More Prefetch Options

[jsamuel]

imported trac ticket
created: 2009-08-28 11:20:00
reporter: TPS

I would like the option to enable/disable each of the prefetch behaviors of RP. Default it however it is now, but I would like the option to keep each of the prefetch options enabled, or conversely, to keep forcing them (each) disabled upon startup & shutdown. If prefecthing can be dynamically activated/disactivated during browsing, maybe also per-load or timer-based options to force them to the above options.

[jsamuel]

imported trac comment
created: 2009-12-13 21:26:04
author: justin

Thanks for the suggestions. I just commented on #54 and made it specific to dns prefetching not realizing it was partly a duplicate of this ticket. Marking #54 as a duplicate of this one now.

I think it makes sense to provide the same additional options for both types of prefetch. Currently, I think link prefetching is more dangerous than dns prefetch, but that possibly just means I need to make the warning text that would go with the option clearer (ultimately there will probably be links to pages at requestpolicy.com that go along with some of the options, as there's too much to explain to fit in a dialog box).

What I think I'll do in !RequestPolicy is determine if this is not the first time !RequestPolicy has run and, if it isn't, assume that dns/link prefetch was re-enabled on purpose. In that case, instead of just disabling dns/link prefetch, !RequestPolicy will show a warning in the menu that, when clicked, opens a window with information and the option of disabling dns/link prefetch.

I'm not inclined to try to keep forcing these settings one way or another during the browsing session. If a user really has some other extension doing the same thing in the opposite direction, then the user may not know that some percentage of the time they have prefetch enabled and the rest of the time they don't. I'd rather they see a warning in the !RequestPolicy menu.

The way I imagine implementing it is that the only time the change will be made without asking the user is on initial installation. After that, if they have some other extension changing their settings, !RequestPolicy won't force the change ever but will only warn in the menu. It wouldn't be reliable to try to force it on startup because, if some other extension is doing it as well but changing the setting in the other direction, then what the user will end up with will be related to the timing of when the extensions made their change to the setting and could therefore be unpredictable.

This is one of those cases where I knew when implementing the behavior to force changing the setting on startup that sooner or later I'd need to deal with this better as some users wouldn't want them always disabled. Thanks for bringing this back to my attention.

[jsamuel]

imported trac comment
created: 2011-09-05 10:55:04
author: justin

Additional configuration options for prefetch control were added in #84.