Browser Caching in ASP.NET application

Question

Any suggestions on how to do browser caching within a asp.net application. I\'ve found some different methods online but wasn\'t sure what would be the best. Specifically, I

Answer 1

Its worth bearing in mind that even without Cache-Control or Expires headers most browsers will cache content such as JS and CSS. What should happen though is the browser should request the resource every time its needed but will typically get a "304 Unmodified" response and the browser then uses the cached item. This is can still be quite costly since its a round trip to the server but the resource itself isn't sent so the bytes transfered is limited.

IE left with no specific instructions regarding caching will by default use its own heuristics to determine if it should even bother to re-request an item its cached. This despite not being explicitly told that it can cache a resource. Its hueristics are based on the Last-Modified date of the resource, the older its the less likely it'll have changed now is its typical reasoning. Very wooly.

Frankly if you want to make a site perfomant you need to have control over such cache settings. If you don't have access to these settings then don't wouldn't worry about performance. Just inform the sponsor that it may not perform well because they haven't facilitated a platform that lets you deliver that.