Quote:
Originally Posted by Mhondoz
WWFlybert,
You are right 
First, I checked the size of the whole PaintSchemes folder, and this was about 2 GB. Second, I converted all BMP files with the batch conversion tool in IrfanView. But since many of the skins has the same name (void.bmp), when dumped to the same destination folder of converted skins a lot of files were overwritten. That made the PNG folder a lot smaller than it should be, and my hope for size reduction was too optimistic, sorry about that and thanks for correcting me WWFlybert. 
I have now realized that IrfanView has an option to create new sub folders in the batch conversion, and I have done the test again, so this result should be more accurate:
Not so large difference as before, but still significant I think.
A change to PNG could be carried out as part of the installation process of a new patch, like the 4.09 default skins patch. Then all default skins in BMP format could be deleted and replaced with PNG. Reducing download and installed size. Custom skins would not be touched, but over time custom skin providers could start to supply their skins as PNG.
Just a thought  |
For me, a bigger improvement would be to allow shortcuts to skins. Right now, a skin may apply to many sub-variants of a plane, resulting in MANY copies of the same file. I had hoped shortcuts would work, but of course, they don't.... Sure would be nice! (I have 15.4g of skins!)