[whatwg] should async scripts block the document's load event?

[Darin Fisher]

I don't know... to me, "asynchronous" means completes later.  Precedence:
 XMLHttpRequest.

The Mozilla network code uses the phrase "load background" to describe a
load that happens asynchronously in the background _and_ does not block
onload.  Perhaps not coincidentally, this mode is used to load background
images :-)

-Darin


On Fri, Feb 12, 2010 at 11:50 AM, Jonas Sicking <jonas at sicking.cc> wrote:

> It's a good point. Curious to hear what other people are thinking.
>
> / Jonas
>
> On Fri, Feb 12, 2010 at 10:10 AM, Nicholas Zakas <nzakas at yahoo-inc.com>
> wrote:
> > To me “asynchronous” fundamentally means “doesn’t block other things from
> > happening,” so if async currently does block the load event from firing
> then
> > that seems very wrong to me.
> >
> >
> >
> > -Nicholas
> >
> >
> >
> > ______________________________________________
> >
> > Commander Lock: "Damnit Morpheus, not everyone believes what you
> believe!"
> >
> > Morpheus: "My beliefs do not require them to."
> >
> > ________________________________
> >
> > From: whatwg-bounces at lists.whatwg.org
> > [mailto:whatwg-bounces at lists.whatwg.org] On Behalf Of Brian Kuhn
> > Sent: Friday, February 12, 2010 8:03 AM
> > To: Jonas Sicking
> > Cc: Steve Souders; WHAT Working Group
> > Subject: Re: [whatwg] should async scripts block the document's load
> event?
> >
> >
> >
> > Right.  Async scripts aren't really asynchronous if they block all the
> > user-visible functionality that sites currently tie to window.onload.
> >
> >
> >
> > I don't know if we need another attribute, or if we just need to change
> the
> > behavior for all async scripts.  But I think the best time to fix this is
> > now; before too many UAs implement async.
> >
> >
> >
> > -Brian
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > On Thu, Feb 11, 2010 at 10:41 PM, Jonas Sicking <jonas at sicking.cc>
> wrote:
> >
> > Though what we want here is a DONTDELAYLOAD attribute. I.e. we want
> > load to start asap, but we don't want the load to hold up the load
> > event if all other resources finish loading before this one.
> >
> > / Jonas
> >
> > On Thu, Feb 11, 2010 at 10:23 PM, Steve Souders <whatwg at souders.org>
> wrote:
> >> I just sent email last week proposing a POSTONLOAD attribute for
> scripts.
> >>
> >> -Steve
> >>
> >> On 2/10/2010 5:18 PM, Jonas Sicking wrote:
> >>>
> >>> On Fri, Nov 6, 2009 at 4:22 PM, Brian Kuhn<bnkuhn at gmail.com>  wrote:
> >>>
> >>>>
> >>>> No one has any thoughts on this?
> >>>> It seems to me that the purpose of async scripts is to get out of the
> >>>> way
> >>>> of
> >>>> user-visible functionality.  Many sites currently attach user-visible
> >>>> functionality to window.onload, so it would be great if async scripts
> at
> >>>> least had a way to not block that event.  It would help minimize the
> >>>> affect
> >>>> that secondary-functionality like ads and web analytics have on the
> user
> >>>> experience.
> >>>> -Brian
> >>>>
> >>>
> >>> I'm concerned that this is too big of a departure from how people are
> >>> used to<script>s behaving.
> >>>
> >>> If we do want to do something like this, one possibility would be to
> >>> create a generic attribute that can go on things like<img>,<link
> >>> rel=stylesheet>,<script>  etc that make the resource not block the
> >>> 'load' event.
> >>>
> >>> / Jonas
> >>>
> >>
> >
> >
>
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