Just as one example: Look for “Angry Birds RIO”, iPad or iPhone Version – does not matter. It has a 1024x1024px icon with a filesize of 4 MByte to be loaded… crazy, hm? Is there a possibility to load just the small version (128x128px) of an icon? I guess, iTunes also does not load the full version of an icon, just a smaller size version… must be possible, somehow.
Apple has within his API just attributs for 60×60, 100×100 and 512×512. Problem: Some Apps didn’t follow it – and the developer put a 1024×1024-image in all the attributs.
Example:
https://itunes.apple.com/lookup?id=284910350
Icon-60 has 57×57, Icon-100 and Icon-512 has 1024×1024.
No chance – not my fault. I could just use an option, to load the smaller image, but with same apps, there just are the 4MB images.
This is not exactly true. Look at https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/angry-birds-rio-hd/id420636551?mt=8 for an example. Can you see the icon on top? Look into the source code. This icon has the source: http://a1.mzstatic.com/us/r1000/118/Purple2/v4/bb/01/bb/bb01bb3f-148e-8582-38ce-e6bd7a8f9bf5/mzl.jrbncgju.175×175-75.jpg with 175x175px.
This is one of those 4 MByte big 1024×1024 icons… but as you can see in this case it is possible to load a small 175x175px version, which is also enough to show a 64x64px icon which will also look great on retina (because of it´s 175x175px size).
So why not just using the same source as itunes does?
Summary: I would never let load 4 MByte versions of an icon. Just think about all those mobile users… they have a volume limited flatrate. With 300 MB per month a 4 MByte download for a 64x64px icon is far, far, far too much.
Hm, so you must use the API for icons? Is there no chance to use the same source as itunes itself uses? As you can see there are existing 175×175 versions which would make the website load much faster.
I cannot see any use for 1024×1024 or even 512×512 versions when just displaying the icon in 64x64px. You know what I mean? Every KByte above the use of an 128x128px version (for retina) is just waste of bandwith.
There must be a solution to resolve this issue… not any ideas?
As if Apple does not provide me the data? 😉 They do not allow access to other outputs as the API . They may also use other data for its OWN iTunes-Store, yes.
You wrote some seconds ago “Step back. It seems as if you could adjust the size. Let me see.” – what do you mean with that?
Would be great if this would lead to a solution 🙂
Yep, I’ll try something – but I would not bet that it will work with every app.
I hope it will work with every app 🙂 I am always searching for solutions if there is a big issue. To me this is a very relevant and big issue that should be solved.
In my case I was optimizing my website very much. Load time, backend, frontend, SEO and all those things… and then there comes a 4 MByte icon 😉 You know what I mean? Hihi.
Would be great if you let me know if you found something! Thank you!
Mhm, I checked very much icons now. Nearly every icon has a size of at least 600 KByte – for a 64x64px icon.
I really hope this can be fixed. Otherwise I would not recommend this plugin because it really leads to heavy bandwith usage… but I guess you will find a way.
In my upcoming blog. I am using chrome and see all informations about images. And all linked apps are using icons with at least 600 KByte filesize. Most of them with 1024x1024px site.
My blog is not accessable for other people at the moment.
Have you found a solution?
I meant “most of them with 1024x1024px size”, of course.
