Archives vs. big posts vs. galleries

[Numerous One]

Originally Posted by DTravel

This has been discussed before.

Most certainly it has. I couldn't find the references. I was exposed to the eccentricities of fate in a mental exercise of finding the appropriate keywords.

There is a repertoire of permanent topics related to the boards. This is one of them.

I don't know the dates previous discussions started, but in the distant past (in the Information Age, 1 year = Phanerozoic Eon) image hosts, at least those reliable and usable ones, after all, recommended here on VEF - imagevenue and imagebam - didn't have the option of creating uniform galleries of interlinked images, and generating a single url for all the pics uploaded in one turn and organized by the uploader in some way.

Although, there was a "batch upload" option, solely a convenience for the uploader, pictures were stored separately. Board members were left to load the page, and then bulk/batch download all the pics. In some cases, the additional step of saving the page to HDD was required before the batch download process could have started (not a problem here; I'm maniacally saving pages, or even the whole threads locally anyway, in order to view and download later - "Aww, free downloader! How sweet!" - they look at him compassionately).

All the pics had to be "visible" on the board page itself. So, it made sense not to impose further limitations at that moment. Otherwise, we'd have a single set spanned over dozen separate posts. More elegant solution, even the only reasonable then, was to let members post the entire set in one or two posts (containing 100+ links).

Now it seems to me, please pardon me if I'm loosing the perspective and overlooking something essential, we have other possibilities.

Long-winded, set off to inhaling some air,
NO.

P.S.
I'd always vote for the "bitch downloading" option.

[curveslover3]

I have often had to reduce the number of posts per page down to 5 to get it to load correctly. not a big problem.

Something I plan to do with my future mag scans is to include a contact sheet? I wish all full mag scans had one in addition to the cover pic (which often have no bearing on the contents). Photoshop makes it easy to produce. With large numbers of photos, this would be equally efficient?

[DTravel]

I can't provide any links to prior discussions of this issue. I can re-cap some basic info that I remember posting in prior iterations of this. Most people don't have any problem with download a single 500k to 1meg image file. A single thumbnail (180x180 pixels) image is usually about 5 to 10k in size. A little basic math would indicate that it should only take about the same amount of time for your browser to load 100 thumbnails as it does for one to download a single typical full size image.

Personally I doubt that the number of thumbnails is the cause of some users' webpage loading time issues.

[Jism Jim]

Originally Posted by AMON

As someone who does post galleries for specific models, I am quite interested to read these alternatives to downloads. I have been reluctant to use downloadable links as their lifespan can be short

An important advantage of archives is that they maintain the integrity of a set. With image galleries there is always the risk that a few images disappear without anyone noticing, becauie the thumbs remain.
Of cours, uploads can die, but in that case the whole set is unavailable, so people don't get an incomplete set.

[buttsie]

Originally Posted by DTravel

I can't provide any links to prior discussions of this issue. I can re-cap some basic info that I remember posting in prior iterations of this. Most people don't have any problem with download a single 500k to 1meg image file. A single thumbnail (180x180 pixels) image is usually about 5 to 10k in size. A little basic math would indicate that it should only take about the same amount of time for your browser to load 100 thumbnails as it does for one to download a single typical full size image.

Personally I doubt that the number of thumbnails is the cause of some users' webpage loading time issues.

Thanks for the wake-up message

Its really got to be the connection or
a software security suite/anti-virus/firewall/ browser add-on conflict then

Firefox has some shocking add-ons if your looking to kill performance.
They include some well known ones

Starting with add-ons disabled probably a first port of call

http://kb.mozillazine.org/Problematic_extensions

Disabling your security suite the 2nd given someone said a few weeks ago bit defender was the culprit when trying to access imagebam

[nylonfan]

Originally Posted by buttsie

Starting with add-ons disabled probably a first port of call

http://kb.mozillazine.org/Problematic_extensions

I've tried it for page 27 in my lace stockings thread (a little advertising, sorry )
F5 with addons: ~ 28 sec
F5 without addons ~ 20 sec
Next try with addons was more than 50 seconds. I interrupted it.
The page contains about 1470 thumbnails. Try it yourself

So if I shortened the post to 5 thumbnails per post the speed up should be 10x. If I have a litte time, I will try to shorten my own posts and have a look at the loading time.

But whether or not: a maximum of 2500 thumbnails (125 pics x 20 posts) is too much. Even 5 * 125 is too much.

I think hos' and Numerous One's suggestions are the best way to speed up loading time and keep the forum tidy!

Just my 2 cents...

[DTravel]

I will also point out something that I hope is obvious to most. Downloading 5 thumbnails can take just as long as downloading 500 if the image host is slow. It doesn't matter what kind of limits the forum imposes if the image host is slow in sending the data. And ALL the image hosts have, in my experience, been degrading for most of the last year.

[AMON]

Well, thanks to nylonfan and hos..
I've tried the suggested method on my Anya thread
http://www.vintage-erotica-forum.com...43#post2059243
And it seems to be working so you've got one convert.

[nylonfan]

Originally Posted by DTravel

I will also point out something that I hope is obvious to most. Downloading 5 thumbnails can take just as long as downloading 500 if the image host is slow. It doesn't matter what kind of limits the forum imposes if the image host is slow in sending the data. And ALL the image hosts have, in my experience, been degrading for most of the last year.

You are absolutely right. But in fact, if the image host is slow, 5 images will load faster than 500 ;-).
My experience is, that there are only few images which need long time to retrieve from the host. IMHO Firefox is loading 5 - 10 images in parallel. If these 5 - 10 are stucking, FF will wait until at least one is loading or timed out.
The chance to find pics which will need more time to load will increase if more pics are to be load.
Since I'm an unlucky fellow, I find some at every load

Maybe - but this is a small chance - if more and more resign to put all previews into one post, the server load will decrease and loading will be faster. But this is really a small chance.

@AMON: thank you and welcome to the club

[nylonfan]

I discovered that JDownloader can handle the gallery links. And as a little goodie, JD will download all images even if they are spanned across more than one gallery

For ImageHost Grabber, you have to open every part of the gallery and start the download.

JD is more comfortable because of fewer clicks. ImageHost Grabber is faster. For me, IHG does it for me.