Re: Feature request: Server connection status message

On Thu, Mar 10, 2016 at 04:12:05AM +0000, eocene wrote:
> On Wed, Mar 09, 2016 at 08:39:02PM +1300, James C wrote:
> > Hello Dillo maintainer people,
> > 
> > If I set out to write this patch, the first version will be painful. Do you want the change?  Do you want to hand-hold me through writing it?
> 
> We do have:
> 
> MSG_BW(S->web, 1, "Contacting host...");
> MSG_BW(S->web, 1, "DNS resolving %s", hostname);
> 
> for the status bar, although unfortunately they are wiped out if you move
> the pointer over a link. I've thought it would be nice if such status messages
> could reappear when no longer showing a link...

  Yep.

  It was a bit funny to see a feature request for some status messages which
were already there (among others).
  The reasons for it, though, are completely understandable (IMO). Usually
those messages go very fast and get wiped out by cursor movement, so
they miss the intended informative purpose.

  It was also very good to read a question before trying to develop a patch.
Usually it's better to ask and have some feedback before coding [the attentive
reader already got that the reuqested patch would make no difference].

  ... but the problem is real!

  Years have taught me to try to find the root problem of what the patch
tries to fix. In this case, it looks like the problem it that sometimes
the user can't find out whether the page has been asked for or not (no
visual clue feedback telling the difference). I've had the same problem
at times (using ADSL). Thinking of it as I use dillo, I suspect that sometimes
the servers are answering a "temporarily busy" HTTP message or just droping
the connection. This is known to happen, as it was developed as a technique
against bots and DDOS attacks, by using the fact that a web browser would
try again (which dillo may not be doing for some cases).
  I've also noticed that sometimes I don't get images from a site and the
reason is that the DNS can't resolve the name, but when asked again it does.
This surely is part of the problem (at least for me). BTW, this is typical
behaviour of a crowded DNS server.

  I'd go for kind of a colored led indicator in the status bar (not wiped by
cursor movement {which displays the underlying URL}). that when hovered pops
a hint text briefly explaining the status. For instance:

    red: Resolving server name
    orange: contacting host
    yellow: expecting answer
    green: data stream already flowing.
    white/off: done.

  That way it would be quite easy to tell at which stage lies the failure.
  Obviously this is for the main page only (not images, nor stylesheets,
  nor other resources).

  Now, I'd say the problem would be tackled once the underlying causes
(as the ones described above, or a different one) are patched for. In 
which case the "status led indicator" would be very useful feedback, and
would help to locate problems while browsing.

  Let's discuss this a bit before coding,
we have a very good signal/noise ratio in dillo-dev!


-- 
  Cheers
  Jorge.-