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pngcrush
pngcrush is currently available as a command-line, shareware program in DOS and Linux x86 flavors. The DOS version works under Windows 95/98/NT and can handle long filenames; it may also run in an OS/2 DOS box, but without long-filename support. The current release, as of January 1999, is version 1.1.3 which has a home page at http://pmt.sourceforge.net/pngcrush/. The simplest pngcrush operation is a basic ``crush'' on a single file, specifying the output filename: pngcrush foo.png foo-crushed.png This results in output that looks something like the following: pngcrush 1.1.3, Copyright (C) 1998, Glenn Randers-Pehrson. | This program was built with libpng version 1.0.3, | Copyright (c) Guy Eric Schalnat, Group 42 Inc., | Copyright (c) 1996, 1997 Andreas Dilger, | Copyright (c) 1998, 1999, Glenn Randers-Pehrson, | and zlib version 1.1.3, Copyright (c) 1998, | Jean-loup Gailly and Mark Adler. foo.png IDAT length in input file = 148723 IDAT length with method 1 (fm 0 zl 4 zs 0)= 147533 IDAT length with method 2 (fm 1 zl 4 zs 0)= 124710 IDAT length with method 3 (fm 5 zl 4 zs 1)= 110589 IDAT length with method 9 (fm 5 zl 2 zs 2)= 880073 IDAT length with method 10 (fm 5 zl 9 zs 1)= 85820 best pngcrush method = 10 for foo-crushed.png (42.36% reduction) overall result: 42.36% reduction, 62903 bytes pngcrush also supports a truly brute-force approach that currently tests 102 different methods but may add more in the future. This rarely improves compression by more than a tenth of a percent over the default approach, but for busy sites looking to conserve bandwidth, saving even a dozen bytes may be well worth the cost of a very lengthy--but one-time--pngcrush session. The brute-force method is invoked with the -brute option, logically enough: pngcrush -brute foo.png foo-crushed.png In general, a site optimizing its content will want to crush all of its PNG images (by using batch-mode conversion), and pngcrush includes two options to support batch conversion. The first allows one to specify a new extension for converted images, which will be created in the same directory as the original: pngcrush -e -crushed.png foo.png foo2.png foo3.png foo4.png This example crushes four images, foo.png through foo4.png, giving them the extension -crushed.png; thus the output names are foo-crushed.png, foo2-crushed.png, and so on. Such an approach is handy for casual use, since an alphabetical directory listing will (usually) list the original and crushed versions in pairs, allowing quick, after-the-fact inspection of the changes in file sizes. But because it involves renaming files, this is probably not the preferred approach for a web site. The alternative is pngcrush's -d option, which allows one to specify an output directory in which to place the crushed images: pngcrush -d crushed_images foo.png foo2.png foo3.png foo4.png This example crushes the same four images, but leaves their filenames unchanged. The new versions will go in the crushed_images subdirectory, which will be created if it does not already exist. The -rem option allows one to remove PNG chunks. This is quite handy, and is often a great way to trim a few dozen bytes from files (which can make a big difference in the case of small web graphics), but it does require knowledge of PNG's chunk names. The following example removes any timestamp chunks and both compressed and uncompressed text chunks from foo.png and places the result in the crushed subdirectory: pngcrush -d crushed -rem tIME -rem zTXt -rem tEXt -rem iTXt foo.png Note that this approach is somewhat akin to doing surgery with a hatchet: one has no control over specific instances of the listed chunks in the case of those (like zTXt, tEXt, and iTXt) that may appear more than once. In particular, the tEXt or iTXt chunk is where copyright info usually appears, and that is usually not something one wants to remove.[30]
pngcrush -d crushed -replace_gamma 0.65909 mac.png mac2.png mac3.png For images from a PC-based design group, the corresponding command is: pngcrush -d crushed -replace_gamma 0.45455 pc.png pc2.png pc3.png In addition to optimizing the sizes of the images, these examples strip any existing gamma information out of the files, on the assumption that the values are known to be wrong and replace it with values that are appropriate for stock Macs (with a factory-default ``system gamma'' value of 1.8) or stock PCs. If it is known that the images that have gamma information are correct, use the -g option instead; it will add a gAMA chunk only to those images that do not already have one. I should note that pngcrush is still a relatively new utility, and it
does have a number of rough edges yet. For example, if an output file
already exists, it will be overwritten without warning. There is also
no recursion, no support for wildcards other than what the operating
system provides (i.e., only under Unix), and no way to set a default
extension or directory for crushed files (say, via an environment variable).
The program's extended options also assume a fairly advanced knowledge of
PNG files--for example, the official names
of PNG chunks, in the case of the -rem option, or the numerical
color types used internally by PNG, or the precise palette index of the
color to be made transparent, in the case of the -trns option.[31]
Nor is there yet support for counting colors in images and automatically
converting from, say, RGB to palette format, although this is planned for
a future version. But these are relatively minor user interface issues
that will undoubtedly improve as the application matures. As regards its primary
purpose of squeezing PNG images as tightly as possible, pngcrush is quite
capable, and is likely to become an indispensable addition to the toolchest of
any image-wrangler.
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