HTTP caching is a key part of what makes the web usable, and draft standards like HTTPbis add further refinements to the existing HTTP/1.1 caching features. At WebPerfDays 2012, Mark Nottingham (@mnot) and Josh Bixby (@joshuabixby) gave some useful tips on how we can tune our web applications to take advantage of the existing and forthcoming HTTP cache features.
Continue reading How HTTPbis changes HTTP caching, and why CDNs are not always the answer
Public WiFi connections are often unsecured, leaving their connections open to being hijacked or “sniffed” by malicious people. To protect users from data and privacy loss due to insecure and untrusted connections, web sites and applications are increasingly being run entirely over secure connections (HTTPS).
My prediction is that by 2015, it will be bad practice to access web sites via HTTP, and users will increasingly demand HTTPS. This has interesting implications for hardware manufacturers and software development teams alike.
The excellent non-nonsense Quick Tab extension (https://chrome.google.com/webstore/search/quicktab?hl=en-GB) makes Google Chrome much more usable, especially if you tend to have (like I do) many tabs open:
Why this isn’t standard in Chrome is baffling, but good work from Tom Lerendu (http://tomlerendu.com/chrome/)
New research from the University of Cambridge supports the view that Verified by Visa is deeply flawed and unsafe. I first came across this mess of an implementation a while back, and the situation has only become worse since then:
the scheme has become a target for phishing, partly because inconsistent authentication methods can leave customers confused.
It’s time to insist that Visa, MasterCard and other payment gateway providers take some responsibilty for this, and stop pushing risk onto the customer.
There is a great collection of “loading…” spinner GIF images at http://www.loadinfo.net/ such as this:
Crucially, you can also generate your own spinners, with settings for back- and foreground colours and transparency.
Matthew Skelton 