Fill in the blank: _______ is the process through which all unnecessary characters are removed from a file.
- Minification
- Fetching
- Caching
- Deferring
Explanation: The correct answer is Minification. Minification is the process of removing all unnecessary characters from a file without altering its functionality. These unnecessary characters typically include white spaces, comments, and newline characters. Minification is commonly applied to files such as HTML, CSS, and JavaScript to reduce their file size, thus improving website performance by reducing download times. Smaller file sizes mean faster loading times, which is crucial for providing a seamless user experience, particularly on devices with slower internet connections or limited bandwidth. Minification is often performed as part of the build process during web development, using specialized tools or plugins that automatically strip out redundant characters from the codebase before deployment.