On some websites like this one, you have to click on the refresh button so view the latest page. i.e, if you are on this page, and somebody posts a reply, you wouldn't see it until you hit the refresh button. Why isn't it continuous? Why do you have to manually press a button. On sites like Ebay for example, if you are on an auction page, you see the time clock to the end of the auction counting down and if new bids come in, you see that too as they happen.
Explain page refresh function and why it's necessary.
- Thread starter atikovi
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Not a computer guy but I would guess it has to do with computer resources. I like the clock to read seconds as well, and the newer operating systems do not display it. The explanation I read is to constantly show seconds uses up computer resources so they do not display seconds. There is a way to make seconds show up, and I do that.
I would figure having webpages constantly update like every second or more would use a lot of internet, and use computer power, etc. I would guess ebay sets it to constantly update so you can see the timer run down and other bids. If I remember when I would bid before I would constantly hit the refresh button.
I would figure having webpages constantly update like every second or more would use a lot of internet, and use computer power, etc. I would guess ebay sets it to constantly update so you can see the timer run down and other bids. If I remember when I would bid before I would constantly hit the refresh button.
no ebay just has a timer that runs it doesnt update every second.
A clock with seconds doesnt use many resources.
to turn on seconds
How to display seconds in the system clock in Windows 10 | TechRepublic
There is a way to display seconds in the Windows 10 system tray, but you will have to edit the Registry File to make it happen. We show you the necessary steps.
www.techrepublic.com
It has to do with internet traffic and data usage would be my guess to the OP's question.
also bitog will tell you if there have been new replies sometimes.. not sure what triggers it.
Trying to respond to a thread triggers it.
It's a forum, not a chat room.
A web browser only displays a snapshot of a webpage, which consists of source code instructing the browser how to display it. Some of that source code may have something built into it to tell it to run a piece of code to look for something that changed, or trigger something to notify the broswer that something is changing dynamically. Clicking refresh does force the browser to retrieve that snapshot of data, which uses bandwidth and resources.
If the forum software that generates these pages provided the means to tell the browser to continuously load all the replies, that would create lots of traffic for the site hosting it, so it's kinder to the hosting sites if it just sends a little bit of data and let people reload if they want to.
If the forum software that generates these pages provided the means to tell the browser to continuously load all the replies, that would create lots of traffic for the site hosting it, so it's kinder to the hosting sites if it just sends a little bit of data and let people reload if they want to.
The technology likely absent from pages that need refreshing is AJAX - Asynchronous Javascript And XML.
Refreshing a page will trigger the server to query the database, reload what the database has stored (latest messages in a forum, stock levels of a product, news articles, etc.) and then create the code necessary for your browser to render something on your screen. AJAX-capable pages will perform those actions without the need to refresh. As you can imagine, the extra data being tossed back and forth can impose a bit of a performance hit on the server; however, it spares the server from the starting-from-scratch refresh that might take place.
Refreshing a page will trigger the server to query the database, reload what the database has stored (latest messages in a forum, stock levels of a product, news articles, etc.) and then create the code necessary for your browser to render something on your screen. AJAX-capable pages will perform those actions without the need to refresh. As you can imagine, the extra data being tossed back and forth can impose a bit of a performance hit on the server; however, it spares the server from the starting-from-scratch refresh that might take place.
That's specifically what the OP is asking about and now that I think about it, what's the difference in how it "refreshes" in order to display the text "There are new replies in this thread. Refresh to display them." and it actually just show the new replies ? Technically there is ZERO difference. From a user-interface standpoint it could definitely be less than ideal. That auto-refreshed text is just a single line. If a reply is multiple lines or if there are multiple replies of multiple lines of text, it would require the page to shift (page-down) to keep the text box where someone is typing their own reply to move.
Anytime you open a new website page it will be up to date. Same thing with hitting the refresh function on an existing page you're sitting on. I rarely use refresh on a page unless I'm just sitting there to monitor it for changes in a short time for some reason.
