Originally Posted by
pauland
w00dy, other programs don't generate the images used for the website as Xara does, so cache problems aren't so obvious because the images don't change their name as the website is updated - this means that even if the cache isn't fully updated, most content remains unchanged anyway and new content is fetched. With Xara image names are recycled, so if the cache is partially out of date, the page can look scrambled.
Xara gives users the ability to mitigate this effect by naming images, which means that caches are more likely to have the correct content in place.
Ultimately, just as with all other software, you learn to use the software and adapt your working practices to suit the technology to your needs. This caching issue exists for all software but is exacerbated by the way Xara hand-holds the user saving them from having to do all the donkey-work required by other software. In practice, professional web developers don't refresh their website several times a day, exacerbating cache issues, or if they do, they take steps (already described in this thread) to minimise issues. It's very poor practice to be testing web page updates by publishing to a live site, until the site is ready for public consumption.
Regarding forcing the cache to be flushed - this is something that web developers should not normally do - it slows page loads and makes websites load more slowly than they should. As a workaround for Xara it could be useful, but if I did use this method, I would republish a couple of days later (without other changes) with that cache setting code removed.
Xara software does great things to make web publishing easy. In some cases where people use it with poor working practices, some of the more technical issues of web publishing manifest themselves in unwanted ways. This requires that web developers up their game - either by adapting their working practices using Xara, or incorporating more technical means to circumvent unexpected (to the inexperienced) behaviour of web technology.
All the angst about caches can be solved by incorporating web workarounds (already described in this thread and elsewhere) while using Xara, or adopting a more professional publishing regime whilst using Xara. Alternatively, by aquiring some web technology skills, users who cannot live with the reality of internet caches and Xara page development, could use a text editor to write their HTML pages directly, or try and cut corners to HTML enlightenment using other software, which will clip their wings in other ways.
99% of Xara users don't have a problem with Xara web generation, others that do either up their game by taking on-board the realities of the web and Xara page generation, or continue to blame their tools while everyone else gets on with the job.
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