Going off and fetching stuff that the user hasn't explicitly requested yet is icky.
For example, you connect your laptop onto your employers network, and want to look up several things about face detection. You start typing "face" and each time Chrome goes off and fetches your Facebook page. You get fired for repeatedly visiting Facebook at work. Thanks, Chrome!
I can see your argument, but I'm having a hard time grasping the "Thanks, Chome!" comment as if they were the ones who fired you. Obviously if your workplace fires you for this they are in error for using inaccurate data.
You didn't visit Facebook repeatedly and if you get fired for that you have an excellent legal case.
You're loading things from Facebook on a very high percentage of websites, so if you were really going to get fired for HTTP requests to Facebook, it would have already happened a long time ago.
Not necessarily. If it's a portable device, they may be able to take it home (practically the default, if you're issued a laptop).
Employer at that point (in the home) cannot prevent you from visiting any such site as you're doing it on your time. I suppose they could have a clause preventing you from visiting FB (or any other site) at any time from a work-provided device, but that's unlikely.
There were various Firefox plugins that implemented something like that, and they've been heavily criticized for the additional cost to the websites.
One I used was called Fasterfox.
"Prefetching is considered an aggressive practice when it's initiated by the client, and plug-ins like Fasterfox have been widely criticized for supporting it"
There is also a local proxy server (cannot remember the name but it has been around since the late 90s) that can do the same for any browser. Last time I looked at it, it was not intelligent and would preload every .html link on the page, plus any .css or .js they referred to.
I haven't checked Chrome 17 yet, but they've had this feature for a while in chrome://flags/ and you can probably still turn it off.
On Chrome for Android they use this feature, too, but it's on default for "Wi-Fi only". I guess they could make a similar setting for laptops that use 3G connections, too.
Enables prerendering of suggestions from the Omnibox and predicts appropriate network actions (prerendering, Instant, DNS preconnect) by calculating a confidence value for each Omnibox result."
Your options are Automatic, Enabled, Disabled. Default was Automatic.
Not only that but mobile networks often limit the number of open tcp/udp connections to an unbelievably low number. You could easily DoS yourself out of the network's tcp stack.
Also, preloading and rendering something like ten pages in parallel when I really want only one implies wasted wattage. There goes your battery too.
Some serious bandwidth usage if you're on a mobile connection - Windows 8 will be able to detect this, I'm not sure if Linux or OSX can do it in a nice way. In the meantime you can disable it here: http://support.google.com/chrome/bin/answer.py?hl=en-GB&...
I wonder if Google Analytics will count those preloads as page views / unique visits. Anyone has an idea? Edit: Since GA works mostly with Javascript, I assume it won't have any significant effect.
You can use the "X-Purpose: instant" HTTP header to detect these requests. If you're really paranoid, you can return those requests with "403 Forbidden" responses, or your analytics company will have to take these headers into account.
>The preloading will occur in cases when the top match generated by the omnibox's autocompletion functionality is a site that the user visits frequently.
The feature only sends the URL if its not in a known whitelist. But yes, unless you download very popular stuff, sending all your URLs to Google is exactly what it does.
That's primarily based on a client-side database (a Bloom filter, to be exact). It only checks in with Google if the URL appears to be in the filter, which most aren't.
A lot of people have a problem with this as you are downloading something you haven't explicitly asked for. Would it be more appropriate if Chrome opened the TCP connection as you typed thus decreasing latency, but without actually downloading content?
HN users complaining about bandwidth usage? Seriously? It's 2012. I'm all for a better user experience, and this is exactly what Google is delivering. Quit crying.
And Chrome 17 isn't available on mobile devices. A similar feature is on Chrome for Android, but is on by default only if the user is connected through WiFi.
Which would be fine, if the default is 'off'. It isn't, as far as I understand.
It seems you like that feature. I respect that, just like I totally understand that for some users 'instant search' on Google is a good feature. For me this is a misfeature though and, given the potential network abuse, shouldn't be on by default.
Ignore the mobile network: Every hotel I've been to in Europe and Israel had very crappy wifi quality. I'm pretty sure that I'll hate sitting in a lobby with or on the same floor as Chrome users with that setting turned on (granted: Depends on usage patterns and how frequent this feature would jump into life). On those connections I can easily throttle myself to death by opening three tabs.
Please don't go for the low-hanging 'fix the network' here. I cannot. And that's a real world scenario that will become worse by a setting that defaults to true although it might very well create problems for the user _and others around him_.
One person on the network watching YouTube/NetFlix or streaming music is going to use tons more bandwidth than Chrome predicting where you'll go. Same for everyone with mail clients that automatically check every X minutes.
Also, I'd imagine Chrome is right a good portion of the time which is no extra bandwidth at all, just faster. It's also pages you frequently visit, which means the cache will almost always be used (visiting Google uses a whopping 1.5KB). Furthermore, Chrome automatically updates itself, which is also going to use a lot of bandwidth. Everyone here seems to love the auto updates...
If you have bandwidth trouble, it's not unreasonable to flip a few switches. For everyone else, the better experience is probably worthwhile.
That's fine until you hit C|Net or some other shite filled web site which is 2.8Mb to hit the front page.
That's 1097 preloads and the base 3G rate (3Gb) in the UK is used up. 1Mb after that costs about $1.50 so each subsequent preload of CNET would cost you $4.20. Does that sound fair? 3G monthly bills will hit the thousand dollar mark with little effort.
On a standard ADSL plan in the UK (5Gb), that is 1828 preloads and the data allowance is used up. After that, rate limiting kicks in which makes everything bar browsing light weight web sites unusable.
That's not many.
It's totally offensive usage of my connection and if it's turned on by default, people are going to get screwed badly.
The better experience point is a load of shit - it's a workaround for crap sites which don't load in a reasonable amount of time the first time.
It's not the browser's job to make "intelligent" decisions for me.
Is this a joke? Chrome is known for its seriously agressive update system. Meaning staying on Chrome 16 is nigh on impossible. Not that I really have an opinion on the auto-loading of URLs mind you.
Google employees get to have a nice fat fiber-optic pipe to their offices. The only broadband I can get in my office park is a 1.5 mBit ADSL pipe. We also run phones and conferencing over that so QoS gives us even less. Sorry, but I have a right to be concerned.
From the second paragraph: "The preloading will occur in cases when the top match generated by the omnibox's autocompletion functionality is a site that the user visits frequently"
Since you probably don't "frequently" visit malware-filled websites, this shouldn't be an issue - although I wonder if Chrome would load it anyway or not.. It seems to do a better job than most browsers of pre-emptively warning you when you try to visit a dangerous website, at least in my experience.
Just another way for Google to capture information about you (options be damned - if it's on by default, it's going to stay that way for the majority).
Plus, this seems like a cheap way to look like your browser is faster.
51 comments
[ 2.0 ms ] story [ 86.4 ms ] threadFor example, you connect your laptop onto your employers network, and want to look up several things about face detection. You start typing "face" and each time Chrome goes off and fetches your Facebook page. You get fired for repeatedly visiting Facebook at work. Thanks, Chrome!
You're loading things from Facebook on a very high percentage of websites, so if you were really going to get fired for HTTP requests to Facebook, it would have already happened a long time ago.
Not if you're "at-will".
One I used was called Fasterfox.
"Prefetching is considered an aggressive practice when it's initiated by the client, and plug-ins like Fasterfox have been widely criticized for supporting it"
http://books.google.com.uy/books?id=DyVgAez6yg8C&pg=PA29...
Not a good feature if you ask me.
On Chrome for Android they use this feature, too, but it's on default for "Wi-Fi only". I guess they could make a similar setting for laptops that use 3G connections, too.
"Prerender from omnibox
Enables prerendering of suggestions from the Omnibox and predicts appropriate network actions (prerendering, Instant, DNS preconnect) by calculating a confidence value for each Omnibox result."
Your options are Automatic, Enabled, Disabled. Default was Automatic.
Also, preloading and rendering something like ten pages in parallel when I really want only one implies wasted wattage. There goes your battery too.
You can use the "X-Purpose: instant" HTTP header to detect these requests. If you're really paranoid, you can return those requests with "403 Forbidden" responses, or your analytics company will have to take these headers into account.
http://code.google.com/chrome/whitepapers/pagevisibility.htm...
It's a legitimate whinge.
It seems you like that feature. I respect that, just like I totally understand that for some users 'instant search' on Google is a good feature. For me this is a misfeature though and, given the potential network abuse, shouldn't be on by default.
Ignore the mobile network: Every hotel I've been to in Europe and Israel had very crappy wifi quality. I'm pretty sure that I'll hate sitting in a lobby with or on the same floor as Chrome users with that setting turned on (granted: Depends on usage patterns and how frequent this feature would jump into life). On those connections I can easily throttle myself to death by opening three tabs.
Please don't go for the low-hanging 'fix the network' here. I cannot. And that's a real world scenario that will become worse by a setting that defaults to true although it might very well create problems for the user _and others around him_.
Also, I'd imagine Chrome is right a good portion of the time which is no extra bandwidth at all, just faster. It's also pages you frequently visit, which means the cache will almost always be used (visiting Google uses a whopping 1.5KB). Furthermore, Chrome automatically updates itself, which is also going to use a lot of bandwidth. Everyone here seems to love the auto updates...
If you have bandwidth trouble, it's not unreasonable to flip a few switches. For everyone else, the better experience is probably worthwhile.
That's 1097 preloads and the base 3G rate (3Gb) in the UK is used up. 1Mb after that costs about $1.50 so each subsequent preload of CNET would cost you $4.20. Does that sound fair? 3G monthly bills will hit the thousand dollar mark with little effort.
On a standard ADSL plan in the UK (5Gb), that is 1828 preloads and the data allowance is used up. After that, rate limiting kicks in which makes everything bar browsing light weight web sites unusable.
That's not many.
It's totally offensive usage of my connection and if it's turned on by default, people are going to get screwed badly.
The better experience point is a load of shit - it's a workaround for crap sites which don't load in a reasonable amount of time the first time.
It's not the browser's job to make "intelligent" decisions for me.
A cool feature, but I think this should be opt-in.
Since you probably don't "frequently" visit malware-filled websites, this shouldn't be an issue - although I wonder if Chrome would load it anyway or not.. It seems to do a better job than most browsers of pre-emptively warning you when you try to visit a dangerous website, at least in my experience.
Plus, this seems like a cheap way to look like your browser is faster.