script and css load time

[novicenate]

I know this is probably a bad question, but is there a point at which the length of code in a stylesheet and external javascript seriously and visably to the average person affects the load time of a page?? If so, when?Nathan

[real_illusions]

there isn't really a definitive point.Its a general trend where, the more stuff there is to load, the longer the page will take to load. Different internet speeds will also affect load time, but be it on dial up or super duper mega fast it'll set fire to your underwear broadband speeds, the loading times will always increase the more stuff there is to load.

[novicenate]

well, I know that as you add more images the entire load time increases becuase images are 10-50 or even 100 KB in size each. but code is typically very small, even large pages of it, because it's just text. so I guess I was asking moreso since file size isn't much of a factor, does it take more time for a browser to "read" the large page of code and figure out how to display it, which then takes more time to load the page overall??

[novicenate]

well, I know that as you add more images the entire load time increases becuase images are 10-50 or even 100 KB in size each. but code is typically very small, even large pages of it, because it's just text. so I guess I was asking moreso since file size isn't much of a factor, does it take more time for a browser to "read" the large page of code and figure out how to display it, which then takes more time to load the page overall??

[aspnetguy]

there are now JavaScript libraries approaching 100k and blog and forum pages can easily become very large.

[jesh]

Also, when you put your CSS and javascript in external files, the browser only has to download those files once. After the files have been downloaded, they are served from the browser's cache. If all of your pages use the same CSS, the visitor will only have to download your CSS file once on the first visit to your website. Then, as that visitor navigates through your site, his/her browser will load the CSS from cache and the experience will be much faster.So, if, like aspnetguy said, there are javascript libraries that are larger than 100KB, it may take some time to download it and the user may experience a delay, but this will only happen the first time the visitor comes to your site.

[novicenate]

excellent knowledge. thanks everyone!

[jlhaslip]

Here is an URL for testing the page loading times and sizes. They make an analysis based on several factors, file size, images and their sizes, etc.http://www.websiteoptimization.com/services/analyze/

[justsomeguy]

Also, just so you know, every character on a page is 1 byte. If you have 1024 characters on a page, your file is 1KB. When you consider how much text shows up on a page like this, plus the HTML to render the text, pages get fairly large. Before I made this post Opera was reporting that the inline elements on this page (this thread) total over 130KB.