We have been using DjVu for one of our digitizations projects and it does offer
good compression but there is another Lizardtech product called MrSID that is
much better and offers more control for compressing images (DjVu is now marked
for text, not image compression). The problem is still that it is proprietary
and the viewer must download the MrSID viewer into their browser. This is not
always possible on public machines and in some institutions where downloads are
controlled. To solve our problem for those who could not or did not want to
download the viewer, we also offer a jpeg option.
Lesli Zimmerman
Sr. Technical Metadata Specialist
University of Tennessee Digital Library
Chris Prom wrote:
> Katherine,
>
> We breifly looked into using something called DjVu for the same reasons
> you mentioned (better compression and better image quality), but decided
> against it. That was a year ago. You may want to check
> www.lizardtech.com to see if the technology has matured. What I saw was
> much more impressive than png, but requires a browser plug-in. There is a
> built-in page turner and a nice enlargment feature. Also it is a
> proprietary technology.
>
> Chris
>
> Christopher Prom
> Assistant University Archivist
> University of Illinois Archives
> Room 19 Library (MC-522)
> 1408 W. Gregory Drive
> Urbana, IL 61801
>
> web: http://www.library.uiuc.edu/ahx/
> e-mail: [log in to unmask]
> phone: 217 333 0798
> fax: 217 333 2868
>
> On Tue, 13 Mar 2001, Kathlene Ferris wrote:
>
> > We are experimenting with using PNG (Portable Network Graphics) files for
> > web delivery of digital images linked to our encoded finding aids. PNGs are
> > attractive because the lossless compression format produces smaller files
> > than JPEGs and even GIF files, saving significant server space. The main
> > problem that we have identified so far: browser support is only fair and
> > applications support could be better.
> >
> > Has anyone else investigated or even used PNG files? Specifically, we want
> > to know if there are other reasons not to go with this format.
> >
> >
> > Kathlene Ferris
> > Online Archive of New Mexico
> > University of New Mexico General Library
> >
--
***********************************
Lesli Zimmerman
"If you take care of the small things, the big things take care of themselves.
You can gain more control over your life by paying closer attention to the
little things." -- Emily Dickinson, American poet
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