I recently wrapped up a project with a client who needed a simple product gallery website. Once finished, the site was moved to the permanent server, and my client proceeded to add products to the database.

It’s always a little bit unnerving to realize that people may spend hours depending on a script you write - even one you may be very accustomed to - and relying on its stability.

When he called me, a bit flustered, asking why during the past three hours, none of the products he meticulously added to the database was showing up on the site, a solution came to my mind, albeit with a slight delay. Now, granted, this type of question is never good to hear, especially regarding a script you wrote entirely by hand yourself: “Is there any way you can get them back?” My heart skipped a few beats immediately thereafter.

I knew he used Internet Explorer, which often has crazy cache issues. (Firefox does too, which I wish they’d fix.) I told him how to clear his cache, and while doing so, loaded his site on my own machine here. Much to my relief, his products appeared. IE had stored an old version of the product pages in order to decrease loading times… discovering that spells R-E-L-I-E-F.