How can I force a cache refresh?

[Jaiem]

Is there anyway with HTML, META or JavaScript to force the visitor's browser to refresh the cache each time the page is viewed?

Thanks!

[Tommy]

META HTTP-EQUIV=Pragme CONTENT=no-cache

will get the browser to download the page as it instructs the browser to ignore what it might have in it's cache.

I know you can force a refresh to cache in ASP.

[Jaiem]

Thanks Tommy.

But are you sure that's the right syntax?

I've seen it listed differently such as:

<meta http-equiv="pragma" content="nocache">

[Tommy]

Hi Jaiem,

No, I'm not sure I've got it spot on. Your example looks much more like how it should be. I did look it up so I would get it right but I couldn't find it/didn't try hard enough :)

Infact there has been a cycle over the last four years now, every few months I have to look it up again because I just can't remeber the exact syntax.

You can also play with the cache settings on the server to try and make sure visitors always download the latest page.

[jstanden]

<META HTTP-EQUIV="Pragma" CONTENT="no-cache">
<META HTTP-EQUIV="Cache-Control" CONTENT="no-cache">
<META HTTP-EQUIV="Pragma-directive" CONTENT="no-cache">
<META HTTP-EQUIV="Cache-Directive" CONTENT="no-cache">
<META HTTP-EQUIV="Expires" CONTENT="0">

If you have the ability to use any scripting language (PHP/ASP/CF/etc.) one of the most effective things you can do is implement a "cache-killer" by appending a variable (i.e. &ck=) with a random number (or unix epoch timestamp) to the end of the URL.

Any time we must have a non-cache copy (dynamic PDFs for financial forms, etc) we use this method.

[antoniyo]

force the Command line ipconfig/flushdns
is that what you want ?