[skyhigh007]

now, I tried with two different html pages use same background and mid background for both pages. I installed IEwatch on my IE 7 and see whats being cached. It turns out that shared images are cached and response is from cache. But why the page still blinks when i go to a different page ? Here's the link

[tomdkat]

Originally Posted by skyhigh007

now, I tried with two different html pages use same background and mid background for both pages. I installed IEwatch on my IE 7 and see whats being cached. It turns out that shared images are cached and response is from cache.

U da man! I'll have to look into IEwatch. How did you find it?

But why the page still blinks when i go to a different page ? Here's the link

I have no idea, something about the way IE renders the page. I think IE wants to make sure everything is downloaded before rendering the page and if all the content is cached, the blink occurs because it's able to locate all the content more quickly. I know Firefox 2 cached objects in memory to speed up performance switching between recently viewed pages. Firefox 3 also does this as does Opera 9.5.

I don't know why IE behaves the way it does but I'm glad you found a way to verify whether it was actually downloading the content each time vs using cached copies.

Peace...

[skyhigh007]

I was searching for HTTP viewer on google, IEwatch and httpwatch cameup. I looked at the both, IEwatch has 30 day trial so I picked that one. LOL Here's a site that doesn't look to blink in IE at all Link. Can you tell why ?

[tomdkat]

Originally Posted by skyhigh007

Here's a site that doesn't look to blink in IE at all Link. Can you tell why ?

Nope because it blinks for me using IE6.

Peace...

[skyhigh007]

It looks like the background and the header is not blinking in IE 7? Link

[tomdkat]

This last test case is interesting since in IE6, the background doesn't flash at all for me and the header will sometimes flash. The section of image below the navigation menu consistently blinks.

I don't have access to IE7 on this machine. The thing is, a LOT of people still use IE6 so you'll have to keep that in mind.

Peace...

[skyhigh007]

In the last case, I switch from a large background image to a small image that repeats. As for the middle images, I give top, middle and bottom each section an background image. I still dont get why it blinks for the header.

[tomdkat]

It has NOTHING to do with your HTML coding, at least that's my opinion. It's a side-effect of IE's page rendering method. Just a fact of life for IE users.

Peace...

[skyhigh007]

so are you saying I have to stuck with that blink?

[tomdkat]

Only if you're an IE user.

Seriously, your last set of test pages demonstrated (at least to me) that using smaller images reduces the "blink". The header image didn't blink nearly as much as the lower image and the background basically remained static.

If your images are relatively small in size, the blink should be minimal. If you must use larger images, I don't know what to tell ya.

Peace...

[skyhigh007]

Well, what I did in the last test page was, for the background image, I changed to a smaller image and repeat it , before it was a image like 1100x 1200. As for the middle background, before I also had a big image 780x1200, now I divided into 3 sections, top, middle, bottom and the menu buttons are put it between top and middle. During testing, the background does not change and the header blinks sometimes. So, I guess IE hates Large image files.

[skyhigh007]

Is it possible to have background-image: url (something.php); ?

[tomdkat]

If you're careful in how you have PHP fill in the background URL, that could work.

Peace...

[skyhigh007]

thanks!