Middleman::Webp
This is Middleman extension that generates WebP versions of each image used in site during build.
WebP is image format developed by Google and it usually generates smaller files than regular jpeg or png formats.
Browser's supporting WebP will include Accepts header to the image file requests so you can refer to jpegs or pngs in your HTML and use for example .htaccess configuration to provide smaller alternatives for browser's supporting WebP.
See my blog post "Introducing WebP extension for Middleman" for more details why I think using WebP matters.
Installation
Middleman-webp depends on cwep and gif2webp commandline tools, so install those first for your system.
- Fedora:
yum install libwebp-tools
- Ubuntu:
apt-get install webp
- OS X:
brew install webp --with-giflib
- Or install from the Google's WebP site: https://developers.google.com/speed/webp/download
Add this line to your Middleman site's Gemfile:
gem 'middleman-webp'
And then execute:
$ bundle
And activate :webp extension in your config.rb:
activate :webp
Using with old Middleman 3
You are not able to use latest gem version if you are using Middleman 3. In that case install gem with following Gemfile statement:
gem 'middleman-webp', '~> 0.3.2'
Using with Rubies <= 2.4
Support for Rubies <= 2.4 was dropped in 1.0.0 version of this gem. If you are unable to update Ruby version use following Gemfile statement.
gem 'middleman-webp', '< 1.0.0'
Options
Custom conversion options
Options for conversion are defined using Ruby's glob syntax or Regexp for matching image files and hashes containing args supported by cwebp:
activate :webp do |webp|
webp.conversion_options = {
"icons/*.png" => {lossless: true},
"photos/**/*.jpg" => {q: 100},
/[0-9]/.+gif$/ => {lossy: true}
}
end
Ignoring some of the image files at you site
If there are some image files that you don't want to convert to the
webp alternatives, you could ignore them using ignore
option
matching those paths.
activate :webp do |webp|
webp.ignore = '**/*.gif'
end
Ignore option accepts one or an array of String globs, Regexps or Procs.
Append the .webp extension instead of replacing the original extension
If you want the output images to be named sample.png.webp
instead of sample.webp, set the option append_extension
to true.
activate :webp do |webp|
webp.append_extension = true
end
Forcing generation of .webp files even if they are larger
By default Middleman::WebP will only keep .webp versions if they are smaller than original ones.
If you want avoid this behavior and always save .webp version even if they are larger, disable allow_skip option.
activate :webp do |webp|
webp.allow_skip = false
end
Working with asset_hash core extension
When you use asset_hash extension you may want to change whether WebP image are converted before or after Middleman build, dependin on how you plan to serve/download them.
Default behaviour is to generate WebP images after build, which will create identical filenames with different extension, preserving the original asset_cache hash. This works well if you are going to replace request content based on Accepts header while serving image files by configuring .htaccess or something similar.
However if you are going to determine used file type on client side and want to use asset helpers, it would be good idea to generate WebP versions before build allowing them to have their own asset hashes. In this case you probably want to generate WebP versions always even if they end up to be same size or larger than originals.
activate :webp do |webp|
webp.run_before_build = true
webp.allow_skip = false
end
Configuring your site to provide WebP alternatives
Configure web server to serve WebP images if they are available and browser has set the HTTP Accept header.
Look for this example how to do it in .htaccess.
Contributing
- Fork it ( http://github.com/iiska/middleman-webp/fork )
- Create your feature branch (
git checkout -b my-new-feature
) - Commit your changes (
git commit -am 'Add some feature'
) - Push to the branch (
git push origin my-new-feature
) - Create new Pull Request