Embedding script with timeout in case server goes down

Question

I need a way to make sure my script won't block the viewed page,
if the server serving the script is down (port 80 is blocked for some reason).

Currently when I test it and take down the server (Apache), or close the firewall,
I see in the browser that it is trying to load the resource (script in that case), without
success for long seconds, until it aborts.

Is there a nice way to get past this issue?

Answer 1

Perhaps it's time to start using jQuery?

Check out jQuery.ajax() info and search for timeout keyword.

UPDATE:

For this particular solution you could use getScript() to fetch and execute remote scripts.

Answer 2

A recent post from Steve Souders analyzes this problem : Frontend - Single Point of Failure, by browsers and type of failure