Bandwidth question if file returns no source code

Question

I was wondering how much (or would it waste any) bandwidth if you request a page at regular intervals?

If i used ajax to get a page every 10 seconds and the page returns no sourcecode whats so ever and its literaly empty, does this waste any bandwidth ?

Answer 1

It'll still take up a "slot" on your web server for a minimal amount of time, and the HTTP request and response headers still need to be transferred between the client and the server, so yes it'll still take up a (minimal) amount of bandwidth.

Answer 2

I would have thought so. A few bytes if any, but you are still calling a file.

Answer 3

You'll have the bytes comprising the request and the acknowledgement from the server.

Presumably the web server would be returning a http status code of 200 (OK) or 204 (No response) so you'll have the header data for that.