[Clipart] other newbie question: how does the thumbnailing work internally?

[Nicu Buculei]

On 04/29/2009 04:41 AM, chovynz wrote:
>
> At the moment, the current version, uses the same png file for the
> thumbnail as the preview, as the actual png, only scaled down (or up if
> it is smaller). It means that when someone uploads a large png, the
> computer who browses the clipart, still downloads the larger file, but
> scales the image to suit whatever view you are currently looking at.
>
> This is important to note for a few reasons. It's especially noticable
> for me, as I am on dialup. Even though we are moving into the broadband
> age (the world is not there yet), I think we still need to be
> considerate of broadband usage, and user time (dialups).

On top of that, images scaled by the browser look ugly (the re-scale is 
optimized for speed, without resampling)

For low bandwidth a small PNG thumbnail will usually have a smaller file 
size compared with a complex SVG (we have some SVGs over 1MB).

> And these are why I am pushing for (working) SVG thumbnails. SVG
> thumbnails reduces multiple handling (e.g. it removes the necessity for
> uploading a png, perhaps in multiple sizes), it can handle many
> different viewing sizes while still looking good, it lessens the
> broadband usage and time, both for viewing and downloading. (Remember
> that when you view a picture on the net, you are also downloading it at
> the same time.)

Still Internet Explorer is the most used web browser on the web (not 
sure about usage stats on our website), so a large part of our user base 
will not be able to see those thumbnails.

> Current PNG thumbnails counter all these good things and make more work
> than necessary, plus more broadband usage.
>
> I'm lazy. I want svg thumbnails. :-P :-D  ;-)

Me lazy too... want automatic thumbnail generation :p

-- 
nicu :: http://nicubunu.ro :: http://nicubunu.blogspot.com
Open Clip Art Library: http://www.openclipart.org
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