As the underlying mechanism that runs the web, HTTP is the language spoken by browsers and web servers to communicate, download webpage elements and upload user data. The version we currently use is 1.1, which is now almost 15 years old. But HTTP version 2 is on the way.
While version 1.1 has served us well, the Internet Engineering Task Force are currently formalizing the standard and plan to submit a final protocol proposal to the Internet Engineering Steering Group in November of this year. HTTP2 is not a complete rewrite rather an upgrade of the exising version. The main improvements relate to speed. Webpages have grown heavier and more complex over time, and our desire to access them from different types of devices and different types of locations has also increased - often leapfrogging the infrastructure necessary to provide broadband speed in all use cases.
HTTP2 focuses on how the data is transmitted "on the wire" based on the SPDY protocol. HTTP2 implements multiplexing, meaning many requests can be made at once and resources can be delivered whenever they are ready, not necessarily in a particular order or even only after they've been requested.The new protocol is binary, whereas the old was text-based. Binary protocols can express more meaning in less space which gives HTTP2 a speed boost out of the gate.Strictly speaking your current website will work as it currently does following the change-over to HTTP2, but it could be optimized to take full advantage of the change. To find out how, head over to mobiForge to see read the full article.
