Re-Opened Suggestion: Images

[rabler]

The site software may not allow this, but if it does
it would be nice if higher paying members got larger VIEW resolution rather than larger upload resolution,
and lower paying members had limited viewing resolution.

After all, anyone can view their own copy of their images at whatever resolution their camera produced. Iit isn't a motivation for them to upgrade membership to benefit everyone else, unless they are a commercial member. Effectively I feel like I'm getting punished for paying for Diamond membership and struggling to view posts from silver members.

 

[rabler]

@vtcnc I certainly understand that these things take time. I'm sure you are a volunteer, yet you seem to take the brunt of a lot of technical work on the website. I've been there, and appreciate that it can't be your first priority.

I would imagine the cost issue is more one of bandwidth utilization than of storage space.

 

[vtcnc]

@vtcnc I certainly understand that these things take time. I'm sure you are a volunteer, yet you seem to take the brunt of a lot of technical work on the website. I've been there, and appreciate that it can't be your first priority.

I would imagine the cost issue is more one of bandwidth utilization than of storage space.

Appreciate the understanding.

Yes, the issue is bandwidth. We have something on the order of 3TB of server space/storage. You can imagine that some significant amount is for the software and an equally significant amount or more is needed for images, video, backups, etc.

The volunteering part is what makes this especially challenging with the following twist: most "bandwidth" issues are on the user end. The servers we employ (without knowing the specs) are not the bottleneck. Nor is traffic on the site the issue. Usually, the issue is on the user end because of the users ISP service, location and often - user error or browser and computer maintenance issues.

I'm not saying any of this to cast blame in one direction vs. the other. Rather, the reality of client side limitations is that compromises must occur on the server side despite having plenty of bandwidth and plenty of storage space. File size and its delivery to the client in the face of these limitations is really the challenge. So, limiting the size of images and videos is a way to try and optimize the solution to this problem.

And I say all of this with the painful knolwedge of being a volunteer and not an expert. This is the spirit of which I ask those who have shelled out their hard earned money to please be patient. My priority is to make the experience best for those that are committed to the site through their donations. I will absolutely make mistakes in trying to achieve that and correct them as we learn what works and what doesn't.

One of the things that is helpful is to provide examples. Please point me to example forums or threads here at H-M where you are experiencing problems. If I can use those to make changes and move towards a better solution, I will.

Thanks.

 

[rabler]

@vtcnc,
I live with HughesNet satellite internet, so I am definitely on the low end of the bandwidth curve. I hope to soon move up to Starlink. So I understand. I have also been SysAdmin on more than one website, so I get that there are a mess of issues and software documentation to try to sort out and test.

As an option to the user experience: when an image is uploaded it can be added to the post as "full size" or "thumbnail". Is there a way to eliminate the full size option? That would give viewers the option of being able to still click open the full size image without the forcing the full image download on those who don't care to see the full size image. This would be the easiest way to allow the user to select, and also reduce the bandwidth used by the servers as only selected images would get enlarged.

As for an example: This thread by @woodchucker: https://www.hobby-machinist.com/thr...-quality-nos-drill-bit-with-poor-grind.97456/ I couldn't tell, and apparently wasn't the only one, what was wrong with the drill bit. I tried unsuccessfully to click the image open to enlarge it so I could get a better view, but even after the OP pointed out the issue I had trouble "seeing" it.

Thanks again for looking into this. Please take your time. I just didn't appreciate being told that the current setup was truly "unlimited", but I need to take a deep breath, step back, and give you and the others who make this a great site time to try to optimize it for everyone. That's a task that you can only iterate at over time.

 

[WobblyHand]

Appreciate the understanding.

Yes, the issue is bandwidth. We have something on the order of 3TB of server space/storage. You can imagine that some significant amount is for the software and an equally significant amount or more is needed for images, video, backups, etc.

The volunteering part is what makes this especially challenging with the following twist: most "bandwidth" issues are on the user end. The servers we employ (without knowing the specs) are not the bottleneck. Nor is traffic on the site the issue. Usually, the issue is on the user end because of the users ISP service, location and often - user error or browser and computer maintenance issues.

I'm not saying any of this to cast blame in one direction vs. the other. Rather, the reality of client side limitations is that compromises must occur on the server side despite having plenty of bandwidth and plenty of storage space. File size and its delivery to the client in the face of these limitations is really the challenge. So, limiting the size of images and videos is a way to try and optimize the solution to this problem.

And I say all of this with the painful knolwedge of being a volunteer and not an expert. This is the spirit of which I ask those who have shelled out their hard earned money to please be patient. My priority is to make the experience best for those that are committed to the site through their donations. I will absolutely make mistakes in trying to achieve that and correct them as we learn what works and what doesn't.

One of the things that is helpful is to provide examples. Please point me to example forums or threads here at H-M where you are experiencing problems. If I can use those to make changes and move towards a better solution, I will.

Thanks.

One thing that makes it hard to show examples, is there is no way to show the pre-compressed photos (the before) as opposed to the post-compressed photos (the after). I do know in the thread https://www.hobby-machinist.com/thr...-quality-nos-drill-bit-with-poor-grind.97456/ I couldn't tell from the degraded first photo what the problem was. I downloaded the photo and it was severely compressed. Blowing it up really didn't help since the picture had been degraded (pixelated and blurry). After the OP pointed out the issue, it was still hard for me to see, until I used a real drill to compare.

Now that is only one example, and maybe a poor one, from a beginner's perspective. The picture was posted by a silver member, so maybe that's to be expected. But from a beginner's perspective, we need some help to recognize stuff, and to learn from it. I believe the member that stated the actual photo on their end was much clearer, and it certainly was much higher resolution.

Appreciate your volunteering, and that of all the HM volunteers. If I could be helpful in anyway, I'd like to help.

 

[WobblyHand]

@rabler we picked the same example!

 

[WobblyHand]

Re: end user bandwidth. I'm on the bottom-most tier of fiber here in town. I got in on some kind of grandfathered deal for the service. That being said, the service is spotty. Drops out a lot on rainy weather, as if I had a dish. Oh yeah, they want to charge me well over $100/month to upgrade from 30Mbps/10Mbps to 100Mbps service plus charging me to change the ONT. Currently grandfathered at $35/month as an early adopter, but I'm kind of stuck at this point, because of the lack of local competition. Still, it is way better than the dial up I used to have.

ISP prices are crazy. Less than 30 miles away, I could get 100M/100M for $30/month. I had to temporarily install internet into my deceased mother-in-law's house for a security system. That was no contract, that was month by month. Why the low cost? Because the city fathers allowed multiple ISP's to compete. There's 6 broadband providers there, vs. only 2 (fiber and cable) where I live.

I have been on websites where it's excruciatingly slow, (dial up days, less so now) so I understand the issue. Keep trying to balance things. Appreciate your efforts.

 

[vtcnc]

I've upped image sizes. @WobblyHand and @rabler - can I get some feedback on whether this is better, same or worse.

Please bear in mind that the change is a running change and not retroactive. Previously posted threads should not have been affected prior to Jan 12. So, I'm asking specifically if you have had image viewing issues post Jan. 12th.

 

[WobblyHand]

I've upped image sizes. @WobblyHand and @rabler - can I get some feedback on whether this is better, same or worse.

Please bear in mind that the change is a running change and not retroactive. Previously posted threads should not have been affected prior to Jan 12. So, I'm asking specifically if you have had image viewing issues post Jan. 12th.

Thank you for making some changes. I tried a couple of posts to the test area this morning. Unfortunately don't see a change in image quality from post #11. Different image, posted both as thumbnail and full image. Resultant downloadable image from HM was 960x720, identical to post #11. Both uploads were at 4032x3024. Similar compression ratios as before. For my new image: Pixel reduction factor = 17.64:1, file reduction factor = 20.85:1 which is similar to #11.

Can barely resolve the engraving on my Rohm drill chuck. Zu is resolvable, but Auf isn't. The Auf is in a region of lower contrast due to bright lighting, high compression ratios means the detail vanishes. Can't see the umlaut over the O. The knurling is indistinct. In the original photo, all these details are present.

By the way, a big thanks to HM for stripping GPS information. That's a very good thing to do.

So TLDR, can't notice any change yet. Image is still 960x720. Want to thank you for trying. If you can, keep poking away at this. There are many users who would greatly appreciate the improvements.

 

[rabler]

I've upped image sizes. @WobblyHand and @rabler - can I get some feedback on whether this is better, same or worse.

Please bear in mind that the change is a running change and not retroactive. Previously posted threads should not have been affected prior to Jan 12. So, I'm asking specifically if you have had image viewing issues post Jan. 12th.

Bryan
The current image sizes are working Ok for me. There are still some posts where the issues discussed are not as readily visible as would be desirable, but I think that is to some extent an issue of people having become accustomed to being able to post 4000x3000 images. Sometimes it is just necessary for posting to either zoom in or crop images, or post a couple of pictures to tell a story (wide angle and close up). That should settle out as folks become more accustom to the current configuration.

I would really like to see a way to implement the thumbnail only approach so a somewhat larger image could be stored, but at this point I feel that should go on the long-term feature request list, and not be a front burner problem for you to worry about.
Thanks