Jim, when you uploaded your site, di you select full upload or new and changed (it should be FULL upload after optimise)?

When you opened your site, did you clear the cache in your browser (ctrl+F5)?

Did this fix the problem?

(if preview has all the links still in place (ctrl+preview in WX5 will ensure you are looking only at the optimised preview), the the problem is getting it to your host and clearing the old site out of your browser)

Hi Esahc,

Thank you for your usual helpful and prompt feedback. On my project I had a page with some text and two photos, I had created web links for each of the photos that when clicked took you to different websites. This worked perfectly well, I then used WebSiteX5 Optimiser. I deleted all the original files from my web-hosting site and carried out a full upload of the “optimised” project. On checking on the website, the web link on one of the photos worked OK, on the other photo it did not work.

I went back to WebsiteX5 and loaded the original (pre optimised) files, clicking on the photos (still in WebsiteX5, not online), both web links worked OK. I then loaded the “optimised” file (still in WebsiteX5, not online), only one of the web links worked OK. On checking the web link for the second photo had been deleted by WebsiteX5 Optimiser, I then reinserted the web link uploaded the file to the web server and both links worked OK.

Following your feedback, I decided to try the optimiser once again, firstly I checked my original (pre optimised) file and both the web links worked in WebsiteX5 (not online test). I then used the optimiser on the original file, I selected Complete Optimisation, the process duly run OK, offering to save the files, I selected the location for the “saved optimised file” which run OK. On opening, the folder there was no saved file. I tried this a few times thinking that I had done something wrong, but still no saved file. Thinking that perhaps the optimiser had been corrupted, I uninstalled it and then downloaded it again from Incomedia web site, it still would not save the “optimised” file. I then made a new project with two photos with web links and checked that these worked OK (still only offline), which they did. I then used the optimiser and it saved the optimised file OK. On loading the optimised file into WebsiteX5 and checking the web links both worked OK (still offline ).

So, no answer as to why the web links got deleted by the optimiser in my original (first) effort using the optimiser.

At this point, I started removing all sharp objects from my desk as I was slowly losing the will to live. I decided to go back to my very first “original” file and try the optimiser again, once again the optimiser ran OK, only now I noticed that the “optimiser” had actually increased the file size by about 1MB. I selected the folder in which to save the optimised file, everything went OK and yes you guessed it the file had not been saved, was this because the file was now larger than the original ? I don’t know.

I bet that you now regret asking, anyway what has turned out to be an epic waste of time, with a response looking like war and peace, I have decided to uninstall the Optimiser and never have it darken my door (or PC again).

As usual grateful for your help,

Jim

Hi Esahc,

Final point, see-attached jpeg just to prove that I have not been over indulging in Scotland’s national drink.

Jim

Jim, at grave risk of driving you to the bottle, can I ask if you ever imported the iwzip you created in order to run optimiser?

I ask this because I recently had a project that saved, backup up and ran reliably, but if exported to iwzip it failed. So what I would like to know is if the export is losing the links, or optimizer is losing the links.

If it is optimizer, can you advise how big the iwzip is (before optimizing). If it is 2gb or less you could send it to incomedia (using wetransfer.com) so they can fix optimizer.

BTW It is not unusual for optimised projects to grow under some circumstances, this is because every image for every resolution is replaced so that it is optimal. The site may be larger, but the load times should be faster.

Congratulations on maintaining your sense of humour :-)

Hi Esahc,

Thank you for your further feedback, like you I like a challenge and let’s face it Incomedia can be very challenging. As I type this reply, I am sure that I can hear the unopened bottle of 18 year old malt calling to me; thankfully, it’s only 10.00 am here, so too early, hmmm or is it!

To answer your questions, I had set up a page on my test site, on it, I had two photos with web links to other websites, this worked OK. The iwzip size of the file is 130,288Mb, when imported back into WebsiteX5 the two web links worked OK.

I then decided to try WebsiteX5 Optimiser, it saved the project OK and I deleted all the files from my web-hosting site and carried out a full upload of the new “optimised” project. On testing online only one of the web links worked, the other failed.

I checked the project in WebsiteX5 and one of the web links had been deleted by the optimiser (both web links were still present in my original pre optimised project). I then added the missing link back into the optimised project, uploaded it and everything worked OK.

Not one to give up easily, I decided to try optimiser with another test project, this time it retained both web links. I then went back to my original project, ran optimiser again, it ran OK and offered to save the optimised file for me in a folder of my choice, again it appeared to run OK saying that it had saved the file, however on opening the folder the “saved” file does not exist.

I have attached a link to my original project which WebsiteX5 Optimiser “optimises” but does not save, the link is https://we.tl/t-tgzx41qNnt

Thank you for your further help,

Jim

Jim.

I assume these are the 2 links

Just so you know that you need not avoid the bottle, the same thing happened to me. Optimiser completed (yes I had to update it and 20 minutes later +2 shots of whisky I got to start), but on completion there was no saved optimised file!

So I made the obvious assumption. Your html code was to blame. So I removed it.

Same problem :-(    (sadly, not the html code)

This is all too hard, so I am now asking Incomedia to download your project from the link provided, run optimiser and tell us why it fails to actually save an optimised iwzip (let alone save an iwzip and drop a link).

I checked - as I post this it is 2:30pm-ish where you are. It is 12:30am-ish where I am. Not a suitable time for a 4th drink. Have a great day I'm off now. Sadly Incomedia will not reply for at least 24 hours - perhaps 24.

Hi Esahc,

Thank you for your continued efforts, Icomedia certainly don’t make life easy!

It’s 4.10 pm here as I type this reply, probably too early for a shot of whisky, but wait, the sun must be over the yardarm somewhere in the world, so that makes it OK to indulge.

Like you, I await Incomedia’s response,

Jim

Jim

Today I progressively deleted everything except the 2 linked images. Interestingly it was still optimising 53 images and yet there were actually only 2 left in the project. I took a look at library.xml and there they were. If I had to hazard a guess I would say your site was originally done in v13 or v14, at this time I vaguely remember there were major problems with deleted files continually being uploaded even though not in the project any more. I believe (hope) this issue has now been resolved.

If your site as it is online is the full site, I strongly recommend recreating it, but if it is only a minute portion of the full site I guess you need Incomedia's help and in any case hopefully they may be able to fix Optimiser to deal with this anomoly in future.

For what it is worth I dealt with another project (created in v13) that had long deleted files included in the library.xml. The project saved, backed up and uploaded  perfectly, but wx5 could not create an iwzip (and so the project could not be upgraded to v16). In this case I located all 40+ missing pdf's. photos, etc and removed the entries from the library, then when I had an iwzip I ran optimiser and reduced the iwzip file size from 2.1GB to about 375MB. Now the website flies.

Hi Esahc,

Yes, you are right the project was initially created in v14, I too noticed that the image count in Optimiser was highter than the amount of images that I had added to the project. I assumed this to be due to the various images included with the software. This particular project is only a "test" project that I use for trying out different things, although I retain what you have seen in the iwzip file as something that I might eventually build on and run as a stand alone website.

What I can't understand is why did the optimiser initially "optismise" this file and save it, albeit deleting one of the web links with WebsiteX5 allowng the "optismised" file to be imported and now still continues to "optimise" this file but not save it.

My main concern is my site at www.naphillvillagehall.org.uk which was created in v13, then upgraded to v14 and finally v16 (I avoided v15 had enough issues upgrading to v14) which has a lot of work and time spent on it. I feel that for  whatever reason this project has got a bit over weight verging on the obese and as such I would like to speed it up. However to recreate it from scratch would be a very time consuming task, I have not tried "optimiser" on it as I did not want to take the risk.

Can you advise how I would check and remove deleted files from the library.xml.

It will be interesting to see what Incomedia comes up with.

Thank you for the further update,

Jim

Jim, run optimiser on your obese project. As you know it will not overwrite your existing project, but do not upload it to your website unless you are absolutely sure it is perfect. You can export to Disk to check if you don't trust preview.

Use windows explorer and open library.xml to have a browse  I googled a free XML editor to edit it, but I had an advantage, export always failed and told me which file was missing. Your project exports fine unfortunately.

Hi Esahc,

Thank you for the further information, given that my Naphill Village Hall site was originally created in version 13, I have decided to recreate it from scratch in version 16. The only thing that annoys me with recreating in version 16, it does not allow a free choice of password format as version 13 did and when updated to version 16 the imported file still retained the original passwords and not the enforced email ????@???? format. Why Incomedia cannot allow both options, beggars belief or shows downright arrogance on Incomedia's part.

This is a very simple request why Icomedia does not allow it seems rather petty.

Once again thank you for all your help,

Jim

Jim, you are not alone in your criticism of Incomedia to remove user names and replace with email address, there are many complaints here (if you can make the search engine find them), just like this one https://helpcenter.websitex5.com/en/post/181166

Recreating your website in v16 may be a daunting task, but you will get to play with some of the new features like multiple menus, a sticky bar that can contain multiple objects, improved webfonts, etc.

However, I think it is imperative that Incomedia look closely at Optimiser and your example provided https://we.tl/t-tgzx41qNnt, it is supposed to improve a project not randomly remove links, fail to create an output file or crash (as it did with me where a large project included many files in the library.xml which did not exist in the project). Optimiser should also generate a log file to identify anomolies, errors and changes made to the project.

Hi Esahc,

I have started to recreate my “obese” project in Version 16.3.1. (iwzip size 94,698Kb), I decided to run optimiser to see what the results would be, it reduced the iwzip file size to 41,098Kb. Interestingly it said that there were 10 photos, I only placed 4 in the project so is optimiser “optimising” photos that are built into X5 software, if so surely photos built into the software should have already been “optimised” by Incomedia. Hmmm........... could this be a touch of “smoke and mirrors” on Icomedia’s part

The other issue that you may be able to explain is that when recreating the project anew I had added new pages, which were given a page number by X5. I later either renamed these pages or deleted them. But on checking on the upload file for the new project these pages are still there with the date they were created, rather than today’s date when every page in the project was opened, checked with the project being saved. You can see that the pages with the X5 page number have a date of the 21/10/18 whereas every page that I opened today has the 23/10/18.

See attached jpeg.

Does this mean that deleted pages will be uploaded to the web server?

Your feedback is appreciated.

Jim

Hi Esahc,

Update, sorry the dates the page number pages were either deleted or renamed is the 21/10/18 and 22/10/18, the whole project was opened "refreshed" and saved today 23/10/18, so all files should have the date of 23/10/18.

Jim

Jim, I looked at one of my projects and the css file related to a changed page has the most recent date, the other css files have the date I last exported the project and uploaded it whether I worked on the associated page or not (but I may have also done a ctrl+preview which seems to force update everything), except for one css file related to a page long deleted. So yes, I assume the redundant files will be uploaded during a full upload, but I do not believe they will ever be uploaded if new and changed is selected.

As for the number of images being optimised (I am now guessing) I suspect it is possible that for different resolutions (desktop/tablet/phone) WX5 internally has separate copies for each. I know that after optimising this is the case which can explain why a project can be bigger after it is optimised and yet still load faster.

Hi Esahc,

Following your feedback, I decided to do some more work on my “obese” project, which was created in version 13, upgraded to version 14 and then to version 16. The project has 150 pages in it and numerous web links, the iwzip file size was 254,456KB.

I decided to recreate the project anew starting from scratch in version 16.3.1, some four long days later, this was a decision that I regretted, any way I completed it.

Some comparisons:

Original project 150 pages created in Ver13 to Ver 14 to Ver 16, iwzip file size 254,456KB.

Ran Website Optimiser on this iwzip file which reduced the file size to 169,635KB reducing the original iwzip size by 33.33%. I checked all the web links and they worked OK. I had set the optimiser to Complete; however, on checking the “optimised” file, the quality of some of the photos was unacceptable. The new “optimised” web site downloaded faster but not by much.

I then recreated a new version of the same project identical to the original project in version 16.3.1, this generated a iwzip file of 145,103KB.

Ran Website Optimiser on this iwzip file which reduced the file size to 71892KB reducing the original iwzip size by 50.45%. I checked all the web links and they worked OK. I had set the optimiser to Complete; however, on checking the “optimised” file, the quality of some of the photos was unacceptable.

The new “optimised” web site downloaded nearly as fast as it takes Donald Trump to Tweet a change of mind.

When I recreated my “obese” project anew in Version 16.3.1, I was disappointed to find that X5 was not removing either deleted files or duplicate files from the project, this was even after deleting all the backups. Even after running the optimiser, which I had hoped would remove these files, they still remained. The deleted or duplicate css files (total of 39 files), had to be manually deleted from the pcss folder and the upload pcss folder.

The failure of X5 to remove deleted files from a project is totally unacceptable and should be considered a priority bug fix.

So as they say “you pays your money and takes your choice”.

Thanks for all your help.

Jim

Hi Jim.

I'm sorry to hear that you've experienced all these issues with the optimizing tool.

I would like to clear out some doubts that emerged from this topic as well as addressing the issue with the missing links:

1_ The project definitely can get bigger after the optimization. If you apply filters, or other kind of effect to an image, according to what exactly was added the project will need to apply certain logics to show the images with the required filters added. By running the optimizer on that, an image with each filter will be generated instead, thus reducing the time it takes to the software to apply said filters to a single image.

2_ I performed initial tests on the project you linked, but accidentally deleted that before being done with it and now I'm unable to download that anymore. Would it be possible for you to upload that again here for me? This way I can proceed to forwarding this to the developers for further analysis in order to discover and sort out whatever issue may rise with disappearing content.

3_ If you're having issues with the quality of certain pictures, it could be a completely different problem. Would it be possible for you to attach some screenshots that show these differences?

Thank you for your patience and understanding as we try to sort all of this out

Stefano

Hi Stefano G,

Thank you for your feedback it is appreciated, I have attached a link to the iwzip file of my test project where a web link was deleted by the optimiser and also the optimiser said that it was saving the optimised file and that it had saved it, but opening the folder the optimised project was not there.

Link: https://we.tl/t-yyyneSAuWS

I have also attached a jpeg showing a before and after optimisation photo from the Swiper Animated Slider object in a project (this is a different project from the one in the link).

I hope these are helpful to you.

Jim

that's why I did not trust the optimizer ...

Hi Jim

In order to properly test all of these issues, I'd like to start by verifying what I believe to be the most urgent one.

I've sent the project you provided to the developers so that they might examine it and verify why it seems not to be saving the project after the optimization project. I can confirm that the file is definitely not there after the optimization has ended.

As soon as there's news on this, I will be sure to notify you here

Thank you for your patience

Stefano

Hi Stefano G,

Thank you for the further update.

Jim

Hi Stefano G,

Thank you for the further feedback. As instructed by you I have removed the space at the end of the project name and before the .iwzip and the project was "optimised" and saved by X5 Optimiser.

Many thanks for all your help.

Jim