Edge Side Includes

ESI is a means of marking up the components of a page in an XML syntax with rules that a ESI-aware reverse-proxy can understand to allow it to decide what parts of the page are to be cached and what parts are to allways be fetched from the source. It kinda compliments other include technologies (like SSI for example) and distributes the burden of deciding what dynamic components to send to clients out to edge proxies and away from the central originating web server.

It was published as a W 3 C Note in August of 2001 and includes conditional tests and rules and an invalidation protocol to force expiry. There are some simple Examples Here of how it might work within content.

The technology is being championed by the likes of Akamai who provide a content distribution service to clients to get their web goods as close as possible to the punters, so it can only help them deliver their service in a more timely fashion. Content management/publishing heavyweights like Interwoven, Vignette and Oracle are also involved.

See Also: Web Development | Web Hosting | Notes Index

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