The use of the hashbang (#!) by Twitter (among other websites) appears to have received quite a lot of hate. While we’re sure that there are merits for the use of the hashbang, such as potentially faster loading times as it utilizes JavaScript routing as opposed to traditional URLs and full page loads, we’re pretty sure there arguments against it as well, such as technical problems with implementation by web developers, and on more than one occasion has caused URL issues on the user end as well. Either way as far as Twitter is concerned, they are currently working on removing hashbang URLs and will be utilizing pushState instead.
This was confirmed by Dan Webb, a front-end engineer at Twitter who tweeted that he was working on “undoing twitters hashbang URLs”. Either way it looks like pushState will be the new method of refreshing pages, either that or some older browsers might have to resort to a complete page refresh if pushState is not supported on them. If you’d like to read up on hashbangs, more information can be found at Ben Cherry’s website who argues that the hashbang has its place and usefulness, while Dan Webb‘s article has it laid out with both pros and cons.
Filed in . Read more about Twitter.