5 ms·

It's become pretty clear that a lot of developers never test their websites or apps in low bandwidth environments. Testing over a heavily throttled connection

by entuno 3y ago

It's become pretty clear that a lot of developers never test their websites or apps in low bandwidth environments. Testing over a heavily throttled connection that drops packets should be a mandatory part of usability testing for anything intended to be used over the Internet.

Scoundreller 3y ago
Nor expensive data environments. The NPR One app used to chew through a few hundred mb of data in "caching" every time you started it. No way to restrict this function to wifi only. And no, you can't select bit rates. Also Zoom has little ability to minimize the audio or video data usage (but I've learned you can reduce how much of others video is sent to you by reducing the window size). Just wish I could set myself to 480p to be present but not destroy my data while working at the cabin.
- 0xFF0123 3y ago
  I always found zoom much better at saving bits than other video conferencing systems. The fact that when you intermittently dropped out you catch up on the sped up audio always seemed neat (although I'm unsure if that was an intended feature, or just a side effect).
  - szundi 3y ago
    Pretty sure intended
  - Scoundreller 3y ago
    > I always found zoom much better at saving bits than other video conferencing systems. Likely true. Zoom doesn't chew up much bandwidth. I always find it funny when people think they need to upgrade their home internet bandwidth because a family "works & studies from home". Unless you're up/downloading huge media files, several instances of Zoom and virtual desktops will consume less than a 4k Netflix stream.
- lostlogin 3y ago
  > Just wish I could set myself to 480p to be present but not destroy my data while working at the cabin. Would this be achieved by plugging in a crappy camera and only giving that to Zoom?
- a1o 3y ago
  MS Teams is terrible at this too, I need it to only send me audio and ignore video, because a lot of times I am at sea with poor connection - these are company ships, so it's needed for a lot of folks at work...
  - mynameisvlad 3y ago
    This is very much possible in the desktop app, although apparently the position of the feature has changed at least once: https://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/msteams/forum/all/how-do-i-turn-off-incoming-video-in-teams-desktop/3070123b-008e-45a4-b021-1269ab3c3723 https://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/msteams/forum/all/how-do...
- oefrha 3y ago
  No idea if there’s a native way to do this in Zoom since I don’t have that problem, but if you’re concerned about your upload bitrate, you can use OBS to downsample your camera and configure Zoom to use OBS’s virtual camera instead.
- phh 3y ago
  In India on TVs, (where people use 4g to watch content) Google added a data saver mode in Android TV. They just shape the trafic down (to 500kBps iirc?). I guess that was easier than trying to convince app developers to reduce their data usage on a system flag. That's stupid for a lot of reasons, but I guess in your case that would work.
resonious 3y ago
Firefox and Chrome dev tools make this super easy, but I think people just aren't thinking about it.
sublinear 3y ago
I strongly disagree that this is in the hands of the developers. People used to say the same about accessibility until the ADA lawsuits started coming in forcing businesses to take it seriously. There needs to be a business incentive to spend developer time on low bandwidth. Progressive web apps that cache stuff are about all you're gonna get for now.
dotancohen 3y ago
> Testing over a heavily throttled connection that drops packets should be a mandatory part of usability testing for anything intended to be used over the Internet. And this is actually easy to do, as Google Chrome Devtools can simulate this environment with a click.
wildrhythms 3y ago
Because the higherups who OK these decisions and designs and demand every user sees a shiny animation or popover that drives their next promotion have an idealistic vision in their mind of a user who is 'always connected', always online, using a perfectly calibrated high resolution screen, and the latest modern high power device purchased with a quarter million dollar yearly salary just like them.
kmarc 3y ago
I was surprised that many of the "professional" web de s don't test, don't even occur to them to install other browsers, like, for example, Firefox... Which is a shame, since FF dev Tools have a quite comfy tool for testing the we page in low bandwidth environments: * https://firefox-source-docs.mozilla.org/devtools-user/network_monitor/throttling/index.html https://firefox-source-docs.mozilla.org/devtools-user/networ... (I haven't done web de for a good ten years now, yet, even I somehow know about these)

by entuno 3y ago

Scoundreller 3y ago

Nor expensive data environments. The NPR One app used to chew through a few hundred mb of data in "caching" every time you started it. No way to restrict this function to wifi only. And no, you can't select bit rates. Also Zoom has little ability to minimize the audio or video data usage (but I've learned you can reduce how much of others video is sent to you by reducing the window size). Just wish I could set myself to 480p to be present but not destroy my data while working at the cabin.

0xFF0123 3y ago
I always found zoom much better at saving bits than other video conferencing systems. The fact that when you intermittently dropped out you catch up on the sped up audio always seemed neat (although I'm unsure if that was an intended feature, or just a side effect).
- szundi 3y ago
  Pretty sure intended
- Scoundreller 3y ago
  > I always found zoom much better at saving bits than other video conferencing systems. Likely true. Zoom doesn't chew up much bandwidth. I always find it funny when people think they need to upgrade their home internet bandwidth because a family "works & studies from home". Unless you're up/downloading huge media files, several instances of Zoom and virtual desktops will consume less than a 4k Netflix stream.
lostlogin 3y ago
> Just wish I could set myself to 480p to be present but not destroy my data while working at the cabin. Would this be achieved by plugging in a crappy camera and only giving that to Zoom?
a1o 3y ago
MS Teams is terrible at this too, I need it to only send me audio and ignore video, because a lot of times I am at sea with poor connection - these are company ships, so it's needed for a lot of folks at work...
- mynameisvlad 3y ago
  This is very much possible in the desktop app, although apparently the position of the feature has changed at least once: https://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/msteams/forum/all/how-do-i-turn-off-incoming-video-in-teams-desktop/3070123b-008e-45a4-b021-1269ab3c3723 https://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/msteams/forum/all/how-do...
oefrha 3y ago
No idea if there’s a native way to do this in Zoom since I don’t have that problem, but if you’re concerned about your upload bitrate, you can use OBS to downsample your camera and configure Zoom to use OBS’s virtual camera instead.
phh 3y ago
In India on TVs, (where people use 4g to watch content) Google added a data saver mode in Android TV. They just shape the trafic down (to 500kBps iirc?). I guess that was easier than trying to convince app developers to reduce their data usage on a system flag. That's stupid for a lot of reasons, but I guess in your case that would work.

resonious 3y ago

Firefox and Chrome dev tools make this super easy, but I think people just aren't thinking about it.

sublinear 3y ago

I strongly disagree that this is in the hands of the developers. People used to say the same about accessibility until the ADA lawsuits started coming in forcing businesses to take it seriously. There needs to be a business incentive to spend developer time on low bandwidth. Progressive web apps that cache stuff are about all you're gonna get for now.

dotancohen 3y ago

> Testing over a heavily throttled connection that drops packets should be a mandatory part of usability testing for anything intended to be used over the Internet. And this is actually easy to do, as Google Chrome Devtools can simulate this environment with a click.

wildrhythms 3y ago

Because the higherups who OK these decisions and designs and demand every user sees a shiny animation or popover that drives their next promotion have an idealistic vision in their mind of a user who is 'always connected', always online, using a perfectly calibrated high resolution screen, and the latest modern high power device purchased with a quarter million dollar yearly salary just like them.

kmarc 3y ago

I was surprised that many of the "professional" web de s don't test, don't even occur to them to install other browsers, like, for example, Firefox... Which is a shame, since FF dev Tools have a quite comfy tool for testing the we page in low bandwidth environments: * https://firefox-source-docs.mozilla.org/devtools-user/network_monitor/throttling/index.html https://firefox-source-docs.mozilla.org/devtools-user/networ... (I haven't done web de for a good ten years now, yet, even I somehow know about these)