What does the image decoding attribute actually do?
An in-depth look at the decoding attribute and how it affects web performance differently when using sync, async or not at all
TuneTheWeb Blog
Barry Pollard's thoughts about web performance, security and usability
Latest posts
What we learned about Core Web Vitals from Google IO
The 2021 Google IO event had a number of presentations about Core Web Vitals so what did we learn from them up the upcoming page experience ranking?
Making the slowest 'fast' page
Can you make a webpage which gets 100 score in Lighthouse and passes all the Core Web Vitals and still feels slow?
What do Lighthouse Scores look like across the web?
An in-depth look at Lighthouse scores across the 6.8 Million sites the HTTP Archive crawled in September 2020
Setting Height And Width On Images Is Important Again
Thanks to some recent changes in browsers, it's now well worth setting `width` and `height` attributes on your images to prevent layout shifts and improve the experience of your site visitors.
Should you self-host Google Fonts?
A deep dive into the performance implications of using Google Fonts (good and bad) and whether self-hosting is better.
Running Lighthouse in GitHub Actions
How to set up automatic runs of Ligthouse audits on pull requests using GitHub actions.
Helping to create the Web Almanac
The story behind the HTTP Archive Web Almanac from one of it's contributors.
Critical Resources and the First 14 KB - A Review
Do you really need to optimise as much of your critical page into the first 14 KB of your HTML for TCP reasons? Or does that not hold true in an HTTPS world?
Adding controls to Google Tag Manager
12 tips to enforce control to secure Google Tag Manager (GTM) and prevent security or performance problems
Writing a Technical Book for Manning
If you've ever thought of publishing a tech book then read up on my experiences writing HTTP/2 in Action for Manning.
Why do we need HTTP/2?
Why do we need HTTP/2? In this article, we’ll show why HTTP/1.1 has fundamental performance problems, and therefore why HTTP/2, is needed now.
Further thoughts on Accelerated Mobile Pages (AMP)
A review of AMP a couople of years after implementing this on my site and what changes (if any) it made.
Thoughts on Google versus Symantec
Google has recently been punishing Symantec for a number of incidents when issuing certificates and are now proposing even more restrictions.
HTTP versus HTTPS versus HTTP2 - The real story
Some people claim HTTPS is faster then HTTP and it can be - if you use HTTP/2 - but what's a real picture of these three protocols.
What does the Green Padlock Really Mean?
What does that green padlock on a website really mean, what's the difference between DV OV and EV certs? What does a CA do?
Implementing Accelerated Mobile Pages (AMP)
Learn how I added Google Accelerated Mobile Pages (AMP) to this site and use my example to implement on your own site
Inlining CSS
Inlining CSS into a style block in your HEAD tag can have massive performance benefits but I still don't recommend it. Find out why.
Do we really need Google's Accelerated Mobile Pages (AMP)?
Google is trying to fix the mobile web with Accelerated Mobile Pages Project (AMP), but do we really need another format to do this?
Tune The Web Blog
Keep up to date with changes to tunetheweb.com and read any articles, or opinions, that don't really fit in with the rest of the site.
Dangerous Web Security Features
Are some web security features like HSTS, HPKP and CSP too dangerous for mainstream use due to the potential to DoS yourself?