title: Web Workers handling AJAX calls - optimisation overkill?
body: <p>I'm working with a code that handles all AJAX requests using Web Workers (when available). These workers do almost nothing more than <code>XMLHttpRequest</code> object handling (no extra computations). All requests created by workers are asynchronous (<code>request.open("get",url,true)</code>).</p>
  
  <p>Recently, I got couple of issues regarding this code and I started to wonder if I should spend time fixing this or just dump the whole solution. </p>
  
  <p>My research so far suggests that this code may be actually hurting performance. However, I wasn't able to find any credible source supporting this. My only two findings are:</p>
  
  <ul>
  <li>2 year old <a href="http://bugs.jquery.com/ticket/9889" rel="noreferrer">jQuery feature suggestion</a> to use web workers for AJAX calls</li>
  <li><a href="https://stackoverflow.com/questions/14068084/opinion-about-synchronous-requests-in-web-workers">this</a> SO question that seems to ask about something a bit different (using synchronous requests in web workers vs AJAX calls)</li>
  </ul>
  
  <p>Can someone point me to a reliable source discussing this issue? Or, are there any benchmarks that may dispel my doubts?</p>
  
  <p>[<strong>EDIT</strong>] This question gets a little bit more interesting when WebWorker is also responsible for parsing the result (<code>JSON.parse</code>). Is asynchronous parsing improving performance?</p>