New Option To Retain Photographs’ Filenames In Website

[Boy]

Suggestion
Include in the fly-out menu when right-clicking an image the option “Use original file name in website”.

Background
It is already possible to publish a website in Xtreme and Web Designer and retain the original filenames of imported photographs by using the Placeholder option “Replace with graphic file”. However, there are some drawbacks and limitations to this approach.

First of all, users seem to find it somewhat unintuitive to use the Placeholder tab (e.g., the image is not visible in your .web/.xar document) but, more importantly, this way pictures can only appear in their original form. Many users want to ‘work’ their photographs in Xtreme/WD, by clipping them (incorporating them in shapes), giving them borders, applying shadows or transparency etc.

It is of course possible to do all of this, then export a named bitmap and re-import it using a placeholder, but if you want to edit your creation you would have to start all over again.

Possible Obstacle
In one thread (http://www.talkgraphics.com/showthread.php?t=44734) it was mentioned that the moment imported photographs become part of a vector shape (e.g., as a fill), the shape has no name.

Current Behavior
The current behavior when importing photographs into Web Designer is as follows: When you drag & drop a picture from an Explorer folder into a web design and right-click it, you can see “name.jpg” (or another file extension name) in the various menu options. Even when you use a photo object from the Designs Gallery and Ctrl+right-click it, you can see “name.jpg”.

It's true that when you create a vector shape and then drag & drop a fill picture onto it, it doesn't show the picture's name when you right-click it. But when you select "Replace bitmap..." and right-click the new picture, you see “name.jpg” again. And why not, it's just a clipped photograph. The original file name is shown in most cases (and -- it seems -- could be shown in all cases) in the right-click menu.

Conclusion
Since XWD 'knows' a photograph's original (HDD) file name once it's imported, couldn't there be an option in the right-click menu to use this file name when exporting the website?

Even when a picture inside a shape is no longer the same as the original photograph, the shape is being exported as a picture. So, the question is if on export the clipped or otherwise edited photograph could be given its original file name (with a change, e.g., from .jpg to .png when transparency is required).

Based on earlier discussions on these forums, I imagine that such an option would make quite some people happy.

[steve.ledger]

Thanks Boy,
Though it's best to keep feature requests short and to the point.
The developers might be forgiven for simply skimming over lengthy posts
(though this particular feature is a well know and often brought up request..)

[Boy]

Actually, I didn't write this whole piece for my enjoyment but felt that I had to summarize some of the earlier discussions in order to present a comprehensive case.

I felt that the paragraph headings would make it rather easy for developers (and other forum participants) to pick & choose only those texts that would be of interest to them.

[btprocessing]

I need those file names to upload so they can be indexed in the searches, at least i will make a side page with some pictures with their original names using the place holders.

[pauland]

I suspect this request would be better served in alternative way:

Dear Xara: Please preserve this image as a graphic in it's own right, retaining the original image name.

( the difference from the original request is that Xara would keep the image as a seprate html element and prevent it from being incorporated in another. This solution would require a change to Xaras rendering algorithm, but would be the better solution).

[MediaGuy]

This would be a great feature my example for this need is in creating realestate home views and being able to know the names for quick changes when they are sold or updated. Retaining the photo names has my vote