cpcwiki bugs

[nocash]

Hi, I've noticed two cpcwiki bugs. I am using Opera as browser (don't think that it's browser related though).

First, in cpcwiki (not in the forum), GIF files are displayed as they should, see here: http://cpcwiki.eu/index.php/Image_Bug. Aside from the anti-compuserve theory, there's no reason why GIFs couldn't be resampled in same quality as PNGs. Is there a way to fix that? Or to forward bug-reports to somebody?

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Second, in the cpcwiki forum, attached files are working strange. For example, on http://cpcwiki.eu/forum/index.php/topic,678.60.html, the top-most two attached pictures (spanish 6128 and 6128+ keyboards):

If I click on the thumbnail:
  Gets me an oversized 1-megabyte PNG file with (incorrect) JPG extension.

If I click on the text link saying Filename.jpg (200 kB, nnn x nnn)
  Gets me an oversized 1-megabyte PNG file with (incorrect) PDF extension.

Judging from the text link, correct should be a JPG with around 200 kilobytes? But cpcwiki automatically converts it to PNG format, and destroys the extension, why? Am I doing something wrong? Does that happen for other people, too?

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The third image on the above forum page (spanish system cartridge pcb) does have the PDF extension problem, too. But it arrives as real JPG, without the JPG-to-PNG conversion.

I remember having the same problem with TXT file attachments in cpcwiki forum, too. (Being renamed to PDF) (but the TXT files being fortunately not coverted to PNG).

[Devilmarkus]

We know about these problems.
It's called the no$wiki bug

No, really, resizing GIF files is done by wiki internal rendering engine.
So use PNG instead.

I have no problems with the attached images.  All images show me extension ".jpg"

[arnoldemu]

resizing:

Maybe wiki uses a bad image scaler code:

See this:
http://www.4p8.com/eric.brasseur/gamma.html

Other tools also fail. I have irfanview and it fails one of these tests producing really bad pictures.

[Gryzor]

WHAT?! BUGS IN OUR BELOVED SITE? HOW DARE YOU!

...but you're right to mention them here. Btw, I use Opera too, as do some of our other users, and I find it works superbly...


About the forum images: weird, I can confirm the issue with png vs jpg, with a couple of differences:
-If I click on the thumb it gives me a PNG, which maybe it shouldn't, but with a PNG extension, not JPG. But I'm using FF here at work, maybe it's got something to do with that? Gerald, if you're reading this, can you tell us what kind of images you uploaded?
-Also, I get no PDFs, only the JPGs. Again, maybe it's just Opera? Will have to try it at home, or if you could confirm it with FF yourself it'd be great...


As for the GIF rendering problem, it's a long-standing one, but I never thought anyone minded. I have a couple of ideas but I need to look into it... thanks for the great example page

Cheers
T

PS Ah, others got there first. Markus is right about rendering, and relating to Arnoldemu's comment (ha! I had noticed this when image-editing myself, but never quite got it! Thanks for the great article!) I need to see if we could switch renderers...

[Bryce]

I've uploaded pictures on occasions (GIFs mainly) that just didn't want to display at all, I had to resample them as jpg/png AND resize them before they would display, although they were definitely not too big or anything unusual. I never found out exactly which part of the file the wiki didn't like, but they're probably still in the database, cos' I've no idea how to delete a picture once it's uploaded.

Bryce.

[nocash]

> So use PNG instead.
Hmmmm, that matches my anti-compuserve idea. The company had a bit of a bad reputation when they planned to charge fees for using the gif format. (NB are they still doing that?) Aside from that, I like GIFs more than PNGs. And with current technology, it should be still possible to resample a GIF.

> http://www.4p8.com/eric.brasseur/gamma.html
Funny effect! Though that happens on special striped and dithered images.

> Maybe wiki uses a bad image scaler code
Yup, a very bad one, it can't even resample the solid black question mark :-)

[Devilmarkus]

Hmmmm, that matches my anti-compuserve idea. The company had a bit of a bad reputation when they planned to charge fees for using the gif format. (NB are they still doing that?) Aside from that, I like GIFs more than PNGs. And with current technology, it should be still possible to resample a GIF.

Well.... PNG = CompuServe Portable Network Graphic 

[Gryzor]

Well.... PNG = CompuServe Portable Network Graphic 

Hahaha! Pwned!

[arnoldemu]

> So use PNG instead.
Hmmmm, that matches my anti-compuserve idea. The company had a bit of a bad reputation when they planned to charge fees for using the gif format. (NB are they still doing that?) Aside from that, I like GIFs more than PNGs. And with current technology, it should be still possible to resample a GIF.

Well I prefer PNG. PNG because it is lossless and is mostly a web standard.
Then JPG after but then we know that is lossy.
Well you say it should still be possible to resample GIF. Well yes, but we see it is not
I think it all depends on how the code was implemented.
The wiki may use a PHP library, but does that then use a system function or not???
I never had any problem but then I uploaded most pictures as JPG.

> http://www.4p8.com/eric.brasseur/gamma.html
Funny effect! Though that happens on special striped and dithered images.

No, it can effect *all* images
Sometimes it is not so obvious.. and the picture appears less bright.

> Maybe wiki uses a bad image scaler code
Yup, a very bad one, it can't even resample the solid black question mark :-)

Yes, it is bad.

[arnoldemu]

I've uploaded pictures on occasions (GIFs mainly) that just didn't want to display at all, I had to resample them as jpg/png AND resize them before they would display, although they were definitely not too big or anything unusual. I never found out exactly which part of the file the wiki didn't like, but they're probably still in the database, cos' I've no idea how to delete a picture once it's uploaded.

Bryce.

Same here I want to delete one, and you can't do it.

I uploaded an inferior picture of the gx4000 (not as nice as the one already there).. and now I can't delete it.

Gryzor please can we have choice to delete a picture if *we* uploaded?
thanks.


Hey are all my other mistakes and actions recorded in the wiki too? OMG I've gotta hide. 

[Devilmarkus]

I really think, GIF is very outdated.
Since there exist animated PNG, too, with 24 bit, I don't see a reason to use GIF.



Sorry, IE users, not your lucky day!

[Devilmarkus]

Also dont work in Safari... I think Opera cant show it, too...
But Firefox plays this animation well!

[Gryzor]

I vote for PNG too. Here at work, where I work with creative material all the time (presentation, creative agencies etc) I always use PNG because it's lossless, it allows transparency and has decent sizes. No real reason to use GIF any more!

...and I didn't know they finally did the animation feature!!!

As for deleting images: there's no "delete" function in mediawiki, since the db works in incremental ways. So even if you take the action of 'deletion' you can always revert it. The end result is that the image won't appear, say, in the list of images, but it'll still be there in the db and on the server and it can be brought back to light. You can, of course, delete the file manually through ftp and then edit the db but I won't even bother

Which images do you want deleted?

[robcfg]

I'm in for PNG too for bitmaps, and I'd vote for SVG for vector graphics.


I think the SVG filter also does not render all svg files accurately. Try this link and this other one.


I took my time to create a nice vector of Arnor's logos, you know... 

[Gryzor]

These SVGs look absolutely ok to me???

[Devilmarkus]

I'm in for PNG too for bitmaps, and I'd vote for SVG for vector graphics.


I think the SVG filter also does not render all svg files accurately. Try this link and this other one.


I took my time to create a nice vector of Arnor's logos, you know... 

Nice logos.
But not everybody knows how to create SVG files...

[nocash]

From wikipedia:

"The US LZW patent expired on June 20, 2003.[19] The counterpart patents in the United Kingdom, France, Germany and Italy expired on June 18, 2004, the Japanese counterpart patents expired on June 20, 2004 and the counterpart Canadian patent expired on July 7, 2004.[19] Consequently, while Unisys has further patents and patent applications relating to improvements to the LZW technique,[19] the GIF format may now be used freely."

So far, I can't see any political/financial reason why not supporting GIFs here.

GIF advantages are they are REAL web standard, lossless, sometimes smaller than PNGs (sometimes not), and finally, lots of files are in GIF format - so it'd be uncomfortable to convert them before uploading (not to mention to convert files that are ALREADY uploaded on cpcwiki). No matter who prefers which format - both PNG and GIF should be supported.

PS. updated the http://cpcwiki.eu/index.php/Image_Bug page, adding options for different skins, revealing a bizarre transparency effect - the image resampler is real crap :-)

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On the forum attachment bug. I also tried it with my slowest browser: firefox. It doesn't do the PDF bug, instead, both thumb & text link are giving me PNG files with incorrect JPG extension.

Both Opera & Firefox don't complain about the faulty extension. You only notice it by:
Takes forever to download (due to lower/lossless compression rate).
Saving the image and then loading it with iview gives "wrong extension" warning).

[robcfg]

The two links produce different results both on Chrome on Win XP and Safari on MacOS X Snow Leopard.


Take a look at this:

[Bryce]

Hi Gyzor,
           take a look at the files here: http://www.cpcwiki.eu/index.php/File:CPC_Disc_Cassette_Schematic.gif
The last picture I uploaded worked, but the two before it (as you can see, have a problem generating a Thumbnail. If you click on the picture it's perfectly visible, but if you add it to a Wiki page, the page fails to render.

In this case, they are all GIFs, so the file can stay there as the old version, but sometimes I decided to convert to JPG to solve the problem, so the old file had a different name and is "Lost in Space" somewhere. I'm sure you have a way of checking files in the database that aren't used in any wiki page. If so, you'll find these files there.

Bryce.

[Devilmarkus]

The two links produce different results both on Chrome on Win XP and Safari on MacOS X Snow Leopard.

The answer is easy:
(as shown in file's history:)
Error creating thumbnail: convert: unable to read font   `/usr/share/fonts/type1/gsfonts/n019004l.pfb'.

You see: SVG needs all resources. It will be lot of work to make it complete.

[Devilmarkus]

Hi Gyzor,
           take a look at the files here: http://www.cpcwiki.eu/index.php/File:CPC_Disc_Cassette_Schematic.gif
The last picture I uploaded worked, but the two before it (as you can see, have a problem generating a Thumbnail. If you click on the picture it's perfectly visible, but if you add it to a Wiki page, the page fails to render.

In this case, they are all GIFs, so the file can stay there as the old version, but sometimes I decided to convert to JPG to solve the problem, so the old file had a different name and is "Lost in Space" somewhere. I'm sure you have a way of checking files in the database that aren't used in any wiki page. If so, you'll find these files there.

Bryce.

http://cpcwiki.eu/index.php/File:CPC_Disc_Cassette_Schematic.png works fine for me.
Also the PNG file is smaller in filesize than your GIF

[robcfg]

The answer is easy:
(as shown in file's history:)
Error creating thumbnail: convert: unable to read font   `/usr/share/fonts/type1/gsfonts/n019004l.pfb'.

You see: SVG needs all resources. It will be lot of work to make it complete.

Yep, that was before I converted the font to paths. The thing here is that the svg filter renders the same file in two different fashions.

[Bryce]

@Markus, Yup saw that, but what was wrong with the first PNG, why does it result in an error?

Bryce.

[Devilmarkus]

@ Bryce:
Please email me your original PNG you used first.

[Bryce]

You can download it here: http://cpcwiki.eu/index.php/File:CPC_Disc_Cassette_Schematic.png

I deleted the original from my database.

Bryce.