Get static

If you are in charge of a web site that provides even slightly important information, or important services, it’s time to get static. I’m thinking here of sites for places like health departments (and pretty much all government services), hospitals and clinics, utility services, food delivery and ordering, and I’m sure there are more that haven’t occurred to me. As much as you possibly can, get it down to static HTML and CSS and maybe a tiny bit of enhancing JS, and pare away every byte you can.


Because too many sites are already crashing because their CMSes can’t keep up with the traffic surges. And too many sites are using dynamic frameworks that drain mobile batteries and shut out people with older browsers. That’s annoying and counter-productive in the best of times, but right now, it’s unacceptable. This is not the time for “well, this is as performant as our stack gets, so I guess users will have to live with it”. Performance isn’t just something to aspire to any more. Right now, in some situations, performance could literally be life-saving to a user, or their family.Get static

Such an important message. Now, more than ever, we need to realise that everyone plays a part.