httpd/browser caching of javascript/css files

[rocketraman]

For every page load, Sugar does about 10-30 http GETs for various css, js, gifs, and so forth. I have configured Apache to tell the browser to cache these files by adding the following to my httpd config (found on another forum post):

AddType text/x-component .htc
AddOutputFilterByType DEFLATE text/html text/plain text/xml text/javascript application/x-javascript text/css
ExpiresByType text/html "access plus 1 day"
ExpiresByType text/css "access plus 1 day"
ExpiresByType text/javascript "access plus 7 days"
ExpiresByType application/x-javascript "access plus 7 days"
ExpiresByType image/gif "access plus 1 month"
ExpiresByType image/jpg "access plus 1 month"
ExpiresByType image/png "access plus 1 month"
ExpiresByType image/x-icon "access plus 1 month"
ExpiresByType text/x-component "access plus 1 day"

However It seems that Sugar appends the version to the query string for http GETs for css and js files, for example here is an example GET from my access logs:

x.x.x.x - - [24/Sep/2006:19:54:10 -0400] "GET /sugarsuite/themes/Sugar/style.js?s=4.5.0b&c= HTTP/1.1" 200 1093

I believe that the inclusion of a query string on these files is preventing apache (and the web browser) from caching these js and css files.

Any solutions?

Cheers,
Raman

[stevec]

Hi,

Using the firefox livehttpheaders tool, you can use the 'generator' tab to monitor all the requested and downloaded files (make sure all the options are selected to see exactly what it's doing). http://livehttpheaders.mozdev.org/

On mine, it's caching css and js fine.

If you're using apache and ssl, make sure you've got it enabled for the ssl sites too.

[rocketraman]

Hi,

Using the firefox livehttpheaders tool, you can use the 'generator' tab to monitor all the requested and downloaded files (make sure all the options are selected to see exactly what it's doing). http://livehttpheaders.mozdev.org/

On mine, it's caching css and js fine.

If you're using apache and ssl, make sure you've got it enabled for the ssl sites too.

Nice tool... installed it and confirmed that css and js are not being cached. I am using SSL -- but I have set the options above specifically in the Location directive for my SugarCRM directory and still no dice. Are there any other settings I need to set/check?

Do you also have a query string appended to your GETs, and is your caching working despite that?

Cheers,
Raman

[stevec]

Hi,

Yes - the query strings are appended to those GETS but they are being cached, The pertinent part of the config is:

ExpiresActive On
ExpiresDefault "access plus 300 seconds"

        DocumentRoot /var/www/
        RewriteEngine On
        RewriteCond %{REQUEST_METHOD} ^TRACE
        RewriteRule .* - [F]
        <Directory />
                Options FollowSymLinks
                AllowOverride None
        </Directory>
        <Directory /var/www/>
                Options FollowSymLinks MultiViews
                AllowOverride None
                Order allow,deny
                allow from all
AddOutputFilterByType DEFLATE text/html text/plain text/xml text/javascript application/x-javascript text/css
    ExpiresByType text/html "access plus 1 day"
    ExpiresByType text/css "access plus 1 day"
    ExpiresByType text/javascript "access plus 7 days"
    ExpiresByType application/x-javascript "access plus 7 days"
    ExpiresByType image/gif "access plus 1 month"
    ExpiresByType image/jpg "access plus 1 month"
    ExpiresByType image/png "access plus 1 month"
    ExpiresByType image/x-icon "access plus 1 month"

                # This directive allows us to have apache2's default start page
                # in /apache2-default/, but still have / go to the right place
                # Commented out for Ubuntu
                #RedirectMatch ^/$ /apache2-default/
        </Directory>

        <Directory /var/www/sugarcrm>
                Options FollowSymLinks MultiViews
                AllowOverride All
                Order allow,deny
                allow from all
        </Directory>

[rocketraman]

Interesting... this morning it just started working (i.e. caching the css/javascript files), without me changing a thing.

The only thing I can think of is that I recently upgraded to 4.5b2 (over the weekend) and the changes and/or date on the files was preventing Apache from sending back the expires header properly (yes, I had restarted Apache after the upgrade). Anyway, whatever the reason, it seems to be working now.

Thanks a lot for the help.

Cheers,
Raman

[WayneSugar]

Just FYI, we append the sugar version (and a custom version that is set in your config.php) to prevent the browser caching .js / .css files between upgrades.

So sugar_3.js?s=4.2.1 will become sugar_3.js?s=4.5.0 after upgrade and this will force the browser to download the .js file since it is a different URL.

In our testing http(s), Firefox, IE all cache the .js files and .css files with these GET parameters.