Web Caching

Request Methods

Table A-13 lists the distribution of HTTP request methods. This data is skewed because, by default, Squid does not forward non-GET method requests up to parent caches. Also, the ICP and Cache Digest protocols work for GET methods only. It is likely that most of the non-GET methods are forwarded directly to origin servers by the lower layers.

Table A-13. Distribution of Request Methods (IRCache and Anon-U Data)

Method	IRCache %	Anon-U %
GET	98.78	98.31
POST	0.881	1.634
HEAD	0.293	0.058
PROPFIND	0.041771	-
MOVE	0.002518	-
PROPPATCH	0.002076	-
CONNECT	0.001292	-
DELETE	0.000474	-
OPTIONS	0.000414	-
PUT	0.000095	0.000180
COPY	0.000015	-
MKCOL	0.000007	-
LOCK	0.000007	-
TRACE	0.000001	-

Note that the Anon-U data doesn’t have any WEBDAV request methods. Most likely, these methods were not in use when the Anon-U data was generated (May 1999).