Getting Started with Web Performance and Optimization

Techniques for new performance issues

After years of emphasis on performance, is the Web actually getting slower? In this video collection from O’Reilly, several experts argue that, at the very least, the Web isn’t as fast as many expected it to be by now. The problem today is the sheer number and size of images, responsive design elements, and the boom in third-party components. How can you help reverse this trend?

This unique video collection explores and demonstrates web performance techniques and tools for addressing this latest batch of problems. Ideal for web developers with one or two years of experience, each segment features a highly rated session from our recent Velocity conferences.

This video collection includes:

• Understanding and Optimizing Web Performance Metrics
  Bryan McQuade (Google)
  Explore several web performance metrics (including onload, time to first byte, and others), along with best practices for improving them.

• Performance Monitoring: Synthetic vs RUM
  Jon Fox (Torbit)
  Compare these two monitoring technologies and discover why one is not a replacement for the other.

• Lightning Demo: WebPagetest
  Patrick Meenan (Google)
  Watch this demonstration to learn how WebPagetest’s latest comparison features work.

• Selecting and Deploying Automated Optimization Solutions
  Patrick Meenan (Google)
  Understand how acceleration solutions can affect your site, depending on how you deploy them.

• Enough with the JavaScript Already!
  Nicholas Zakas (Box)
  Find out why the expanded use of JavaScript is a performance drag—and why much of it is unnecessary.

• Going Beyond Onload—How Fast Does It Feel?
  Patrick Meenan (Google), Chao Feng (Microsoft), and Mike Petrovich (SNAP Interactive)
  Get quick demonstrations of the Speed Index, Page Phase Time, and User-Ready Time techniques for UX performance measurement.

• Prioritize Your Critical CSS and Images to Make Your Site Fast
  Jan-Willem Maessen (Google)
  Use Google’s PageSpeed Optimization Libraries to determine which optimization techniques work best for speeding up first paint.

• A Picture Costs a Thousand Words
  Guy Podjarny (Akamai Technologies Inc)
  Explore a variety of tools and techniques to keep images from slowing down your pages, and learn how to implement them.

Interested in mobile performance? Check out the "Mobile Performance is Critical to User Experience" video collection. And for expert, in-person web performance training, be sure to join us at an upcoming Velocity Conference: velocityconf.com.