In the past, we have reviewed the concept of “prefetching” content before the browser end user requests it – a fascinating and very Ajaxian approach to Web site and app performance. FireFox browsers can take full advantage of this with a relatively new browser plug-in called FasterFox (catchy) that handles prefetching for FF.
Attack of the Prefetchers
As FireFox usage continues to expand, some Webmasters are seeing bandwidth shoot through the roof on even non-Ajax sites as users with FasterFox are prefetching content galore.
What’s an admin to do?
Fighting Back
Thank goodness for robots.txt. Add a few lines to your “robots.txt”, and you can block FasterFox prefetches:
1. User-agent: Fasterfox
2. Disallow: /
Your FireFox users will still get content, but you will not have to pre-serve it.
Best,
Port80