Re: The future of gitweb - part 2: JavaScript

[david@lang.hm]

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On Thu, 14 Apr 2011, Micha? ?owicki wrote:

> 2011/4/14 Jakub Narebski <jnareb@gmail.com>:
>>
>> Second issue is how to use it / how to include it:
>>
>> * Use some external Content Delivery Network (CDN), like
>>  Google Libraries API
>>     http://code.google.com/apis/libraries/devguide.html
>>  e.g.:
>>
>>  <script src="https://ajax.googleapis.com/ajax/libs/jquery/1.5.2/jquery.min.js"></script>
>>  <script src="http://code.jquery.com/jquery-1.5.2.min.js"></script>
>>
>>  or
>>
>>  <script src="https://ajax.googleapis.com/ajax/libs/mootools/1.3.1/mootools-yui-compressed.js"></script>
>>
>>  This is nice solution... if we don't need plugin / extension
>>  which usually are not available in CDN version of library.
>>
>>  Also this makes gitweb dependent on third-party service, and require
>>  network connectivity to Internet to have access to JavaScript-based
>>  features.
>>
>> * Mark appropriate JavaScript library as dependency in gitweb/INSTALL
>>  to be downloaded in appropriate place but do not provide sources.
>>  Perhaps add target in gitweb/Makefile that automatically downloads
>>  it.
>>
>>  This would make installing gitweb correctly more complicated.
>>  JavaScript-based features would not work if somebody instals gitweb
>>  incorrectly.
>>
>>  I think we can set up gitweb build so that one can configure at
>>  build stage whether to use CDN or download library, or use
>>  pre-downloaded (and perhaps instaled somewhere) version of framework
>>  (combining JavaScript on build in all but first case).
>
> I'm not sure about pre-downloaded version of libs. Most of the time
> it's not a big deal but sometimes it may introduce hard to detect
> issues when someone use different version of the lib -
> http://ejohn.org/blog/learning-from-twitter/ .But the idea with
> options - CDN or download is very good. CDNs can improve the page
> download speed by increasing simultaneous connections if files are
> downloaded from many hostnames but for companies where instances of
> gitweb are on the Intrantet the 2nd option could be better I think (at
> least in my case). Additionaly CDNs can save some money when you pay
> for data traffic :)

another advantage of using the library from a CDN is that the user may 
already have it cached in their browser and not have to download it at 
all.

as long as there is a build-time option to make a version that does not 
depend on being able to get to the Internet I think it's a good idea to 
make the default use the Internet.

David Lang