SVG Update

I’m a big fan of SVG, and have in the past worked on several projects involving the format. I haven’t really done anything with it recently though, but there’s been important developments recently that I feel really deserve mentioning.

SVG Web

SVG Web – Is a brand new work-in-progress but highly advanced JavaScript library that provides support for SVG in Internet Explorer (using Flash).

This is especially nice because getting SVG to show in IE before required users to either install the (no longer supported) Adobe plug-in, or to render it as another graphic file. No more! Since so many people already have Flash, it’s a great way to bring SVG to the masses.

The other advantage to this is that more SVG on the web will encourage Microsoft to support it natively in IE9, since one of their arguments for not supporting it has been that it’s not prevalent enough. Native support may also mean SVG-in-CSS support, which is something else I’m a big fan of and which can unfortunately not be emulated using the SVG Web library.

Scour

Anyone that has created an SVG file using GUI software and then opened the file in a text editor will have noticed large amounts of redundant data. The data makes sense for the editor, but is really wasteful when you want to use the file on the web.

Enter Jeff Schiller‘s Scour. This Python script parses SVG files, removes all unnecessary data, and leaves a nice, clean, minimal file that looks exactly the same as the original. If you’ve used “Save for web” in Photoshop before, you get the idea.

So what are you waiting for? Grab your Inkscape, design a masterpiece, Scour it, SVG-Web it, and share your vectory goodness with the world!