WEB CACHE FOCUSING DEVICES

Caching is vital in the World Wide web for reducing network bandwidth and providing acceptable quality of service to users. This paper intro duces the concept of Cache Focusing Devices for improving performance. This approach is novel in that it attempts to address this problem by influencing the behaviour of users, as opposed to concentrating on ar chitectural aspects such as cache dimensioning and purging strategies. Fundamental to this concept is exposing the cache contents to users, contrary to the current industry trend of cache transparency. Tackling caching performance from this perspective is believed to be crucial s ince the browsing profile of users intrinsically limits performance im provements. (C) 1998 Published by Elsevier Science B.V. All rights res erved.