It should be speedier...it was for me anyways :) Though, if you go the drastic route of plain HTML, be warned, there is no more "Auto-complete" for composing e-mail to addresses....hehe.

alex said 10:47PM on 8-19-2007

... I HATE java runtime.... HELL yes it's slowing down the web!

Salsa Shark said 11:28PM on 8-19-2007

Java != JavaScript

JeffL said 12:43AM on 8-20-2007

I think you've misrepresented an important piece here.

JavaScript runs in your browser, not on the web server. So when bad JavaScript gets run, it doesn't really "slow down the web" -- it slows down your browser. Of course, the effect is that the website you're loading seems to slow down. But my browser being slow doesn't effect YOU -- so it's not really "slowing down the website," just my view of the website.

It's subtle, but it's important.

Abscissa said 2:45AM on 8-20-2007

I've always hated JavaScript and this has always been one of the big reasons. People REALLY need to get off this JavaScript binge they've been on.

Richard said 8:43AM on 8-20-2007

No, Javascript isn't the problem, its developers using javasctript for everything, thats slowing down there sites.

Reshma said 12:40PM on 8-20-2007

a simple javascript which displays latest news with picture of your choice for FREE.
Try http://www.odude.com/index/news_webmaster.php

Theres php code too which will not slow down the page.

bugmenot said 9:42AM on 8-21-2007

While most javascript is run client-side, server-side javascript has existed and been in use for over 10 years.

The javascript used by Trident based browsers (IE,Maxthon,avant,etc...) is slower than the one currently used (spidermonkey) by gecko based browsers.

The one used by Presto/Merlin based apps (slightly more than just Opera) is considerably faster than spidermonkey now.

Big changes are (hopefully) a-coming from the Tamarin project with Gecko 2.0 (Firefox 4) when the actionscript code donated by adobe gets integrated to spidermonkey.

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