Accept WebP for articles! (Or even SVG..?)
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Trying to publish my article today, I was surprised by the fact that my .webp image file was rejected by the system. This kind of action is not just obsolete, it is very unfortunate. WebP is one of the well-established standards for the Web supported by all non-nonsense browsers. It renders JPEG, PNG and GIF morally obsolete, as it it replaces all of them implementing all their features, depending on options: photography, drawings, icons, animations and even video, with dramatic improvement in compression, for both lossy and lossless algorithms. Side note: it would be good to accept SVG as well, but I can understand that you consider it unsafe due to the possibility of scripting. Even in this aspect, the presence of the <script...> tag could be easily detected and the scripting could be rejected. Vector graphics in articles could seriously improve the overall quality of the site and publications. Thank you.
—SA
Sergey A Kryukov
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Trying to publish my article today, I was surprised by the fact that my .webp image file was rejected by the system. This kind of action is not just obsolete, it is very unfortunate. WebP is one of the well-established standards for the Web supported by all non-nonsense browsers. It renders JPEG, PNG and GIF morally obsolete, as it it replaces all of them implementing all their features, depending on options: photography, drawings, icons, animations and even video, with dramatic improvement in compression, for both lossy and lossless algorithms. Side note: it would be good to accept SVG as well, but I can understand that you consider it unsafe due to the possibility of scripting. Even in this aspect, the presence of the <script...> tag could be easily detected and the scripting could be rejected. Vector graphics in articles could seriously improve the overall quality of the site and publications. Thank you.
—SA
Sergey A Kryukov
WebP isn't completely ubiquitous yet: Can I use... [^] SVG: We have partial acceptance and are moving more and more towards using SVG in our system itself. We do have SVG cleaning scripts that mitigate the dangers of SVG. Now if only everyone used (and was able to use) a no-nonsense browser. We're getting there, but not quite yet. Soon.
cheers Chris Maunder
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WebP isn't completely ubiquitous yet: Can I use... [^] SVG: We have partial acceptance and are moving more and more towards using SVG in our system itself. We do have SVG cleaning scripts that mitigate the dangers of SVG. Now if only everyone used (and was able to use) a no-nonsense browser. We're getting there, but not quite yet. Soon.
cheers Chris Maunder
Thank you, Chris. Your update is reasonable, and I'll wait for the possibility to include SVG in my posts. Could you notify me when and it it's possible? I'll have a good use for it. As to WebP... If you did not consider it, I would seriously ask you to consider. Here is one thing: it's not important if it is ubiquitous. It is important that it is standardized for the Web browsers, and that the browsers support it well. It will become ubiquitous if sites and developers accept and use it. This is perfectly safe to do so. Thank you.
—SA
Sergey A Kryukov
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Thank you, Chris. Your update is reasonable, and I'll wait for the possibility to include SVG in my posts. Could you notify me when and it it's possible? I'll have a good use for it. As to WebP... If you did not consider it, I would seriously ask you to consider. Here is one thing: it's not important if it is ubiquitous. It is important that it is standardized for the Web browsers, and that the browsers support it well. It will become ubiquitous if sites and developers accept and use it. This is perfectly safe to do so. Thank you.
—SA
Sergey A Kryukov
I've been watching WebP for a while and had actually allowed it briefly a year or two ago but pulled back after noting that many users were still using browsers (eg IE11) that didn't support it. As I said: soon. It becomes ubiquitous only when we make the decision to actively exclude certain readers. Those in corporate environments stuck with IE. Those with old tablets who can't afford to upgrade them. Those who are stuck using old versions of browsers due to security policies. At some point we need to simply say "too bad" to those people, and that's never a fun thing to do.
cheers Chris Maunder
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I've been watching WebP for a while and had actually allowed it briefly a year or two ago but pulled back after noting that many users were still using browsers (eg IE11) that didn't support it. As I said: soon. It becomes ubiquitous only when we make the decision to actively exclude certain readers. Those in corporate environments stuck with IE. Those with old tablets who can't afford to upgrade them. Those who are stuck using old versions of browsers due to security policies. At some point we need to simply say "too bad" to those people, and that's never a fun thing to do.
cheers Chris Maunder
I have to agree. IE? Maybe, but... In many US companies I contacted during last decade (not just software), IT discouraged IE and seized to support it. During first part of 2020, even Edge gave up and embraced Blink+V8. However, I recently found that Edge is still behind: it does not support very important AV1 (which can be contained in WebM or Matroska). AV1 performance and quality-per-bbs is truly amazing, this is new top standard for Youtube. Even Mozilla supports it. (Unfortunately, Mozilla also fell behind: I found incomplete support of touch and buggy sound rendering with WebAudio.) Thank you.
—SA
Sergey A Kryukov
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I've been watching WebP for a while and had actually allowed it briefly a year or two ago but pulled back after noting that many users were still using browsers (eg IE11) that didn't support it. As I said: soon. It becomes ubiquitous only when we make the decision to actively exclude certain readers. Those in corporate environments stuck with IE. Those with old tablets who can't afford to upgrade them. Those who are stuck using old versions of browsers due to security policies. At some point we need to simply say "too bad" to those people, and that's never a fun thing to do.
cheers Chris Maunder
Even Microsoft agree that IE is not a browser[^]. :) Beyond that, and Safari being limited to "Big Sur" or later (no, me neither), only KaiOS Browser seems to lack support. I've had good results using ImageProcessor[^] in an ASP.NET application to dynamically serve up WebP or JPEG images depending on the request headers. Not sure whether that would be an option for you, given the amount of traffic involved? If you want an image format with really limited support, try AVIF[^]. :-D
"These people looked deep within my soul and assigned me a number based on the order in which I joined." - Homer
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Even Microsoft agree that IE is not a browser[^]. :) Beyond that, and Safari being limited to "Big Sur" or later (no, me neither), only KaiOS Browser seems to lack support. I've had good results using ImageProcessor[^] in an ASP.NET application to dynamically serve up WebP or JPEG images depending on the request headers. Not sure whether that would be an option for you, given the amount of traffic involved? If you want an image format with really limited support, try AVIF[^]. :-D
"These people looked deep within my soul and assigned me a number based on the order in which I joined." - Homer
Anyone with an old iPad would be locked out. Dynamically serving is certainly an option, but from a business point of view I'm not sure what I'd gain at a day to day level right now.
cheers Chris Maunder
