Cache not disabled on Chrome browser when passing disable arguments

[2343909]

Have you read the documentation?

• Yes, I've read the how to make a reproducable bug guide
• Yes, I've read the how to debug my script guide

URL

script with multiple urls

What are you trying to accomplish

We have a need to collect perf metrics on the page when cache is disabled or nothing is cached on the client Browser.
I tried to accomplish this with several sitespeed.io provided command line arguments but none appear to work:

• --browsertime.chrome.args="--disable-cache,--disable-application-cache"
• --browsertime.cacheClearRaw true --browsertime.cacheClear true

What browser did you use?

Chrome

How to reproduce

Execute the script on Windows Desktop as follows:
 
node bin/sitespeed.js -b chrome -n 1 --browsertime.chrome.args="--disable-cache,--disable-application-cache" --browsertime.chrome.args="--incognito" --firstParty .*domain.* --video --visualMetrics --multi search_notCached.mjs


Here is the script: 

/**
 *
 * @param {import('browsertime').BrowsertimeContext} context
 * @param {import('browsertime').BrowsertimeCommands} commands
 */
export default async function (context, commands) {
    const seleniumWebdriver = context.selenium.webdriver;
    const By = seleniumWebdriver.By;
    const seleniumDriver = context.selenium.driver;
    await seleniumDriver.manage().window().maximize();

    await commands.navigate(
        'https://domain/';

        await seleniumDriver.findElement(By.id('searchval')).sendKeys('green cup');
        const search = await seleniumDriver.findElement(By.xpath('//div[contains(@class,"lt:flex")]//button[@value="Search"]'));
        await commands.measure.start('Search');
        await search.click();
        await commands.wait.byPageToComplete();
        await commands.measure.stop();
};


Still shows memory and disk cache for JS: 

---See image showing cache happening in the previous section above---

Log output

[soulgalore]

Hi @2343909 thank you for creating the issue.

--browsertime.chrome.args="--disable-cache,--disable-application-cache"

Are those args from AI? I don't think the exists in reality. You can check https://peter.sh/experiments/chromium-command-line-switches/ for the available command line switches for Chrome.

--browsertime.cacheClearRaw true --browsertime.cacheClear true

I think maybe we miss documentation. This is between runs so for example if you have a script that access ten pages, then for each iteration the cache is cleared not for each URL.

If you need to clear the cache within a scripting scenario you need to use Chrome Devtools protocol for Chrome https://www.sitespeed.io/documentation/sitespeed.io/scripting/tutorial-11-Chrome-Devtools-Protocol.html and then the Network.clearBrowserCache command!

Hopa that helps!

[2343909]

@soulgalore Thanks a lot for the help!!! Using Chrome Devtools protocol works!