How to reduce .web file size?

**jimhanus** · 15 April 2009, 11:37 AM

I'm building a website that uses a lot of .jpg's. Most of them were originally 2000 or 3000 pixels wide. I dragged them into Xara and resized them there, exported as .jpg and their sizes were reduced to 1k to 38k in size, which is fine for what I'm doing. Unfortunately, my index.web file retains the original file sizes so my index.web file is 55MB in size. Not a big deal to store, but takes about 20 seconds to save and I also like to store a copy on my server as I work for safe keeping and it's really too big to keep uploading. Any way to reduce the .web file size without re-doing the photos before dragging into XWD? Bitmap gallery still shows the original files renamed bitmap1, bitmap2, etc. Total size for the whole website is only 1.4MB which is OK for 90 bitmaps, but the .web file is tough to manage. Any suggestions?

**covoxer** · 15 April 2009, 11:43 AM

In Web Designer open main menu / Help / "Xara Web Designer Help...". Select "Photo Handling" / "Optimizing Photos and Bitmaps".

**jimhanus** · 15 April 2009, 12:08 PM

covoxer,
I'm aware of that. As an example: Bitmap7 shows as 2000x3000 pixels in the Bitmap Gallery. In the website, it's a thumbnail that clicks to a 500px pop-up. If I re-drag it into the web, it's 500px and trying to optimize doesn't change it. How do I get around that?

**steve.ledger** · 15 April 2009, 12:17 PM

When you optimize the 500pix image, a new 'optimized' bitmap appears in the gallery.
You can then delete the 2000x3000 copy from tha gallery.

So the steps are:

• Drop your 2000x3000 image into WD
• WD will auto resize to 500pix
• Right-Click>>Optimize Photo
• In the bitmap gallery - select then delete the 2000x3000 version

The 500pix copy remains to use in your page, but the .web file will be much smaller when saved.

**covoxer** · 15 April 2009, 12:31 PM

You don't need to delete non optimised copies from the gallery. As soon as you save your document, all not used bitmaps are removed from the bitmap gallery automatically. Try it.

**jimhanus** · 15 April 2009, 01:20 PM

sledger and covoxer,
You're both right (sort of). XWD will make a new bitmap, but keeps the old one UNTIL I close the file. Then it removes the unused version. I didn't try optimizing because the files sizes showed as being the same 500px before and after. Works great. Thanks!