I don't like this (mandatory image -> url conversion)

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I don't like this (mandatory image -> url conversion)

Postby cmsellers » Wed May 25, 2016 6:59 pm

So it's no longer possible to put images in quotes, with images instead getting replaced by a url. I'm sure that somebody put a lot of work into this and all, but I really don't like it.

For one thing, I usually put quoted images in spoilers. That should still be an option. Even if you want to force us to go though an extra step to include images in quote tags, it should be an option.

For another thing, I don't want to have to open a new tab just to refresh my memory on what the image in question is when someone else quotes another someone else's image.

For a final thing, I usually put links to the source of my images around the image. It appears that when people quote my images the inner url (linking to the image) disappears. Usually I get my images from Wikimedia Commons which means people will still get to the image. But when I can't find the image on Commons, the other sources I use are often collections of multiple images in the same page, which would be very confusing for anyone who clicks the link.
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Re: I don't like this (mandatory image -> url conversion)

Postby CarrieVS » Wed May 25, 2016 7:42 pm

cmsellers wrote: I usually put quoted images in spoilers.


The problem with that is it doesn't actually do anything to mitigate the size/loading time of a page with a lot of images, which I presume is the main reason for this feature. The picture still loads when the page does, just out of sight.

It's the same reason we have the youtube=hidden tag and keep asking people to use that instead of spoiler tags.
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Re: I don't like this (mandatory image -> url conversion)

Postby cmsellers » Wed May 25, 2016 7:55 pm

I assumed it was about the physical space and redundancy, as images take up a lot less space than videos. Look at the old music thread without YouTube=hidden. It's basically impossible to load.

Then look at any page of my adorable obscure critter thread, which I think has more images per page than any thread on TCS (mostly because of me making half the posts and usually putting six images per post). Most of those pages have more images than those pages have videos, and they all load fine.
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Re: I don't like this (mandatory image -> url conversion)

Postby Dr. Ambiguous » Wed May 25, 2016 8:14 pm

It's partly to reduce page load time, it's partly to reduce screen real estate. It was basic site etiquette to remove these images when quoting, unless the original image appeared on a different page. Hardly anyone did this, despite reminders, which made it pretty annoying to go through and edit people's posts to match with basic site etiquette. That said, I think you can manually edit them in to quote tags, I think it functions by when you hit the quote button on a post and converting the image to a url. I'm going to edit this post to test that, and then update with the results.

Edit: Turns out I'm wrong, the mod converts any image in a quote tag to an image link. Ideally, it would have some way to force it to still display the image, but it seems it doesn't (unless I'm unaware of such a way). The first thing that comes to mind for me is that it converts the image when the quote button is clicked. I'm not sure if that's the best way to handle the conversion or not though. I'll talk to the rest of the mod team and the backend about it.

That said, if the option comes down to forcing quoted images to links or going back to the old way, I'd stick to what we have now without hesitation.
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Re: I don't like this (mandatory image -> url conversion)

Postby cmsellers » Wed May 25, 2016 8:37 pm

Dr. Ambiguous wrote:Ideally, it would have some way to force it to still display the image, but it seems it doesn't (unless I'm unaware of such a way). The first thing that comes to mind for me is that it converts the image when the quote button is clicked. I'm not sure if that's the best way to handle the conversion or not though. I'll talk to the rest of the mod team and the backend about it.
'
If that doesn't work, I presume that it checks whether the image tag is withing a quote tag. It should be relatively simple to add another condition which checks whether there's an intervening spoiler tag. Though this wouldn't give people the option of including the unspoilered image on a new page, it would still be less annoying than having to click through.
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Re: I don't like this (mandatory image -> url conversion)

Postby NathanLoiselle » Thu May 26, 2016 1:31 am

Load time is dependent on the internet speed of the user. Seeing as how we can't account for that it's proper etiquette to remove them from quotes so that it'll decrease load times.
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Re: I don't like this (mandatory image -> url conversion)

Postby cmsellers » Thu May 26, 2016 1:37 am

NathanLoiselle wrote:Load time is dependent on the internet speed of the user. Seeing as how we can't account for that it's proper etiquette to remove them from quotes so that it'll decrease load times.

Don't the tiny minority people who still have 90's-speed internet set images not to automatically load anyways? I mean, most websites have all sorts of background images for decoration, tracking, and advertisement these days.

That's what I do with scripts. I have decent internet and am still amazed at how slow many websites are with all scripts enabled just on account of the memory and/or they use.
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Re: I don't like this (mandatory image -> url conversion)

Postby Piter Lauchy » Thu May 26, 2016 6:59 pm

I'm a terrible programmer, so I don't really know what I'm talking about, but is it possible to build in a check whether the quoted image is on a new page and if it is, it's displayed? That might be a good compromise.
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Re: I don't like this (mandatory image -> url conversion)

Postby Learned Nand » Fri May 27, 2016 3:05 am

I don't think displaying the same image twice should increase load time; it only saves space. I would imagine -- though am not sure how to test -- that most browsers are smart enough not to load the same image twice on the same page. They usually cache images after the first load anyway. So putting the image in a spoiler wouldn't cause any issues with load time unless the original image weren't on the same page, in which case having the image present on-page is perfectly reasonable.
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Re: I don't like this (mandatory image -> url conversion)

Postby Windy » Wed Jun 01, 2016 7:30 pm

So did you people come to a decision yet?
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Re: I don't like this (mandatory image -> url conversion)

Postby sunglasses » Wed Jun 01, 2016 7:54 pm

The mod team is discussing it.
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Re: I don't like this (mandatory image -> url conversion)

Postby JamishT » Wed Jun 01, 2016 9:59 pm

Windy wrote:So did you people come to a decision yet?


Don't be racist, Windy!

:D
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Re: I don't like this (mandatory image -> url conversion)

Postby DashaBlade » Wed Jun 01, 2016 10:16 pm

JamishT wrote:
Windy wrote:So did you people come to a decision yet?


Don't be racist, Windy!

:D

Tsk. Judging people by the color of their usernames like that.
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Re: I don't like this (mandatory image -> url conversion)

Postby Dr. Ambiguous » Fri Jun 03, 2016 7:51 am

So for those interested, the mods decided to switch it so that the images are put inside a spoiler, and that there will also be a way to force the image to display regardless. Backend hasn't implemented it yet, so it'll be a bit until it's live. Please note that you shouldn't be forcing images to display by default, or even very often, and never if it's still on the same page as the original image.
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Re: I don't like this (mandatory image -> url conversion)

Postby Dr. Ambiguous » Sat Jun 04, 2016 2:27 am

The mod is live now, so quoted images should be in spoiler tags. You can also use [imgdis] to prevent the mod from triggering, so that it will still display the image regardless. Again, use that sparingly.

Thanks to Windy for implementing this.
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