- published: 28 Sep 2014
- views: 234
HTTP compression is a capability that can be built into web servers and web clients to make better use of available bandwidth , and provide faster transmission speeds between both.HTTP data is compressed before it is sent from the server: compliant browsers will announce what methods are supported to the server before downloading the correct format; browsers that do not support compliant compression method will download uncompressed data. The most common compression schemas include gzip and deflate, however a full list of available schemas is maintained by IANA. Additionally, third parties develop new methods and include them in their products (e.g. the Google SDCH schema implemented in Google Chrome browser and used on certain Google servers).
A 2009 article by Google engineers Arvind Jain and Jason Glasgow states that more than 99 person-years are wasted daily due to page load time increases when users do not receive compressed content. This occurs where anti-virus software interferes with connections to force them to uncompressed, where proxies are used (with overcautious web browsers), where servers are misconfigured, and where browser bugs stop compression being used. Internet Explorer 6, which drops to HTTP 1.0 (without features like compression or pipelining) when behind a proxy- a common configuration in corporate environments- was the mainstream browser most prone to failing back to uncompressed HTTP.