On Sun, Aug 15, 2021 at 01:29:37AM -0400, J. David Bryan via cctalk wrote: > On Sunday, August 15, 2021 at 12:55, Kevin Parker wrote: [...] >> ...but on my limited understanding it required support from the web >> server to actually give effect to this. > I believe that's right. At least all of the servers I used seemed to > support this option.
The option in question is called "range requests" and is documented in the original HTTP/1.1 standard from way back in 1997. Any web server worth its salt should support it automatically when serving static files. It's used for resuming downloads, for example. [...] > Assuming one only looks at a few pages, it would certainly reduce the > amount of data served, though, of course, if one requested the entire > file, it would actually be a slight disadvantage. A larger disadvantage is the pause to download the next page when leafing through a PDF, which can be quite distracting to people who can read without moving their lips. [...] > As you say, it requires server support, and to be honest I've not checked > recently to see if servers bother byte-serving anymore. [...] If a server lacks support for range requests, it is either very old or a small hobby project, and shouldn't be let anywhere near the public Internet.
