The Technology Behind SiteCelerate

There are two factors involved in moving web traffic faster.

Compression

Compression is just the shrinking of the data and typically web pages are compressed 5x by the SiteCelerate and NetCelerate systems; small JavaScript files are 3x and images 2x. Images vary a lot depending on how carefully any compression was done originally.

The system can also be tuned to be more or less aggressive on image compression. The default setting is about 3 on a scale of 8, leaning toward image quality over maximum compression.

Acceleration

Acceleration takes in other aspects of "getting the data there faster" and includes:

1. Maintaining persistent connections on all data, dynamic and static (saves 50ms - 200ms per connection on dialups)
2. Setting expiration times on static data so that the browser doesn't have to repeatedly ask via “If-Modified-Since” requests about content that that is very stable. (There is 100% bandwidth savings on those requests not made)
3. Matching static AND DYNAMIC content to previous requests to provide "Not-Modified-Since" 30K pages can turn it 300 bytes. (99% compression and 10x - 50x speedup).
4. Intelligently Cached Optimised content, so there is no need to access the web server.

These combine to provide the kind of results that make a real difference that can be measured using web browser diagnostic tools like Web Detective. The user also experiences a speedup because the whole page text is delivered and can be displayed before the "image" packets start mixing in and slow down the page. The effect is the page pops up in a couple seconds and then is populated with images instead of a blank screen for 20 seconds and then having a somewhat complete page appearing.

You can always try it first: Contact us now for a no-obligation test on your systems. To learn more:

• Five major differentiation factors
• SiteCelerate Technical White Paper