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Show HN: I built PixSpeed to optimize website images for free

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Re: Show HN: I built PixSpeed to optimize website images for free

#11

Post by Syonyk »

naberhausj wrote: post #9

The best feature of my purpose-built static site generator is that it automatically builds (mostly) optimized WEBPs from any source image [1]. Not only does it reduce the image size, but it outputs many sizes of the image so that I can use an image `srcset`. The browser then automatically downloads the optimally sized image for the element. It's a game changer to be able to copy photos directly from my Google Photos…

If you're using Jekyll, Jekyll Picture Tag (https://github.com/rbuchberger/jekyll_picture_tag) does the same thing. I use that in my pipeline for my blog, and I agree, it's very nice to just not have to worry about stuffing a 5MB image down someone's tiny cell phone connection.

Though I'm not sure many browsers actually use anything other than the largest image option...

I've debated encoding to AVIF as well, but that's such a painfully long process on a blog with somewhere around 8700 images.

Re: Show HN: I built PixSpeed to optimize website images for free

#12

Post by powersnail »

naberhausj wrote: post #9

The best feature of my purpose-built static site generator is that it automatically builds (mostly) optimized WEBPs from any source image [1]. Not only does it reduce the image size, but it outputs many sizes of the image so that I can use an image `srcset`. The browser then automatically downloads the optimally sized image for the element. It's a game changer to be able to copy photos directly from my Google Photos…

I've done a similar thing[^1] as well, but as a post-processing step after Hugo build my site, because I haven't written my own static site generator (yet).

[^1]: https://github.com/PowerSnail/PowerSnail.github.io/blob/mast...

Re: Show HN: I built PixSpeed to optimize website images for free

#13

Post by SCUSKU »

lou_alcala wrote: post #2

Hey HN, I created PixSpeed to optimize images for my own websites. While tools like TinyPNG are fantastic, I wanted a more custom solution. PixSpeed compresses PNG, JPEG, and WebP images efficiently, helping to improve site loading times without compromising quality. I've been using it myself and hope it can be useful for others as well. The tool is completely free. I'd love to get feedback on what could make PixSpee…

Awesome stuff, would love if there were a total tally at the bottom that indicated the before and after size and percent difference! E.g. before: 10MB, after: 2MB, change: -80%

Re: Show HN: I built PixSpeed to optimize website images for free

#14

Post by markdown »

jasonjmcghee wrote: post #6
brudgers wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The tool is completely free Long term, how do you intend to sustain the service if users become dependent on it and need to use it at scale? How do you intend to maintain reliability and uptime for users whose business depends on access to the service? What happens to users if/when you lose interest/ability to continue the project? Don't get me wrong, you don't owe other people anything. On the other hand, free is of…

"All images are deleted after 1 hour" - so they're using a server and it's a valid ask. My question is - why does this require a server? Write it in something that compiles to LLVM / WASM and just make a static page. Infinitely scalable and just pay for the domain (and CDN provider if applicable) both likely nominal cost.

> Write it in...

I look forward to your version of this service, also to be provided for free, right? And for your sake, hopefully you won't have people in the comments demanding that you completely redo your project in the special way that suits them.

Re: Show HN: I built PixSpeed to optimize website images for free

#15

Post by jszymborski »

naberhausj wrote: post #9

The best feature of my purpose-built static site generator is that it automatically builds (mostly) optimized WEBPs from any source image [1]. Not only does it reduce the image size, but it outputs many sizes of the image so that I can use an image `srcset`. The browser then automatically downloads the optimally sized image for the element. It's a game changer to be able to copy photos directly from my Google Photos…

This is also pretty easy is Hugo, albeit maybe less automatic [0].

   {{ $image.Resize "600x webp q50" }}
[0] https://gohugo.io/content-management/image-processing/

Re: Show HN: I built PixSpeed to optimize website images for free

#16

Post by sangeeth96 »

naberhausj wrote: post #9

The best feature of my purpose-built static site generator is that it automatically builds (mostly) optimized WEBPs from any source image [1]. Not only does it reduce the image size, but it outputs many sizes of the image so that I can use an image `srcset`. The browser then automatically downloads the optimally sized image for the element. It's a game changer to be able to copy photos directly from my Google Photos…

Since I'm committing my blog into git, I found it better to pre-optimize my images so that my repo won't balloon. At first, I wrote a script that simply `find`s my non-WebP images, turns them into WebP. It then looks for those image references in my *.md files and replaces the extension with WebP.

But now, I have a better workflow where I use the Image Converter plugin[^1] in Obsidian since that's how I'm composing my notes primarily. As I paste the images into the markdown file, it gets converted and embedded. There's also Clop[^2] for macOS which auto converts if I copy an image/file to my clipboard into my desired format and quality.

Quite happy with this setup for the time being.

[^1]: https://github.com/xRyul/obsidian-image-converter [^2]: https://lowtechguys.com/clop/

Re: Show HN: I built PixSpeed to optimize website images for free

#17

Post by haroldp »

I have long felt that the best way to optimize photograph JPEGs was to scale them to the right size and then have a human turn the quality down until just before the eye notices a decrease in quality, and this has worked well for me. But I have to say, you beat me in the two images I tested, one by 30% file size, and I could not discern a quality difference. Very nice!

Or maybe I have just been clinging to notion too long?

FYI, your tester did miss an image that my site was including via in the style sheet.

Re: Show HN: I built PixSpeed to optimize website images for free

#18

Post by lou_alcala »

brudgers wrote: post #3
lou_alcala wrote: post #2

Hey HN, I created PixSpeed to optimize images for my own websites. While tools like TinyPNG are fantastic, I wanted a more custom solution. PixSpeed compresses PNG, JPEG, and WebP images efficiently, helping to improve site loading times without compromising quality. I've been using it myself and hope it can be useful for others as well. The tool is completely free. I'd love to get feedback on what could make PixSpee…

The tool is completely free Long term, how do you intend to sustain the service if users become dependent on it and need to use it at scale? How do you intend to maintain reliability and uptime for users whose business depends on access to the service? What happens to users if/when you lose interest/ability to continue the project? Don't get me wrong, you don't owe other people anything. On the other hand, free is of…

I'm considering offering some additional features as paid options. Currently, the system only optimizes images from the URL you provide, but one potential premium feature could be to allow the system to crawl all internal pages of a website, optimizing images across the entire site. This would make it easier for users who want to optimize all their content by simply submitting the homepage URL.

However, this is a double-edged sword: I might encounter sites with a large number of internal pages, which would complicate the resources needed to provide an efficient and sustainable service.

Another option I've thought about is offering a CDN service to directly serve optimized images, improving performance without the need for users to manually download and upload images. It does become more complex when charging users, as reliability, support, and infrastructure take on a much greater role.

Re: Show HN: I built PixSpeed to optimize website images for free

#19

Post by jerriep »

lou_alcala wrote: post #18
brudgers wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The tool is completely free Long term, how do you intend to sustain the service if users become dependent on it and need to use it at scale? How do you intend to maintain reliability and uptime for users whose business depends on access to the service? What happens to users if/when you lose interest/ability to continue the project? Don't get me wrong, you don't owe other people anything. On the other hand, free is of…

I'm considering offering some additional features as paid options. Currently, the system only optimizes images from the URL you provide, but one potential premium feature could be to allow the system to crawl all internal pages of a website, optimizing images across the entire site. This would make it easier for users who want to optimize all their content by simply submitting the homepage URL. However, this is a dou…

You may also want to consider offering an API. I currently use (and pay for) the TinyPNG API.

Re: Show HN: I built PixSpeed to optimize website images for free

#20

Post by jasonjmcghee »

markdown wrote: post #14
jasonjmcghee wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"All images are deleted after 1 hour" - so they're using a server and it's a valid ask. My question is - why does this require a server? Write it in something that compiles to LLVM / WASM and just make a static page. Infinitely scalable and just pay for the domain (and CDN provider if applicable) both likely nominal cost.

> Write it in... I look forward to your version of this service, also to be provided for free, right? And for your sake, hopefully you won't have people in the comments demanding that you completely redo your project in the special way that suits them.

> Long term, how do you intend to sustain the service if users become dependent on it and need to use it at scale? ...

Is what I was responding to. Wasn't criticizing the posted product implementation choices or demanding a rewrite. I see how it could be read that way, which is unfortunate.

Parent comment asked a number of questions that all suggested a server was a requirement. If scale becomes any issue for a service like this, there are approaches other than shutting down the service due to server / maintenance costs.

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