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by Y7ZCQtNo39 3278 days ago
I just don't feel comfortable using them in certain situations, like SaaS web apps. What if they go down, for any reason, and since I depended on the CDN for a core framework (say, React), now my entire site isn't going to load. Queue customer e-mails.

That being said, for less mission-critical projects, they do have their place.
2 comments
Jach 3278 days ago
CDNs aren't an either-or thing. It's common to fall back to a copy on your server if the CDN version doesn't load.

CDNs involve a big set of tradeoff choices you have to make, they don't make sense for every circumstance. I don't think I'd ever throw in "Use CDNs as much as possible" into an optimization advice list.

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nym 3278 days ago
Yeah, keep the dynamic stuff on your webserver, static stuff on the CDN. Part of the reason I say "as much as possible" is because I've seen significant conversion improvements by enabling a CDN.
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nym 3278 days ago
Typically the CDN is used for all static assets does not include the HTML. In the event that your CDN is not working, you can always fallback on your own static.example.server.

CDNs are one of those cases where the cloud vastly outperforms whatever kind of server you have.

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