5 ms·

I ran it on a tiny static 99.9% text-only site that finishes loading in 0.15s, a full 0.1s of which is a 1.5KB creative commons graphic, and google knocks 9 poi

I ran it on a tiny static 99.9% text-only site that finishes loading in 0.15s, a full 0.1s of which is a 1.5KB creative commons graphic, and google knocks 9 points off on mobile because I don't defer the 8ms request for 374 bytes of CSS? Seems arbitrary.

mankyd 10y ago
PageSpeed, which this is based on, uses a relative metric last I checked. I.E. If you have a 2 byte site and can remove 1 byte, you'd get ~50 points off. It's not quite that simple, but that's the basic idea.
- dazc 10y ago
  Sadly, I think, it is that simple.
markdown 10y ago
> 374 bytes of CSS Put it <style> tags in the <head>. No reason to use an external file for so little. It's not worth the overhead.
- dwrowe 10y ago
  That's certainly true, but to his point - it's an 8ms call - is it worth the number of points Google knocks off?
- SahAssar 10y ago
  If it's on http2 and/or preloaded that certainly isn't true.
- BugsJustFindMe 10y ago
  Counterpoint, there's no reason to uglify something simple and clean by copy-pasting CSS into it to just to shave the remaining hairs off the dog's balls* when we already have a nice interface for read-once-use-everywhere references. * - I don't know if that's a real expression. It doesn't even seem to fit, but I like it so I'mma keep it.
- TheAceOfHearts 10y ago
  What size cutoff would you use for the <style> tag? In other words, at what point is the tradeoff worth it?
  - jansenv 10y ago
    I think its around 30kb. https://www.smashingmagazine.com/2015/08/understanding-critical-css/ https://www.smashingmagazine.com/2015/08/understanding-criti...
  - ryanworl 10y ago
    It doesn't necessarily have to be about size. The goal is to let the browser paint the above-the-fold content without any external round-trips. Using the least possible seams sensible, especially if you do it on every page. This lets caching work as intended for the majority of the CSS.
  - markdown 10y ago
    I do it for sizes less than 10KB (completely arbitrary) for most websites because the fact of the matter is that most websites don't get repeat visits often, and visitors rarely visit more than the page/article they arrived at. There's no point making all visitors cache a CSS file when only a tiny minority will need it. Note that I live in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, so HTTP round-trip times are terrible for most users. If you're on a first-world connection, it shouldn't matter as much.
dazc 10y ago
This is exactly why I stopped using page speed insights for testing. The last time I used it, which was at least a year ago, I was losing points for serving too large an image file size on mobile. Only problem was I use converting to webp 'on the fly' with mobile browsers. I could kind of get it if webp was an apple or ms solution but it isn't??
chrischen 10y ago
Especially arbitrary when considering their own website gets points knocked off: https://testmysite.thinkwithgoogle.com/ https://testmysite.thinkwithgoogle.com/ They remembered to cover Google.com (it gets perfect scores), but forgot the testing site itself.
- galfarragem 10y ago
  Youtube gets 54/100 on mobile speed and 70/100 on desktop..
- erelde 10y ago
  The site itself is an abomination on a low end pc. That thing lags, drop frames, etc. And it pretends to have a better score than a static html page without any ressources.
- blauditore 10y ago
  I only see 79/100 mobile friendliness for google.com (tried two times with same results). The screenshot shows some text among the lines of "We're sorry... ...but your computer or network may be sending automated queries. [...]". It looks like some kind of abuse/DoS protection was triggered.
seanwilson 10y ago
> Seems arbitrary It's always going to be arbitrary to have an absolute measure given the diversity of sites. Large/slow images are going to be normal for photography sites for example but worth knocking points off for coding sites. You're better off using it as a relative measure to see if the same site is improving when you make changes.

mankyd 10y ago

PageSpeed, which this is based on, uses a relative metric last I checked. I.E. If you have a 2 byte site and can remove 1 byte, you'd get ~50 points off. It's not quite that simple, but that's the basic idea.

dazc 10y ago
Sadly, I think, it is that simple.

markdown 10y ago

> 374 bytes of CSS Put it <style> tags in the <head>. No reason to use an external file for so little. It's not worth the overhead.

dwrowe 10y ago
That's certainly true, but to his point - it's an 8ms call - is it worth the number of points Google knocks off?
SahAssar 10y ago
If it's on http2 and/or preloaded that certainly isn't true.
BugsJustFindMe 10y ago
Counterpoint, there's no reason to uglify something simple and clean by copy-pasting CSS into it to just to shave the remaining hairs off the dog's balls* when we already have a nice interface for read-once-use-everywhere references. * - I don't know if that's a real expression. It doesn't even seem to fit, but I like it so I'mma keep it.
TheAceOfHearts 10y ago
What size cutoff would you use for the <style> tag? In other words, at what point is the tradeoff worth it?
- jansenv 10y ago
  I think its around 30kb. https://www.smashingmagazine.com/2015/08/understanding-critical-css/ https://www.smashingmagazine.com/2015/08/understanding-criti...
- ryanworl 10y ago
  It doesn't necessarily have to be about size. The goal is to let the browser paint the above-the-fold content without any external round-trips. Using the least possible seams sensible, especially if you do it on every page. This lets caching work as intended for the majority of the CSS.
- markdown 10y ago
  I do it for sizes less than 10KB (completely arbitrary) for most websites because the fact of the matter is that most websites don't get repeat visits often, and visitors rarely visit more than the page/article they arrived at. There's no point making all visitors cache a CSS file when only a tiny minority will need it. Note that I live in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, so HTTP round-trip times are terrible for most users. If you're on a first-world connection, it shouldn't matter as much.

dazc 10y ago

This is exactly why I stopped using page speed insights for testing. The last time I used it, which was at least a year ago, I was losing points for serving too large an image file size on mobile. Only problem was I use converting to webp 'on the fly' with mobile browsers. I could kind of get it if webp was an apple or ms solution but it isn't??

chrischen 10y ago

Especially arbitrary when considering their own website gets points knocked off: https://testmysite.thinkwithgoogle.com/ https://testmysite.thinkwithgoogle.com/ They remembered to cover Google.com (it gets perfect scores), but forgot the testing site itself.

galfarragem 10y ago
Youtube gets 54/100 on mobile speed and 70/100 on desktop..
erelde 10y ago
The site itself is an abomination on a low end pc. That thing lags, drop frames, etc. And it pretends to have a better score than a static html page without any ressources.
blauditore 10y ago
I only see 79/100 mobile friendliness for google.com (tried two times with same results). The screenshot shows some text among the lines of "We're sorry... ...but your computer or network may be sending automated queries. [...]". It looks like some kind of abuse/DoS protection was triggered.

seanwilson 10y ago

> Seems arbitrary It's always going to be arbitrary to have an absolute measure given the diversity of sites. Large/slow images are going to be normal for photography sites for example but worth knocking points off for coding sites. You're better off using it as a relative measure to see if the same site is improving when you make changes.