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GIF Personal Repository Workflow


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Is there a way to have a workflow that browses images in a specific folder of your computer and actually shows proper thumbnails of said images?

 

I found this workflow that seems to be quite popular.

http://destroytoday.com/writings/gif-workflow/

 

However unlike the giphy workflows (that do show a thumbnail) out there this one doesn't show a thumbnail while I'm using alfred's prompts.

It seems like I'm stuck with slow speed either A because I have to query giphy or I have to quick look individual files to see what they are. 

 

As a designer I know many designers out there want this functionality. Any Ideas?     

 

 

Screen Shot 2016-10-12 at 11.49.30 AM.png

Screen Shot 2016-10-12 at 11.49.57 AM.png

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9 minutes ago, Ploink said:

As a designer I know many designers out there want this functionality.

 

 

I don’t think that claim holds water, if you’re only basing it on being a designer yourself. I’m a designer and couldn’t care less for this (having cramped distorted tiny thumbnails is low on my list of options to identify images). In fact, if this were to be implemented natively in Alfred, I’d ask for a way to turn it off. But conversely, simply being a designer does not qualify me to say many designers (or even non-designer) wouldn’t care for this. Without the data, there’s no certainty.

 

But to your point, you answered your own question. Yes, it is possible for a workflow to do this, as the Giphy workflow does it. Take a look at the Script Filter documentation, along with its XML format or JSON format according to your preference. Look at the icon part.

 

It also really depends on what you mean by “proper icons”. I think (would have to confirm if it’s still the case, but it was certainly the case before) that Alfred always distorts images to a square in those thumbnails for speed reasons. So if it matters to you that those icons maintain the resolution of their reference image, your workflow will likely be slow(er) since you’ll have to check each image for their resolution and generate a thumbnail, possibly cropping a duplicate of the image or adding empty space to it programatically (see sips and imagemagick).

 

If, however, you only care for the thumbnail to be marginally perceptible, you’ll be fine simply using the aforementioned icon in the Script Filter just like the Giphy workflow does.

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56 minutes ago, vitor said:

I don’t think that claim holds water, if you’re only basing it on being a designer yourself. I’m a designer and couldn’t care less for this (having cramped distorted tiny thumbnails is low on my list of options to identify images). In fact, if this were to be implemented natively in Alfred, I’d ask for a way to turn it off. But conversely, simply being a designer does not qualify me to say many designers (or even non-designer) wouldn’t care for this. Without the data, there’s no certainty.

 

Woah dude... Not trying to make a political statement about designers. Just happen to know quite a few that would like it... 

 

Thanks for the info.. But seriously thats some major jumping down someones throat. "if you're basing it off" I didn't write a five paragraph essay on why I think that is so it was clearly a passing thought, you on the other hand made some serious assumptions and seem to have a serious chip on your shoulder. 

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10 minutes ago, Ploink said:

But seriously thats some major jumping down someones throat (…) you on the other hand made some serious assumptions and seem to have a serious chip on your shoulder.

 

Unfortunately, it seems that currently one can’t make a comment disagreeing with someone else’s claim without it being taken as a personal attack. Not sure why that is, but I’d certainly like to. I was in no way impolite to you, disrespectful, aggressive, or “jumping down your throat”. I also made zero assumptions in that whole post. The whole point was about neither of us actually knowing the answer.

 

If I was courteous to you in the rest of my reply (and you seem to agree I was, since there was no objection there and even a thanks for the information), why do you assume I would be attacking you before being helpful? To me, that makes no sense.

 

I also did not insult you or made any comments about you personally, so I ask you extend the same courtesy. When we comment on people instead of ideas, we all lose.

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1 hour ago, vitor said:

if you’re only basing it on being a designer yourself

 

I said I know many designers who want this. Not that I am the chief designer and know what we all want and speak for the community. Again I appreciate the feedback but it just seemed like a belabored response to something that was said so casually. I believe you if you say it wasn't intended that way though. So cheers.

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I just realised where the confusion was. I took your sentence in the first post to mean “because I am a designer, I know what other designers would want”, when in fact you meant “because I am a designer, I also know other designers, and they’ve told me they want this”. No wonder we both though the other’s interpretation was unreasonable, we were thinking different things.

 

Anyway, hope you get it working and if you have trouble remember to refer to the well-made Alfred documentation and other workflows for examples. If you’re still having trouble, the forums are populated with people willing to help.

 

Have a nice night (or whatever it is where you are)!

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I'm not a designer. You're both evil and should feel evil ;)

 

With that out of the way, here is a module from one of my workflows for generating Alfred-sized thumbnails while preserving aspect ratio.

 

It's not particularly standalone, however. It depends on GraphicsMagick (via Homebrew) and uses Alfred-Workflow to keep the workflow snappy (thumbnails are generated in the background).

 

You might be able to make use of the GraphicsMagick command or the module itself.

 

If you need help integrating it with another workflow, just ask.

 

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2 hours ago, deanishe said:

I'm not a designer. You're both evil and should feel evil ;)

 

With that out of the way, here is a module from one of my workflows for generating Alfred-sized thumbnails while preserving aspect ratio.

 

It's not particularly standalone, however. It depends on GraphicsMagick (via Homebrew) and uses Alfred-Workflow to keep the workflow snappy (thumbnails are generated in the background).

 

You might be able to make use of the GraphicsMagick command or the module itself.

 

If you need help integrating it with another workflow, just ask.

 

 

Oh thats awesome. I'm not an engineer at all but was trying to get this running with thumbnails. 

 

GIF workflow  Featured on http://destroytoday.com/writings/gif-workflow/

 

Do you think you would be willing to plug into into that workflow for me? (Don't know how much work / knowledge is involved)

 

Also if you don't want to add it to Packal I'd be happy to add it for you and credit you. 

Edited by Ploink
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2 hours ago, vitor said:

I just realised where the confusion was. I took your sentence in the first post to mean “because I am a designer, I know what other designers would want”, when in fact you meant “because I am a designer, I also know other designers, and they’ve told me they want this”. No wonder we both though the other’s interpretation was unreasonable, we were thinking different things.

 

Anyway, hope you get it working and if you have trouble remember to refer to the well-made Alfred documentation and other workflows for examples. If you’re still having trouble, the forums are populated with people willing to help.

 

Have a nice night (or whatever it is where you are)!

 

Ah yes makes sense. Glad we cleared that up. You hit the nail on the head.

 

Sorry for the confusion / potentially unclear prose. 

 

Cheers. 

Edited by Ploink
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Just remembered sips again. A command that has never failed me and comes with macOS. I usually use it to quickly resize a lot of images at once, but for an unrelated case just went to check if it can crop images, and it indeed can (--cropToHeightWidth) and it can also pad images (--padToHeightWidth). Might be a better solution than requiring the external tool.

Edited by vitor
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3 hours ago, deanishe said:

 

I'll have a go, but it's more of a complete rewrite than plugging it in. Do you keep your GIFs in ~/Dropbox/Public/gifs too?

 

Oh awesome thank you for the help. 

 

I do keep my gifs there as do my cohorts at Yelp. Let me know if it's too much trouble. 

 

Cheers Deanishe

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1 hour ago, vitor said:

Just remembered sips again. A command that has never failed me and comes with macOS. I usually use it to quickly resize a lot of images at once, but for an unrelated case just went to check if it can crop images, and it indeed can (--cropToHeightWidth) and it can also pad images (--padToHeightWidth). Might be a better solution than requiring the external tool.

 

I know about sips, so there's likely a reason I didn't use it. Perhaps I couldn't get the transparency to work?

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Hey @Ploink, here you go.

 

Turns out the reason I didn't use sips is because it doesn't support transparent padding. If you don't pad the image to make it square, Alfred distorts the images in its thumbnails.

 

You'll need to have GraphicsMagick installed at /usr/local/bin/gm (i.e. via Homebrew) for this workflow to work.

 

P.S.: Thanks for the beer!

Edited by deanishe
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6 minutes ago, deanishe said:

Turns out the reason I didn't use sips is because it messes with the aspect ratio.

 

Could you give an example? I haven’t found such problem. I’m currently successfully using it (for cropping) in ShortFilms (relevant code).

 

12 minutes ago, deanishe said:

It also doesn't support transparent padding, as far as I can tell :(

 

I believe you are correct. But is that relevant here, where the only thing needed is a good enough thumbnail? Transparent padding could be faked (in theory, haven’t tested) by setting --padColor to alfred_theme_background. I’d say the elimination of an external dependency is worth it.

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I got confused there (I've since edited my post). sips retains the aspect ratio, but then Alfred messes it up again if the image isn't square.

 

The reason I didn't use alfred_theme_background is because I have separate day & night themes.

 

I guess I could add an option to use GraphicsMagick or sips, as I suppose most people don't do that, but then there'd also have to be an explicit "regenerate thumbnails" option, too (for when they do change theme), and this is a pretty throwaway workflow (at least for me).

Edited by deanishe
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1 hour ago, deanishe said:

Hey @Ploink, here you go.

 

Turns out the reason I didn't use sips is because it doesn't support transparent padding. If you don't pad the image to make it square, Alfred distorts the images in its thumbnails.

 

You'll need to have GraphicsMagick installed at /usr/local/bin/gm (i.e. via Homebrew) for this workflow to work.

 

P.S.: Thanks for the beer!

 

Awesome!! You rock. I will try it out tonight. 

 

And its the least I could do!

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