Server & Client-Side Processing
Computer Science: OCR A Level, topic 3.4.6
Server & Client-Side Processing
As web pages are often interactive, actions carried out by the user require a certain amount of processing to ensure they work as intended
Server processing
- Used for more complex processing, or where results are required quickly.
- Languages such as SQL and PHP are often used for server-side processing.
- The data required for processing (e.g. contents of a database) do not need to be downloaded to the user’s computer, improving organisational data security.
- However, busy websites can put excessive demands on web servers.
Client processing
- Basic processing (e.g. form validation) can be carried out on the user’s computer.
- Languages such as Javascript often used for client-side processing.
- Processing user’s data locally means it doesn’t have to be transferred to the web server, improving security.
- However, it relies on the user’s browser being able to run scripts which isn’t always the case.
Test yourself on Server & Client-Side Processing
Which of the following languages is most used for client-side processing