Embedded image size update

[warewolf]

Can we bring the site into the 21st Century and allow at least half-decent embedded images, please? 640x480 100Kb isn't much. Going to 800x600 200Kb is a good compromise that will provide a much nicer user experience for the majority of users.

No, I won't use attachments/thumbnails whatever. They are user-hostile and I won't be party to it.

[Jantar]

Can we bring the site into the 21st Century and allow at least half-decent embedded images, please? 640x480 100Kb isn't much. Going to 800x600 200Kb is a good compromise that will provide a much nicer user experience for the majority of users.

No, I won't use attachments/thumbnails whatever. They are user-hostile and I won't be party to it.

Actually I find thumbnails to be user friendly, I can glance at a thumnail and decide if I want to spend the time to download the whole pic. Embedded images are very user unfriendly as the slow everything down and make most threads impossible to view.

[Badjelly]

Actually I find thumbnails to be user friendly, I can glance at a thumnail and decide if I want to spend the time to download the whole pic. Embedded images are very user unfriendly as the slow everything down and make most threads impossible to view.

I'm with Jantar. If I want to look at the images that warewolf wishes me to see, I will click on a thumbnail. If not, I won't.

I find Firefox's AdBlock extension good for dealing with people who insist on trying to grab my attention.

[warewolf]

Most thumbnails don't show enough detail to make that decision.

If you do decide to view the full image (and pray that it will be worth seeing when it finally arrives) it locks up your screen and presents blackness for 15-90 seconds while the image is sent - if it arrives at all. That's not exactly friendly and pleasant. It breaks the continuity of the experience. You can't keep reading while the image is being sent. You can't do diddly except twiddle your thumbs and lose interest.

Thumbnails make a thread impossible to view because it separates the image from the context. If a later comment is made about the image, you can't quickly scroll back and review the image to see what the comment was about. You have to repeat the request, lock-up, wait, close routine.

At least if a thread is embedded image-heavy you can open it in a new tab/window and go and do something else (eg read that other thread that has now finished downloading) while you wait ONCE for it to download in its entirety in the background. Thumbnails force you to wait for each image separately as a foreground process, and force you to request each one individually. That's seriously user hostile.

[slofox]

Essentially I'm neutral here but I would support Warewolf's idea...

[xwhatsit]

If you do decide to view the full image (and pray that it will be worth seeing when it finally arrives) it locks up your screen and presents blackness for 15-90 seconds while the image is sent - if it arrives at all. That's not exactly friendly and pleasant. It breaks the continuity of the experience. You can't keep reading while the image is being sent. You can't do diddly except twiddle your thumbs and lose interest.

I see where you're coming from there. That's actually a new issue, introduced when SpankMe decided to introduce this new-fangled `lightboxing' so-called feature. Lightboxing is where the screen goes black... image loads up... blah blah. It's a pain, because of what you describe with the delay, and also the image is scaled down in size to fit within the `lightbox'. Before, when you clicked on an image, it would open it full-size in a new tab. However, you can still do that, just middle-click on the thumbnail and it'll open up properly, full-size, without delay in a new tab.

Thumbnails make a thread impossible to view because it separates the image from the context. If a later comment is made about the image, you can't quickly scroll back and review the image to see what the comment was about. You have to repeat the request, lock-up, wait, close routine.

I see what you mean here too. However, if you follow this sticky I wrote a while back, you can embed thumbnails throughout the text and they won't do the silly lightbox thing (if you click on them they'll open up full-size in a new tab).


I think 800x600 and 200kb is not unreasonable. However, when reading ADV, I find another problem -- often the images are scaled down to 800x600 or thereabouts. This looks great in the thread, but you often can't see them full-size (800x600 takes a lot of detail out when the original image was much larger, and often the scaling is poor-quality and makes it look rubbish).

My suggestion is to stick with 640x480, or 800x600 or whatever the limit is, but treat them as giant thumbnails. Then use them as links to the original full-size image (as per the instructions in that aforementioned sticky). Then you have the benefits of both.

[Jantar]

...If you do decide to view the full image (and pray that it will be worth seeing when it finally arrives) it locks up your screen and presents blackness for 15-90 seconds while the image is sent - if it arrives at all. ....

As opposed to 2 hours for a single page on advrider when I tried that recently.

[warewolf]

Yebbut advrider.com is limitless.

How about some middle ground? Do it better than they do, rather than going to the opposite extreme by implementing a solution that creates more problems than it solves?

And what did you do during the two hours? Were you forced to sit there looking at a black screen and manually trigger each image as each one completed, or did you go do something else for the one block of time?

[SpankMe]

If you do decide to view the full image (and pray that it will be worth seeing when it finally arrives) it locks up your screen and presents blackness for 15-90 seconds while the image is sent.

Then click on the image again while it's loading and it will move it to a new tab/window. Or right-click, open in new tab.

[warewolf]

I see where you're coming from there. That's actually a new issue,
...
However, you can still do that, just middle-click on the thumbnail and it'll open up properly, full-size, without delay in a new tab.

It's always been a problem. View-on-request in a new window is still disruptive and does have the same delay. (without delay may be because you lightboxed it into your browser cache before testing.)

I think 800x600 and 200kb is not unreasonable. However, when reading ADV, I find another problem -- often the images are scaled down to 800x600 or thereabouts. This looks great in the thread, but you often can't see them full-size (800x600 takes a lot of detail out when the original image was much larger, and often the scaling is poor-quality and makes it look rubbish).

My suggestion is to stick with 640x480, or 800x600 or whatever the limit is, but treat them as giant thumbnails. Then use them as links to the original full-size image (as per the instructions in that aforementioned sticky). Then you have the benefits of both.

I like your approach.

Unfortunately going wider than 800 will cause horizontal scrolling on screens only 1024 wide, which is a fairly common size still. To my eye, 800x600 seems an acceptable compromise, 640x480 is noticeably degraded and still leaves you wanting. For those great shots yes it's nice to have a hi-res version available on request.

[warewolf]

Then click on the image again while it's loading and it will move it to a new tab/window. Or right-click, open in new tab.

Spawning the attachments into separate tabs still makes for a disjointed experience. You still have the problem of separated content, and you have to close all those tabs separately, too. And you still have to manually click on each attachment to make it happen.

[p.dath]

I prefer the thumb nail approach. Sometime's I have to use GPRS, and NZ still has a large base of dial up Internet users. When you download at 5KB/s, running into a 200KB picture makes loading the page a drag.

So give the user the choice of not loading it.

[SpankMe]

Spawning the attachments into separate tabs still makes for a disjointed experience. You still have the problem of separated content, and you have to close all those tabs separately, too. And you still have to manually click on each attachment to make it happen.

Don't be so bloody lazy I open all images in tabs. That way I can have several loading while I continue to browse/read.

[NighthawkNZ:Me]

Actually I find thumbnails to be user friendly, I can glance at a thumnail and decide if I want to spend the time to download the whole pic. Embedded images are very user unfriendly as the slow everything down and make most threads impossible to view.

I agree and I am on broadband... unlike you who is on dialup...

[Motu]

Stop pandering to the minority who haven't got broadband,this is the 21st century after all.If they want to live in an area without broadband,that's their problem,not the rest of the site's.This site will never get anywhere until it drops the dorky thumbnails.