Technique: Evolving JavaScript Code to Reduce Load Time

First appearing in 1995, JavaScript was meant to be “simple, robust, portable…high performance,” and more, according to JavaScript creator, James Gosling. One of the most popular programming languages in the world, JavaScript is the foundation for millions of applications, thanks to its inherent simplicity and versatility. However, JavaScript has also garnered a reputation for being inelegant, heavy, and slow.

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In 2006, Amazon reported that every 100 milliseconds in page load time cost its organization 1% in sales, creating an estimated loss of $107 million due to slow page load. As over 97% of websites use JavaScript code for complex web page features such as interactive maps, scrolling videos, or animated graphics, performance and load time efficiency are critical for a high-quality user experience. Various improvements such as removing unused code, caching, code splitting, code compression, and more allow programmers to optimize performance and improve execution time.

Read “Evolving JavaScript Code to Reduce Load Time” from IEEE Transactions on Software Engineering to learn how local search algorithms potentially reduce source code size, allowing for increased performance and optimization.