merge js files has no effect

[markshust]

See this page for webpagetest results:
http://www.webpagetest.org/result/160108_GR_A6S/

It doesn't appear the dev/js/merge_files has any effect. I expect that this toggled on would only show a few js files at most (if not one file).

[markshust]

Here's full run-down of core-config if needed for diagnosis:

mysql> select * from core_config_data;
+-----------+---------+----------+-----------------------------------------+----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------+
| config_id | scope   | scope_id | path                                    | value                                                                                  |
+-----------+---------+----------+-----------------------------------------+----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------+
|         1 | default |        0 | web/unsecure/base_url                   | http://magento-2-0-demo.mageinferno.com/                                               |
|         2 | default |        0 | general/region/display_all              | 1                                                                                      |
|         3 | default |        0 | general/region/state_required           | AT,BR,CA,CH,DE,EE,ES,FI,FR,LT,LV,RO,US                                                 |
|         4 | default |        0 | catalog/category/root_id                | NULL                                                                                   |
|         5 | default |        0 | sales/msrp/enabled                      | 1                                                                                      |
|         6 | default |        0 | carriers/tablerate/active               | 1                                                                                      |
|         7 | default |        0 | carriers/tablerate/condition_name       | package_value                                                                          |
|         8 | default |        0 | design/theme/theme_id                   | 2                                                                                      |
|         9 | default |        0 | design/head/includes                    | <link  rel="stylesheet" type="text/css"  media="all" href="{{MEDIA_URL}}styles.css" /> |
|        10 | default |        0 | dev/front_end_development_workflow/type | server_side_compilation                                                                |
|        11 | default |        0 | dev/restrict/allow_ips                  | NULL                                                                                   |
|        12 | default |        0 | dev/debug/template_hints_storefront     | 0                                                                                      |
|        13 | default |        0 | dev/debug/template_hints_admin          | 0                                                                                      |
|        14 | default |        0 | dev/debug/template_hints_blocks         | 0                                                                                      |
|        15 | default |        0 | dev/template/allow_symlink              | 0                                                                                      |
|        16 | default |        0 | dev/template/minify_html                | 0                                                                                      |
|        17 | default |        0 | dev/translate_inline/active             | 0                                                                                      |
|        18 | default |        0 | dev/translate_inline/active_admin       | 0                                                                                      |
|        19 | default |        0 | dev/js/merge_files                      | 1                                                                                      |
|        20 | default |        0 | dev/js/enable_js_bundling               | 0                                                                                      |
|        21 | default |        0 | dev/js/minify_files                     | 1                                                                                      |
|        22 | default |        0 | dev/js/translate_strategy               | dictionary                                                                             |
|        23 | default |        0 | dev/js/session_storage_logging          | 0                                                                                      |
|        24 | default |        0 | dev/js/session_storage_key              | collected_errors                                                                       |
|        25 | default |        0 | dev/css/merge_css_files                 | 1                                                                                      |
|        26 | default |        0 | dev/css/minify_files                    | 1                                                                                      |
|        27 | default |        0 | dev/image/default_adapter               | GD2                                                                                    |
|        28 | default |        0 | dev/static/sign                         | 0                                                                                      |
|        29 | default |        0 | dev/grid/async_indexing                 | 0                                                                                      |
+-----------+---------+----------+-----------------------------------------+----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------+

MAGE_MODE is set to production and all static assets were compiled.

[aoldoni]

Please try changing "dev/js/enable_js_bundling" to 1. I think the merging just merges files not using require.js. For all other files, this it still makes the require.js to inject them via script tags in the head tag. This causes the browser to download the remaining files separately and asynchronously.

[pynej]

Yes, merge_files doesn't do much as it just merges js in the layout head section. The bundling in theory supposed to merge and optimize other js that loads through requireJs but I believe there are still issues with it.
#4506

[guz-anton]

#2563 (comment)

Merge JavaScript Files to Yes currently merges only js files added to <head> explicitly.
You can open page source (Ctrl+U). And find that instead of several files (../requirejs/require.js, ../mage/requirejs/mixins.js, ../requirejs-config.js) you have something like static/_cache/merged/26a...e.js.

If you want to reduce number of request to different static files try to set
Enable Javascript Bundling to Yes and setup Magento mode to production.

Not a bug.
cc @almarchenko