Resize and Display image from server with ASP.NET

Question

Got a question. I have images hosted on my server. I already know of the method when an image is uploaded to resize it and save, but I have another thought in mind.

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Answer 1

Dynamic image resizing has numerous advantages, the least of which is reduced disk space usage. However, it does need to be combined with a form of persistent caching, such as either Amazon CloudFront or a disk cache.

Dynamic image resizing gives you great agility on your web site, whereas pre-generating image variants locks you in, preventing the eventual changes you will have to make. When combined with caching, there is no run-time performance difference between the two.

The ImageResizer library offers disk caching, CloudFront caching, and correct memory and cache management. It's been constantly improved and maintained since 2007, and is quite bulletproof. It's running a few social networking sites as well, some having over a million images.

It's a time-tested, traffic-tested, and unit-tested library :) It's also extremely simple to use - you just add ?width=x&height=y to the query string. Functionality can be added via 20+ plugins, so you won't be weighed down by unused code and features.

The article mentioned by CraigD is inherently limited in its performance by the fact that it uses an HttpHandler instead of using an HttpModule - an HttpHandler cannot pass a request back to IIS native code for execution after the resized image is written to disk. It also doesn't adjust jpeg encoding properly or play well with the ASP.NET cache or URL authorization system. Although, I do have to admit - compared to most of the sample code I've seen, it violates far fewer of the image resizing pitfalls I've compiled.

I strongly suggest using the ImageResizer library. It's good code, I wrote it :) If you do end up using sample code or writing your own, please avoid these pitfalls!