IrfanView

Infobox Software
name = IrfanView



caption = IrfanView version 4.10 showing a .png image with transparency.
developer = Irfan Skiljan
latest_release_version = 4.20
latest_release_date = release date and age|2008|07|18
operating_system = Windows
language = Multilingual (29) [http://www.irfanview.com/languages.htm]
genre = Image viewer
license = Proprietary, Freeware
website = [http://www.irfanview.com www.irfanview.com]

IrfanView is a freeware image viewer for Microsoft Windows that can view, edit, and convert image files and play video/audio formats. It does not have extensive image creation and painting capabilities like Adobe Photoshop, Pixel image editor, Paint.NET or GIMP. Rather, IrfanView is designed to be a lightweight viewer/player which is noted for its speed, ease of use, and ability to handle a wide variety of graphic file formats. The software was first made available in 1996.

The program is named for after its creator, Irfan Skiljan of Bosnia and Herzegovina, and is pronounced IPA|/iːr.fæn.vjuː/. [Cite web |url=http://www.irfanview.com/main_about.htm |title=About the author |author=Irfan Skiljan |accessdate=2007-10-30] IrfanView works under all modern versions of Microsoft Windows (i.e. Windows 95 to Vista; Microsoft tested version 3.98, which was on the official Vista software list). It supports numerous file formats including: image formats such as BMP, GIF, JPEG, PNG (includes the optimizer PNGOUT), TIFF, non-image media files such as Flash, (Ogg) Vorbis, MPEG, MP3, MIDI, and text files.

After version 3.92, the installer could choose to also install an eBay toolbar in order to support the developer. In version 3.92, adding the toolbar was selected at installation by default, and the program was criticized by some as containing spyware. The option was not selected in version 3.97, and was replaced with an option to install Google Desktop Search from 3.98.

Logo/mascot

The IrfanView logo and mascot is a flattened roadkill cat. [Cite web |url=http://www.irfanview.net/faq.htm |title=IrfanView Frequently Asked Questions |accessdate=2007-10-30] The 16px icon has tire tread marks across the caricature; the 32px icon is this "non tire tread" version; and the 48px icon has a gradient across the cat's body. The author of the software does stress, however, that he bears no ill will towards cats. In fact, the IrfanView website pictures him holding a cat.

Features

The program is compact: the latest version is less than 1200 kB in size, although several megabytes of plugins are available to support numerous other file formats and features. In addition to extensive viewing capabilities and file conversion options, IrfanView can also create screensavers and slide shows from collections of images with optional accompanying mp3 audio. These screensavers and slide shows can be created as “stand-alone” executables that will run on computers which do not have IrfanView installed.

Irfanview can be downloaded directly to a U3 compatible device.

IrfanView can also be used to create icons by converting common graphic files into .ico format. It also supports Adobe-compatible 8bf image processing filters, including many freely downloadable ones, though its ability to apply them to portions of an image is limited compared to full-scale image editors.

The program has built-in TWAIN support for retrieving images from scanners; it also has extended support for taking screenshots.

It can crop, resize, and rotate images. Images can be adjusted by modifying the brightness, contrast, tint, gamma level, and so forth, and by converting them between formats. Many of these changes can be applied to multiple images in one operation using batch processing.

IrfanView can direct the active image to open in an external graphics editor (Adobe Photoshop, for example) if the user has one installed.

In English by default, the program is internationalized in over twenty languages.

Plugins

IrfanView has many plugins. Some include:
* JPG_TRANSFORM, which allows some lossless transforms of JPEG images. For a free alternative, see jpegtran and the associate Jpegcrop.

IrfanView thumbnails

This function displays thumbnail file previews, allowing picture organizing and management. The program can be set to display the thumbnails at a wide range of sizes, from very small (50 × 50 pixels) to very large (600 × 600 pixels). The user can select single or multiple thumbnails, then perform the usual Copy/Move/Delete operations on them. Selected thumbnails can also be sent directly to IrfanView's Batch Processing module or opened with an external program such as Adobe Photoshop.

Limitations

Though IrfanView handles many RGB image file types, it is not a color-managed viewer, so CMYK profiles are not used and as a result CMYK images will not display correctly.Cite web |url=http://www.irfanview-online.com/viewtopic.php?t=990&postdays=0&postorder=asc&start=15 |title=EPS format photos |publisher=IrfanView support forum |accessdate=2007-04-25] Cite web |url=http://www.irfanview-online.com/viewtopic.php?t=395&postdays=0&postorder=asc&start=0 |title=Better CMYK TIFF support? |publisher=IrfanView support forum |accessdate=2007-04-25]

Also, IrfanView can't open files with names having special characters different than current language system settings, but it can if you change system settings targeting file name language (e.g. set system to chinese to open files with chinese names). From version 4.20 IrfanView cames with a workarround plugin to solve this issue.

Zooming in Version 4.10

Zooming in version 4.10 was modified to be relative to previous zoom, meaning that if the set zoom interval would be influenced by the percentage of how zoomed in or out the picture is. An example would be if the zoom interval was set to 10 percent, and if the current zoom was 250 percent, then the next zoom step would be by 25 percent. This resulted in seemingly random zoom steps and because there is no way to disable this modified zooming, it was initially considered by most Irfanview users to be a bug. Another problem was that if a user set the zoom interval to 100 percent or greater, then zooming out became impossible, as every negative zoom set would go below 1 percent which Irfanview does not allow. Some users go as far as saying that this makes version 4.10 of Irfanview unusable. [ [http://en.irfanview-forum.de/vb/showthread.php?t=826 Zoom Bug - IrfanView Support Forum] ] In version 4.20 this was solved with three different options for zooming.

Copyright infringement and impersonators

Irfanview is freeware, although it is still copyrighted software; there is no other legitimate version other than that offered at irfanview.com. Versions such as "IrfanView Platinum" or "IrfanView Pro" have appeared which may be copyright infringements that attempt to charge end users by using the name of a free product as well as potentially containing spyware or viruses. [ [http://en.irfanview-forum.de/vb/showthread.php?p=5470 Irfanview Platinum? - IrfanView Support Forum ] ]

Alternatives

XnView is a cross-platform alternative to IrfanView.

References

ee also

*Comparison of image viewers

External links

* [http://www.irfanview.com/ IrfanView website]
* [http://en.irfanview-forum.de/vb/index.php?langid=1 IrfanView English language Forum]
* [http://www.sticksite.com/irfanview/ Tutorial on IrfanView, with links to many others]