# Keep your site simple, and it will be fast! Gabor Javorszky A lead dev at Mindsize, freelancer Twitter: [@javorszky](https://twitter.com/javorszky) <small>slides at https://wctw.j7y.co</small>

## The Request Life Cycle™ 1) HTTP GET to /some/url <img src="pix/ring.webp" alt="">

## The Request Life Cycle™ 2) server does "stuff" <img src="pix/doesstuff.webp" alt="">

## The Request Life Cycle™ 3) HTTP response, hopefully a 200 <img src="pix/sendinglove.gif" alt="">

## The Request Life Cycle™ 4) browser parses the received content (your html) <img src="pix/someofthosewords.webp" alt="">

## The Request Life Cycle™ 5) includes CSS / JS (`deferred`, `async`) <img src="pix/loadassets.webp" alt="">

## The Request Life Cycle™ 6) then parses those CSS / JS files <img src="pix/inflate.gif" alt="">

## The Request Life Cycle™ 7) which may also include additional files... <img src="pix/matryoshka.webp" alt="">

## The Request Life Cycle™ 8) repeat 5-7 until you run out of things to include <img src="pix/matryoshka.webp" alt="">

## All of those can slow down Each of them. One by one.

DNS

It's not DNS
There's no way it's DNS
It was DNS

-- A troubleshooting haikuhttps://t.co/brgEflxBRB

— Ryan Scott Brown (@ryan_sb) August 10, 2016

<img src="pix/haiku.jpg" alt="">

# Server

This is your site with few plugins installed <img src="pix/straightline.jpg" alt=""> Photo by Robert Murray on Unsplash

This is your site with 89 plugins and 4 themes (one of which is Divi) <img src="pix/windyroad.jpg" alt=""> Photo by Raul Taciu on Unsplash

## Javascript is expensive <img src="pix/costofjs.png" alt=""> <small>The Cost of Javascript in 2018 - https://medium.com/@addyosmani/the-cost-of-javascript-in-2018-7d8950fbb5d4</small>

## Unused JS is more expensive <img src="pix/unusedjs.png" alt=""> <small>Actual client's site as of 6pm on 6th Sept</small>

## Fonts / CSS * FOUC (flash of unstyled content) * popups. so. many. popups. :( * things moving under your mouse, so you "misclick/tap"

## Fight for the user Questions to ask:

> Do you really need all 4 custom fonts from typekit? All of the glyphs? Sure you can't get by with Times New Roman / Arial?

> Do you really need to load that fancy frontend framework to display what's on your site? (React, Vue, Angular, Ember, etc)

> Do you really need to track users across 9 different services? (Google Analytics, mixpanel, snapchat, bing, yahoo, facebook)

# Bonus question > How much do you respect their privacy?

> Do you really need all of the plugins you're currently using? Can some of those be broken out into a tiny utility plugin instead? Are some of those unnecessary? Are you only using a tiny part of a larger plugin? (Looking at you, Jetpack!)

> Do you need a full blown pagebuilder? Can you instead design your pages so they're more static?

> Do you need a javascript based a/b testing? Could you do server side template based a/b testing instead?

> Do you need to load assets from various different places? Can some of them be placed on your server / your CDN instead?

> Do you need a starter theme that does EVERYTHING?! Divi and Avada are my top 2 "I'm not touching that" themes.

> Are you using plugins that were written with performance in mind? There are ~~some~~ lots that haven't... Like, LOTS... it's astounding.

> Did you test your site on a low end Android device? For less than £100, you can buy a sim free android device. Consider it a design expense for your company.

> Do you need those huge images? Did you resize them for web size? AND optimized them? (tinypng et al will help here)

> Do you need that animated svg art style? The parallax background? Think of the CPU cycles!

> Did you leave a CSS framework in your CSS file(s)? It's easy to leave the full bootstrap boilerplate in. You probably don't need most.

> How much of your CSS / JS is unused? Because you're undoing / rewriting parts.

## Reading material * Jack Lenox: Delivering WordPress in 7kb: https://blog.jacklenox.com/2018/06/04/delivering-wordpress-in-7kb/ * A List Apart: Sustainable Web Design: https://alistapart.com/article/sustainable-web-design * Load times vs conversion: https://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/page-load-time-conversion-rates * Cost of Javascript in 2018: https://medium.com/@addyosmani/the-cost-of-javascript-in-2018-7d8950fbb5d4

Open floor / Q&A after pizza / refreshments.