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8.4% of all hangs in IE9 in the past month are caused by XMLHttpRequest objects blocking the UI thread with a synchronous request.
http://blogs.msdn.com/b/wer/archive/2011/08/03/why-you-should-use-xmlhttprequest-asynchronously.aspx
If your page uses XHR in synchronous mode, your first thought should be "I'm doing something wrong."
If it's inherently dumb, add a warning to IE, might cut it a % or two. And annoy a bunch of users. Win some, lose some.
[x] Enable Synchronous XMLHttpRequest Warning
Unfortunately, the Mixed Content warning demonstrates the failure of that type of design.
Can't you remove the synchronous API for when IE is not set to use compatibility mode, or is it already done
@zzz: No, it isn't done. And I thope they will never do that. The synchronous mode can prove itself very useful in a web worker, for example.
How about a console warning if synchronous mode is used in the UI thread? It wouldn't be a great solution (especially since the console doesn't become available unless the F12 dev tools are already open), but it might curb its use somewhat.
There are valid use cases for this: E.g. Clicking a link wanting to show a pop-up populated by the server instead of opening the link's url in a new window. Unless, that is, there's an empty response (no data available). Then I want a new window. And since pop-up blocker block window.open, I have to do things synchronously... And yes, the new window is a requirement.
Regards, Michael