TinyWebGallery Blog

TWG 1.8 is now using css sprites for most of the icons and buttons.

Sprites is a technique that only one big image is loaded which contains all the other images. The position of the images inside the big image are defined in a css. This saves a lot of requests (e.g. in TWG only one language flag is now loaded instead of 29)  and bandwith (1 language image = 5kb; 29 language images = 28 kb).

There are a lot of different tutorials out there and I have read quite a
lot to find the best way which should be used if you have an existing
application and you want to introduce sprites.

I have tried different implementation methods and this are the 3 main ways
you will find in the web:

1. with ul/li like explained in http://www.alistapart.com/articles/sprites
2. with divs like you can see at http://css-sprit.es/
3. and with using a img tag as explained here: http://cssglobe.com/post/3028/creating-easy-and-useful-css-sprites

And unfortunately the first ones you find with google if you search for “css sprites” are not the easiest and best way in my opinion! Most of the time they use the ul/li solution.
This works fine if you don’t have a complex layout where each pixel counts and should look
exacly the same. I have started with this in the TWGXplorer but was not able to get the exact same positions as before.
Then I tried using divs. This works quite nice at a lot of places but at the end I also had problems to adjust the divs exacly the way I needed it.
So I finally ended up by using the img tag solution. And for an existing application this is the way to go. You simply replace all images with a transparent 1px image and apply the class for the big image and the class for the sprite. That’s really simple and worked for me in all browsers without any modifications.

I was using the sprite generator you find at http://css-sprit.es/. It has the advantage that the size of each image is specified in the css too and not only the position. The disadvantage is that if you run the generator twice with the same images a different sprite can be created because it does not sort the images. I have contacted the author about this and maybe this is already fixed when you read this post.

I hope I have saved someone a little bit time because for me it took quite a while to compare them.

Have fun using sprites,
Michael

Hi,

The new layout of the TWG website is online.

• A new header line with a section for each of the tools for easier navigation.
• A complete new entry page for easier navigation.
• The new logo is included
• The new versions of TWG/JFU/TFU/WPU are online – more details about them in following posts.

Just go there by yourself – everything should be nicer now…

The blog will soon move from blog.tinywebgallery.com to www.tinywebgallery.com because I want to include the 3 latest news always on the main page and I need direct access to the wordpress classes for this. So please don’t wonder if you will be redirected if you go to the blog!

Have fun using TWG/JFU/TFU/WFU,

Michael

Hi,

It’s now possible to get the Standard License for free using Trialpay.

Try or buy one offer from your preferred brands and get a Standard License — free. TrialPay uses money from the advertiser to pay for your product. It’s that easy.

On the registration page you now have the option to register though trialpay as well.

Best,

Michael

Hi,

I’m looking for testers for my new Wordpress Flash Uploader: WP Flash Uploader.

It is a wrapper for TFU like the Joomla Flash Uploader. If you run Wordpress 2.7 or above and want to test it please contact me.

This plugin does actually contain 2 plugins in one:

• WP Flash Uploader to upload files
• Sync Medial Library which synchronizes the upload folder with the media library. So you can upload images with e.g.  FTP as well.

- Michael

Hi,

I look at my alexa rank once in a while and then compare it with my real user numbers. So my ranking varies between 70.000 and 120.000 but my average visitors a day increased from 5000 to ~ 8000 a day in the same time. So whats does this say – Alexa is maybe interesting for sites with a alexa ranking below 10.000 but not for sites like tinywebgallery which is around 100.000 as you see at the user numbers.

I actually don’t care about alexa because this blog is for TWG/TFU/JFU and stuff related to this. I only wanted to see if more people come to this blog because of this alexa article.

So all TWG/TFU/JFU users – this is only a simple experiment .

Have fun waisting your time with alexa.

- Michael

Below you find some lines you should think about in the alexa forum:

I see this line in blogs just about every day: “How to boost your Alexa Rank.” or “How to Boost Alexa Rank in 2 Steps” or “Boost Alexa traffic ranking” They are inevitably filled with misguided musings posted by fools who can’t be bothered to learn the facts before blathering about some get-rich-quick scheme.

Here’s a perfect example. In this blog post, he says you can boost your rank EASILY by following his simple steps. That post was from August 9th, so he should be in the top 100 by now, right? Wrong. In fact, he barely cracked the Top 100,000. But, his rank did go up… did his scheme work? No, of course not. It is just that people who have the Alexa Toolbar noticed his post and visited his site, pushing his rank up.

Then there are the blogs that tell you to put one of our Alexa Widgets on your site. They all claim that your rank will improve dramatically. But, of course, it doesn’t work. That would be ridiculous, right? But you wouldn’t know that if you read these blogs.

Of course we can’t forget the people who will charge you to increase your rank. I wonder how much money these services have made over the years. I can tell you with absolute certainty, that you may as well burn your money in a voodoo traffic pyre while chanting “Alexa” over and over. Maybe that will work. But these programs definitely don’t and you can look at their traffic rank as proof. If that isn’t enough to convince you, how about this… even trying to boost your rank through these means is resorting to fraud. That is no way to run a business.

So, how do you increase your Alexa Rank? Get more traffic to your site. Make good content. It is that simple.

Hi,

I figured out a problem with my thunderbird installation today.

Every time when I was not online and tried to open my e-mails my Thunderbird (2.0.21) crashed.
The problem is the Addon “Send Later” which tries to connect if you are online or not. Simly uninstall it and you can read e-mails offline again.

Hope this info helps someone .

- Michael