Hi, I was looking to get a prioritized list of things to look for while doing web site testing. There are things we could do to improve the performance of a site and there are things which affects the performance. Is there a guide for developer and testers to follow strictly which will deliver the best website experience?
What should a developer know before building a public web site?
For starters, Yahoo has a great list @ Best Practices for Speeding Up Your Web Site.
For security there is OWASP Top Ten.
The guys from Yahoo! have an excellent Developer's Network. Specifically you can look at their Guide to Exceptional Performance.
I would definitely recommend that you follow their suggestion to download Yslow for Firebug and use that to gauge your site's performance up front and then use its grading system as a way to improve performance.
Keep in mind that these are general rules of thumb and sometimes it is simply not possible to follow all of their best recommendations for improving performance.
Some security problems: Looking if Cross-Site-Scripting or Cross-Request-Forgery-attacks are possible. Can pages be accessed without login, if you know the URL?