Talk:Comparison of image viewers

Shotwell

The article says that Shotwell works on Windows, but it only supports Linux, but I can't figure out how to edit it. --Fetma (talk) 15:30, 4 May 2011 (UTC)

lightroom

Why isn't lightroom included in the image organisers comparison?i use it to organise all my pictures and it is pretty simillar to picassa or acdsee when reffering to it's purpose

Viewing inside archives

Should we add information about the ability to view images inside archives? I know ACDSee let's you see inside ZIP files at least. It'd be especially nice to know which programs let you view inside RARs/CBRs/CBZs.

What's the point? This is comparison of image viewers, not universal-programs-for-doing-anything. Futurix 16:35, 9 September 2006 (UTC)

It would be for viewing images inside the archives, without needing to extract them. Look at CDisplay, for example, "a sequential image viewing utility".

Eliminate Some Programs

I know of at least 2 programs that are image organisers, not image viewers. There is a huge difference between the two. Image organisers organise your files and image viewers do nothing but view single or lists of images. However, since image organisers need to rapidly scroll through thousands of images, often, their support of image formats is not as through as image viewers. The problem here is apparently the same as over at comparison of media players that treats a orgianzier the same as a player. Again, two different things.--Ctachme 15:39, 26 August 2005 (UTC)

Please explain the (huge) difference between an image organizer and an image viewer. At least in a way that specifies the applications in this list as being mere viewers. Almost all applications mentioned do more than viewing single or lists of files. Acdsee, for example, is called a photo manager by it's publisher. The amount of file formats supported? Both Acdsee and ThumbsPlus support around 100 file formats. Surely storing information in a central database is something for an image organizer? Acdsee does this too. I don't think you can talk about any difference between the two application types. Most applications provide both image viewing and image organizing features. Or should applications that can edit images also be removed, because they are image editors not image viewers? — Peter 15:57, 24 February 2006 (UTC)

Alt text

The images in the table on this page have blank alt text - please can someone replace it with something more meaningful? Thank you.. Andy Mabbett 11:02, 26 October 2005 (UTC)

Done. :-D badmonkey 04:44, 14 March 2006 (UTC)

Context menu viewing

It'd be great to list if any of these offer context-menu viewing, such as (the now-defunct) Picaview from ACDSystems. There are some viewers out there that do it, but I haven't run into any that work as well as Picaview. Picaview stopped working with Windows XP SP2 and ACD has no intentions of fixing it or continuing the package.

huh?

What is the meaning of the bull's heads, and why don't I know? Is it common knowledge? Is it assumed I should know? Do these various programs cost a bull's head?

It is a Rams head and should be deleted as someone has put the gnu project icon in the table for a laugh, I will try but am at work and this isp is sometimes odd.

GNU represents Free Software. Ojw 12:30, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

It should be marked as too - the fact that it is open source does not say anything about the price. Futurix 14:59, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

In this case the label of the column should be changed rather than removing the licensing information, which e.g. tells me whether I can expect the software packaged with my Linux distribution or not. --Markus Krötzsch 15:45, 18 August 2006 (UTC)

Icons

Why KDE and GNOME have icons, but Windows and Macs have only letter? Futurix 15:01, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

I think it was decided at one point that the Windows and Mac icons were an inappropriate use of copyrighted logos. However, this page would be much more user-friendly if the icons returned. If people don't like that Microsoft's and Apple's logos are copyrighted, perhaps Wikipedia could make free clones of them. Theshibboleth 18:26, 25 June 2006 (UTC)

Adobe Bridge

Adobe Bridge is not free, it is part of commercial software bundles from Adobe and you cannot get it for free. Futurix 15:05, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

Too much stuff

Should all image viewers of all times be listed in the articles or those at least with some popularity? Check: CocoViewX, CPC View, Elgorithms MagicTracer, ExifPro Image Viewer, EyeBrowse, F-Spot, GQView, GraphicConverter, Gwenview, Image Browser Arctic, IMatch, imgSeek, P3dO, Shell Picture, ShowImg, Vallen JPegger, VeriPic, ViewIt - all are virtually unknown. Futurix 10:11, 4 October 2006 (UTC)

The purpose of this article probably isn't to determine which viewers are popular, and we open a can of worms if we try. If someone felt strongly enough about a viewer to add it, then it should probably remain there until it is no longer supported or usable (In other words, if someone tests and shows that it no longer works on any modern platforms from the last 10 years). User:Kjr99044 2006-10-04 03:00:51

This is very bad criteria - I'm quite sure that at least 50% of image viewers here are virtually unknown and use Wikipedia for promotion of their software (which is against Wikipedia rules).

And please, do not split my comments in the future. It is confusing readers. Futurix 10:11, 4 October 2006 (UTC)

Also, what is the purpose of "File Formats" and "View Functionality (detail)" tables? Why do they cover only 2-4 of the viewers in the list? Futurix 10:11, 4 October 2006 (UTC)

Only 2-4 viewers have been added because the person adding those tables didn't know enough about the other viewers listed to put the necessary information there. Their addition was justifiable because the first table has a crowded list of features for each viewer, which does not give a quick visual overview of features available to the viewer. A table makes it easier to distinguish which elements a viewer is good at. User:Kjr99044 2006-10-04 03:00:51

Most information from those tables can be merged into main table (most of it already there!). Futurix 10:11, 4 October 2006 (UTC)

Plus, I suggest to unify all GNOME and KDE image viewers together - otherwise there are too much of the same thing in the list. Futurix 15:13, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

Strong object to unifying the KDE and GNOME viewers. Saying that those completely different programs would be the same or even vaguely similar is completely unfounded, which I assume you can tell yourself by just looking at their descriptions. Moreover, "unknown by you" is different from "virtually unnknown". Gwenview, for example, is the standard viewer for the Kubuntu distribution which is rather popular at the moment.

Other than this, I agree with the objections. The table is mostly useless for comparing features, and the date of the latest release would often be more telling than a list of functions. Also, most image viewers support every format that most people ever encounter, and converting between formats can be done with other graphic tools anyway. --Markus Krötzsch 15:42, 18 August 2006 (UTC)

Windows Picture and Fax Viewer?

Should the Windows Picture and Fax Viewer be included here? The Wikipedia article for that page (http://wiki.riteme.site/wiki/Windows_Picture_and_Fax_Viewer) links to this one, so I expected it to be here. So I was surprised when I didn't see it. It seems to me that it should since it is so commonly used by those on the Windows platform.

I just added WP&FV to most of the tables on this page (it didn't seem necessary to add it to the "supported platforms" table). If any of the information here is incorrect, then please update the page. — EagleOne\^Talk 15:55, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Licenses

This page should contain information about licenses of the software. Guaka 06:46, 20 October 2006 (UTC)

softpedia

http://www.softpedia.com/catList/74,1,1,1.html

http://www.softpedia.com/get/Multimedia/Graphic/Graphic-Viewers

--83.176.120.108 01:38, 23 October 2006 (UTC)

And? Futurix 08:40, 23 October 2006 (UTC)

what about

Officially the Mac OS X Finder and Windows Explorer have image viewing capability, they're just not very good at it. However that would mean adding Mac OS X software like PathFinder which is more like a Finder replacement. As for items I would actually like to add in, are non-apps such as QuickImage and PicturePopPro allowed in? They are invoked by a contextual menu. What about Digital Asset Managers like Cumulus and Portfolio? Shouldn't there be a link to them from this article?

As for the earlier comment about pruning the list, no I haven't heard of any of those besides GraphicConverter which has been around for a long time on the Mac, but that's why I search on Wikipedia... to find out about things I don't know. Connectionfailure 01:06, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

Image Organizing

People come to this article for help with image organizing. If this article is not going to help them, there needs to be another article that will, prominently linked from here. If this article is going to help them, it needs to clearly address what features are helpful for image organizing, and what software offers such features, in what forms. Right now it just a sea of tech gobbledy-gook useless except to those who already are very knowledgeable. The article is currently completely devoid of any external links to helpful relevant resources. 69.87.200.158 14:44, 19 January 2007 (UTC)

It may be of value to add a column identifying which applications allow parallel access to a cataloging database, i.e. IDImager and DBGallery vs ACDSee. 205.234.33.147 (talk) 23:06, 1 February 2010 (UTC)

Merge Name Column with URL Column

How about merging the "Name" column and the "URL" column into a "Name (URL)"? It doesn't look good to have an entire column with square-bracketed numerals. 3Laws 05:56, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

Way too wide tables

I could barely print the information in there. Only through rescaling the page and printing it with real small fonts. Can you do some reorganising? I mean probably having the link to the home page isn't that relevant to the overview and can be taken out of the table and put at the end. Also other pieces of information can be restructured. Even for viewing is painfull to scroll horizontaly just to check some info. 89.34.24.20

FreeVimager

I've started an article about FreeVimager. Far as I know It's the only image viewer that has pretty good multi-mon support, I think a multi-mon column and FreeVimager, both should be included in the Comparison of image viewers.

Thanks —IncidentFlux 21:03, 7 June 2007 (UTC)

unicode/support

What about creating "Unicode Support" column? Some users that work internationally or share photos with people from around world would definitely want to know if the browser supports unicode. A lot of times browsers will say error opening file:"N:\photos\????\???dsc01.jpg" This happens alot with Czech filenames or East Asian (C/J/K and/or SEA) filenames on an English/American computer. Renaming the file usually changes a lot of the information about the file if there is no metadata on that file or available for that format.

Thanks.

CMYK jpgs

The streams embedded in pdfs are sometimes jpgs (/DCTDecode) that can be extracted by hand into a file and viewed. But they are not always RGB; they may be /DeviceCMYK -- 4 bytes per pixel instead of 3? Which image viewers can properly handle CMYK jpgs? Irfanview sort-of recognizes the file type but shows false color, and then saves as a wrong RGB. Image Analyzer says it can handle CMYK, but does not seem to do it by default -- maybe with the ImageFileLib plugin? -69.87.199.97 14:04, 19 October 2007 (UTC)

Supported file types is misleading

The supported file types section is misleading. Because lots of image types have a lot of sub-types. I have several BMPs and TGAs, for instance, that most viewers that support those types do not handle correctly, even though those images are perfectly valid. And I am not even talking about TIFs yet, because TIFs have "millions" of sub-types and most viewers don't support a lot of those... wjmt (talk) 18:11, 1 February 2008 (UTC)

Image copyright problem with Image:Bsd daemon.jpg

The image Image:Bsd daemon.jpg is used in this article under a claim of fair use, but it does not have an adequate explanation for why it meets the requirements for such images when used here. In particular, for each page the image is used on, it must have an explanation linking to that page which explains why it needs to be used on that page. Please check

• That there is a non-free use rationale on the image's description page for the use in this article.
• That this article is linked to from the image description page.

This is an automated notice by FairuseBot. For assistance on the image use policy, see Wikipedia:Media copyright questions. --00:08, 17 May 2008 (UTC)

Can't see how use here would be acceptable and have rm'd the image from this article. Gwen Gale (talk) 00:12, 17 May 2008 (UTC)

Viewers with no wikipage

Should we allow image viewers that do not have a wikipage to be on this page? (Manwichosu (talk) 13:33, 29 September 2008 (UTC))

I agree that we shouldn't set the bar for inclusion so low that that article is cluttered with every obscure viewer ever thrown together in a computer programming class one day -- Wikipedia:Wikipedia is not for things made up one day.

However, the "notable enough to have its own article" sets the bar for inclusion too high -- see WP:N#NCONTENT.

Perhaps something like: "either has a wikipage, or some third party reliable source reviews and compares it to other image viewers" ? --68.0.124.33 (talk) 16:59, 14 October 2008 (UTC)

Feel free to review and/or create a wiki page for Image Format Studio. See www.Comp-Code.net —Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.22.186.67 (talk) 04:10, 25 March 2010 (UTC)

prices

Should the prices of each program be listed? They can change so rapidly and to me it just seems like a marketing tool for companies. List the different versions, sure, but not the prices, if any.

I agree. Perhaps having a Paid/Free column would be better. 195.23.28.141 (talk) 16:45, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

I agree as well. I'll make these changes if no one objects within a couple weeks. Gregtheross (talk) 17:55, 10 August 2011 (UTC)

Agreed. I hope someone who knows what they're doing gets around to doing this. Franknarf11 (talk) 05:48, 11 December 2011 (UTC)

The prices column has been removed, as I think a paid/free column would be largely redundant given the license column. Anjefu (talk) 21:52, 11 May 2015 (UTC)

Desktop Environments

I'm not a cowboy, so I'll leave it, for now, but organising them by DE support is pretty fucking stupid, who on earth thought this was a good idea? With the appropriate dependancies installed, I can run any of the Linux supported apps on any combination of DE (god forbid), Wm, or even just in an XTerm session. Furthermore, what is X doing there anyway?

This has been replaced by operating systems. Anjefu (talk) 21:58, 11 May 2015 (UTC)

Web Only Functionality.

This is regarding the line about Picasa that mentions face recognition as one of its features, I think it should be noted that the face recognition technology is not available on the software itself but only in Picasa Web albums, or remove this feature from this program since by itself the program does not include it. Topio

Linux tools capable of editing EXIF orientation tags

Which Linux tools are capable of viewing/editing EXIF orientation tags? (Rotation). -96.237.69.202 (talk) 01:06, 22 June 2009 (UTC)

JPEGView 1.0.18 GPL

From my experience the fastest image viewer. If you will see hundreds / thousands of thumbnails the most viewers are very slow. Windows 2000, XP, Vista and Seven only.

http://sourceforge.net/projects/jpegview/files/ GNU General Public License and the Source Code is downloadable.

New param: screenshot feature

Many programs are able to make screenshots of desktop area, some of selected window, a few of window contents including scrolled area. 80.70.236.82 (talk) 08:22, 15 July 2010 (UTC)

uploading and publishing to websites

i think there should be a clear comparison of the ability to upload photos to websites such as facebook and picasa. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 95.86.82.103 (talk) 15:22, 6 February 2011 (UTC)

Why we haven't 'Stretch' feature at the 'View functions' column?

Not all viewers can stretch pics. As to 'fullscreen' feature, this can be black fullscreen with a tiny picture at center...

FastStone can stretch jpegs, non-animated gifs to fullscreen, but it can't stretch animations (i.e. animated gifs), so they always are viewed at 100% size; if animation size is more than screen or a thumbnail, only center of animation will be seen.

At the same time, ACDsee can stretch animated gifs like any other pics.

83.239.180.230 (talk) 08:58, 24 April 2011 (UTC)

Pointless columns

In Comparison_of_image_viewers#Supported_desktop_environments, isn't it pointless to include the AmigaOS and MorphOS columns when NONE of the viewers support either systems? -- œ^™ 05:26, 10 July 2011 (UTC)

I totally support your opinion. Shall we consider removing these columns, as they do not provide any sort of information? AC007 (talk) 08:11, 10 July 2011 (UTC)

I think we should. But first let's wait a little bit longer and see if there's any input from other editors. -- œ^™ 09:34, 10 July 2011 (UTC)

The AmigaOS, MorphOS, IBM z/OS, and OS/2 columns have been removed. Anjefu (talk) 21:15, 11 May 2015 (UTC)

Animated GIFs

I think there should be a column for whether the image viewer displays animated GIFs. As far as I know, IrfanView does, Picasa and Windows Photo Viewer don't. I think it's important enough to be a part of an Image Viewer comparison page. Shashwat986 → talk 11:01, 13 February 2013 (UTC)

DarkTable

darktable should be listed here, if 'organizers' such as LightRoom are. --Bobbozzo (talk) 22:25, 10 April 2014 (UTC)

• Done. 6 years later... TimothyPilgrim (talk) 02:09, 2 March 2020 (UTC)

ImageGlass

I found this viewer for Windows: http://www.imageglass.org/ which seems to be under GNU licence. Can it be added to the lists? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 193.86.114.50 (talk) 14:11, 20 November 2014‎ (UTC)

Why there is no PMView in comparison?

Why there is no PMView in this comparison? It is one of the most convenient and powerful viewers. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 213.21.35.84 (talk) 04:03, 11 April 2015 (UTC)

feh ?

...is missing from the line-up. --Jerome Potts (talk) 16:56, 27 February 2017 (UTC)

Would it be ok to add svg support?

I would like to add a column for SVG support on the table in section 2.1 Commonly used vendor-independent formats table.

Does this need to get approved, or can I just do it? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.22.12.62 (talk) 20:23, 30 May 2017 (UTC)

No approval is necessary. It seems to me that this is an important enough format to warrant its own column. But it might not be worth it if the only info you're going to base the new column on is whether SVG is currently listed in the "Other graphics file formats" column... - dcljr (talk) 02:15, 31 May 2017 (UTC)

heif heic support

Missed heif/heic support information. 07:32, 19 January 2019 (UTC)

What is the policy for adding entries?

I was wondering what the policies/conventions are for adding new entries. For example, I'd like to promote my own photo viewing app. Is it acceptable for me to create a page for it on Wikipedia, then add an entry here if it gets accepted? I have no prior experience of contributing to Wikipedia. BenStevens48 (talk) 09:00, 3 May 2019 (UTC)

First, Wikipedia isn't for promotion. See the guidelines on conflict of interest. In theory, if it meets the sourcing requirements by being written about substantially in reliable sources, we could have an article on it. As a COI editor you should use the WP:AFC process to create the article so it gets independent review. - MrOllie (talk) 10:29, 3 May 2019 (UTC)

Thanks, that's very helpful. I appreciate Wikipedia is not for promotion, although that might be a side-effect, but I wanted to make it clear I had a conflict of interest. I expect if I wrote an article it would fail the sourcing requirements. For what it's worth, the app is a Windows Store app called Pictureflect Photo Viewer. To be fair, there is also another quite popular Windows Store photo viewing app called 123 Photo Viewer. I also agree with the person who said ImageGlass should be added, as that seems quite popular. BenStevens48 (talk) 18:10, 6 May 2019 (UTC)

adding Evince

Evince seems to be missing too, it seems to me to be the major multipage TIFF, PDF and CBx viewer on linux these days, possibly replacing eye of gnome these days! --Uwe a (talk) 14:00, 6 June 2019 (UTC)

Dimensions in the matrix

I think that the tables are missing command line tools or existence of command line version of tools, also first/last release dates (to get a feeling of how alive the projects are). --Uwe a (talk) 14:03, 6 June 2019 (UTC)

Buffering images

One of most important thing about image viewers:

Does it do buffering big images (eg. from digital cameras/scanners) during viewing for fast surfing? - forward only; - forward & backward; - more than one file.

77.255.198.54 (talk) 04:49, 20 September 2019 (UTC)

Why is there no distinction between embedded and separate tags/metadata?

I have mentioned this at Talk:Image_organizer, as well:
The article makes no distinctions between programs viewing/editing tags (or any metadata) that are embedded within the image files, and tags that are contained external to them. (either in a database that the program has, and/or in a metadata-file or something) It would be nice, if there was mention of whether or not they automatically edit/modify tags (of either variety), and if it distinguishes between editing embedded tags and external/database tags, but just having the embedded/external distinction, at the very least…--98.128.228.237 (talk) 00:04, 1 March 2022 (UTC)

adding imageJ

ImageJ is missing, and I found it to be my favorite oldskool image viewer. Deserves a spot I think