Add AVIF

[JanisPlayer]

I'm currently making a change to Nextcloud that allows for the creation of JPEG previews from AVIF images.
With this change, if the proposal is accepted, this app would also be up-to-date.
But there's still one question that needs to be answered: How good is the browser support for AVIF? Can it be added to the well-supported formats without Edge's support, or not?
The browser support for AVIF has greatly improved. Only Edge, Opera Mini, QQ Browser, KaiOS Browser, and of course IE don't support it anymore.

Closes #407

[skjnldsv]

83.35% support is a bit low to my taste 🤔

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[jlHertel]

Hey folks,
Any chance we can see this merged?

Browser support is now reported as > 94% and it seems to be supported in all major browsers.

[JanisPlayer]

@jlHertel One could add support for displaying the original image, but I don't think that's a priority right now. I have already implemented and tested full support, but have not received any feedback from the main developers. In another pool request, they said that they actually intend to do it, but I think the version has already passed. Therefore, the view would only be possible with the original file without preview. A separate app would be possible, though. Something like this already existed for Row pictures. Otherwise, the developer of this app must decide whether to allow the display of the original image if the browser supports it. It would also be possible to quickly convert to JPEG if the browser doesn't support it, but I think that would be a bit much. The problem is that it only works in the file browser, not in your gallery, and you can only identify the image by its name. Therefore, a separate app with a gallery fork would be better, which then also creates previews. But yes, it would be a start if you could view the images in the browser without downloading. If support is added in this app. That would be the problem, because it is not supported everywhere, but only here.

[jaddie]

What's blocking this as its rather disappointing that most other software and suchlke all support and use AVIF now, unyet NextCloud is still lagging behind which just stopped my considerations of using it instead of Immich :(

[JanisPlayer]

@jaddie Unfortunately, this can't be fixed easily without first updating the preview generator. However, due to the now widespread support, what is possible would be to display the images when clicking on them or to load the original in the gallery. The only workaround I can currently offer you is to use the Auto Patcher on my main pull request. It modifies the necessary lines of code to make it work and rebuilds the apps where needed. You should always enter the app version you currently have installed. It's not entirely bug-free, but I haven't encountered anything major, just some complaints about previews not being found.

I assume that this simply isn't a high priority for the developers at the moment, and my implementation is still partially provisional and needs some refinement. So it’s kind of a "looks terrible but works" solution for now. But of course, if the app no longer suits your needs because of this, you're free to use an alternative or additional app that supports AVIF.

Since there are now multiple approaches to solving this, I assume that proper support will happen sometime in the coming years, with a bit of luck. But I can’t guarantee that the Auto Patcher will keep working that long. Maybe a AVIF app would be a solution. ( "But this is maintenance-intensive and would require sounds that are associated with WEB

Maybe an AVIF app would be a solution, but that would be maintenance-intensive and would require components typically tied to web design.
I’d need support and would have a lot to learn. At most, I could use an existing gallery or RAW app as a starting point.
So, extending an already existing app would probably be the better approach. However, not every developer is willing to take on more work or support something new.
That said, there was a plan to support AVIF mentioned under another pull request quite a few versions ago.

[jaddie]

Appreciate the reply, yeah its rather disappointing that something so useful isn't already implemented, especially with a PR available you've done to give them a headstart on it, the space saving by converting everything to AVIF is simply astonishing, well I might see if I can give your auto-patcher a go at some point as I don't want to have to wait years haha!

For reference to show how everything has supported it for a long while now: https://caniuse.com/avif

I just saw your reply on a different thread, in which I am making an offer as a contribution for free btw if that wasn't clear about the build server. nextcloud/server#13552 (comment)