[whatwg] history.back()

[Brady Eidson]

On Jan 21, 2010, at 1:12 AM, Darin Fisher wrote:

> In WebKit, history.back() is currently implemented asynchronously.
> 
> However, it was not always this way.  Previously, if the back navigation corresponded to a hash change, then the back navigation would complete synchronously.  If the back navigation corresponded to a different document, then it would be completed asynchronously.
> 
> The HTML5 spec currently calls for the old behavior of WebKit, which happens to match the behavior of Gecko.  Because the spec is written this way, there is movement in WebKit to change WebKit back.
> 
> IE however appears to implement history.back() asynchronously in all cases just like newer versions of WebKit.
> 
> I actually think this is a better behavior to spec for a couple reasons:
> 
> 1)  It allows for history.back() to behave consistently regardless of the type of navigation.

I agree it would make history.back() consistent regardless of the type of navigation.  I don't necessarily know what benefit this has.

> 2)  It allows for the back/forward list to be decoupled from the main thread of the rendering engine.

I've both brainstormed on my own and discussed this point with others who have done a lot of thought on how a multi-threaded or multi-processed WebKit may work in the future, and we all agree that synchronous history.go() does not make an MT/MP implementation difficult or impossible.

> This last point is quite relevant to Chrome since we store the back/forward list in a separate process.  We do this since items in the back/forward list may actually need to be rendered using different WebKit processes.  (Navigating in the location bar is a hint that we can spawn a new process.)
> 
> We could copy the entire back/forward list to each process and replicate state, but that seems excessive.  Instead, simply matching the history.back() behavior of IE avoids the need to do so.
> 
> From a web compat perspective, it seems wise to match the behavior of IE.  

This is often the case, yes, but not always a good enough rationalization on its own.

> It also has other benefits.

> Can we change the spec?

I've heard one concrete benefit and one theoretical benefit.
Concrete - Chrome's particular multi-process model easily fits in with asynchronous history.go()
Theoretical - Matching the behavior of IE here is important to compatibility than matching Gecko and previous Webkit behavior.

To argue in favor of the current spec:

One of the main drives for async behavior in modern programming and HTML 5 specifically has been to remove the slow and unpredictable nature of blocking I/O from the equation.  Certainly that has been a motivating factor in a lot of feedback I have given, others at Apple have given, and many outside of Apple have given to the HTML 5 spec (including those who work on Chromium).

The current synchronous traversals called for by the spec are explicitly the ones that - from the engine's standpoint - will never have i/o to block on.

More generally, asynchronicity adds complexity to using and understanding APIs as well as predicting the side effects of a particular method call.  Web developers rarely - if ever - have sympathy for the difficulties of the engineers who created the environment they are working in.

It seems that when designing and presenting an API, synchronicity should be preferred unless there's an inherent performance or scalability problem with it.  And I just don't see that problem with the specified behavior of history.go().

~Brady

> 
> -Darin