2006-04-17
Everyone and their dog has heard of Scalable Vector Graphics (SVG) by now. How it's supposed to wonderfully complement traditional image formats.
I don't know about that. The format of them is something from coder's hell. They're all XML files, meaning line after line of arcane gibberish, as far as I'm concerned.
How are they better than a traditional binary image? They aren't really any smaller as far as file sizes go. Because they're XML files, they require a doctype and a proper semantic syntax. They need to be embedded inside any other HTML document to get around the rules of only having one doctype per document.
The W3C's SVG test suite. It's a good way to if your browser supports them. It's also a good way to see what a mess they are. The W3C has to embed them inside a frame to get them to work.
Browser implementation for them is variable. Internet Explorer and older Netscapes support them via the Adobe plug-in. Opera 8.5x and above and Firefox 1.5x support them out of the box, though not all aspects of the SVG standard are covered.
Maybe it's just me, but if I view these with Firefox 1.5.0.2 on Windows 2000, it locks the browser up forcing a re-start of it. Opera loads them not a problem.
I have a few examples of them. They're all in the public domain and were obtained from here.
