While single page applications are very important in the web today, many websites are still completely static, because their only purpose is to convey static information. This project explorers if it is possible to apply the benefit of increased navigation speed from single page applications to static websites by converting them to single page applications automatically.

We explore what steps are necessary to perform such a transformation. This mainly includes deriving a common skeleton from all pages of a website, which can be filled with different content for each page. We implement a prototype application using Node.js.

We will then analyze the effectiveness of our approach by comparing the transformed website to the original static website using metrics, such as page size and interaction time with the website. We measure the website’s performance by automating the navigation through the website and analyzing the captured performance traces. Finally, we will compare our program with other approaches such as instant.page using the same metrics.

We conclude by saying that, such a transformation does indeed bring a significant performance gain. However, is only possible if the static page we perform it on fulfills certain conditions.