LOW SRC and Page Loading

[Andrew J. Mutch]

I'm curious if anyone has the answer to this question:

I've created a new "portal" page for our library Internet terminals that
uses a series of stacked tables for laying out the page.  The top table
has five images in it and I've noticed that the remainder of the page
doesn't load until these five images load.  I want the entire page to load
without waiting for the images -- they can take their time on a slow
connection -- so my question is this:

If I specify a "lowsrc" image in the image tag -- and I'll use a "blank"
.gif file, something very small that will load quickly -- will this "fool"
the browser into thinking the images have loaded so that it will continue
to load the remainder of the page and the "real" images can download at
their own speed?

I'm using Navigator 4.5 but I imagine at least for Navigator, it behaves
similarly in other versions.  


The page is at:

http://northville.lib.mi.us/portal.htm

I haven't added the "lowsrc" images yet so you should see the effect I
described above.  

Andrew Mutch
Electronic Services Support
Northville District Library
Northville, MI