Thanks for clarifying this further Stuart. It makes much sense now. Chris
On Jul 3, 5:05 pm, Stuart <[email protected]> wrote: > 2009/7/3 Christian Fazzini <[email protected]>: > > > > > Currently, we are saving the images onto our server. If we can hotlink > > the images to S3. This would save us storage space. However, the only > > drawback is, whenever a user loads a page on our website, it would > > have to connect to the S3 servers everytime, to load the images on our > > site. > > > If, on the other hand, we saved the images on our server, then our > > website would only have to load everything locally instead of having > > to connect to the S3 servers. > > > Which method should be used? > > It's completely up to you. > > FIrst of all you don't quite understand how a browser loads a web > page. It's the browser that connects to S3 to get the images not your > server, so there is nothing "local" about either option. In fact you > might see a small improvement in load time by using S3 due to the > pipelining algorithms employed by most browsers. > > If you cache the images on your servers then you guarantee that they > will always work without needing to check the Twitter API for changes. > The reason for this is that when someone changes their profile image > the S3 URL also changes leading to broken images if you're loading > them from S3. The downsides are that you're using a lot more > bandwidth. > > If you use the S3 URLs you'll need to regularly check that the S3 URL > still exists or hit the API for each user to see if they've changed > their image. > > Which is best for you really depends on what your application is doing > with the API and what service it's providing to its users. > > -Stuart > > --http://stut.net/projects/twitter > > > On Jul 3, 4:05 pm, Christian Fazzini <[email protected]> > > wrote: > >> Anyone? > > >> On Jul 1, 4:04 pm, Christian Fazzini <[email protected]> > >> wrote: > > >> > So is this wrong if I save the image and user details locally (on our > >> > server) ? > > >> > Also, how would it be possible to get the users profile pic > >> > athttp://apiwiki.twitter.com/Twitter-REST-API-Method%3A-users%C2%A0show > >> > using <profile_image_url> ? > > >> > At current it only returns _normal.jpg, which is set at 43x43. I need > >> > the bigger profile image that is set at 73x73 > > >> > On Jun 30, 10:45 pm, Abraham Williams <[email protected]> wrote: > > >> > > Twitter has said in the past they are more then willing to take care > >> > > of the bandwidth for smaller applications but if you go huge they ask > >> > > you to look at local caching. > > >> > > On Tue, Jun 30, 2009 at 08:12, Philip Plante<[email protected]> > >> > > wrote: > > >> > > > You can cache the user's profile data so API lookups are kept to a > >> > > > minimum. Though the profile image should be hotlinked using whatever > >> > > > value is stored int he profile_image_url attribute of the user object > >> > > > returned from Twitter. By using S3 as a central source Twitter is > >> > > > able to help alleviate image sync issues that would arise when third > >> > > > party services cache the image locally. Also keep in mind that most > >> > > > of the time your user's should already have their cache primed, via > >> > > > twitter.com or another service, due the caching rules employed by > >> > > > Twitter and S3. > > >> > > > On Jun 30, 6:32 am, Christian Fazzini <[email protected]> > >> > > > wrote: > >> > > >> Hello, > > >> > > >> We are in the process of developing a website that uses the Twitter > >> > > >> API. > > >> > > >> I understand that the Twitter API is capable of retrieving a user's > >> > > >> profile photo via: > > >> > > >>http://apiwiki.twitter.com/Twitter-REST-API-Method%3A-users%C2%A0show > > >> > > >> Other websites that are using the Twitter API are, instead, getting > >> > > >> these profile photos from Amazon's S3 storage service > >> > > >> (http://s3.amazonaws.com/twitter_production/). > > >> > > >> At current when a Twitter user logs onto our website, it will > >> > > >> retrieve > >> > > >> his information and store it our local db. At the same time it will > >> > > >> also grab the profile photo from <profile_image_url> and store it on > >> > > >> our server. > > >> > > >> In my opinion, this seems more appropriate instead of having the > >> > > >> site > >> > > >> quer the Twitters API and / or hotlink to Amazon's S3 storage > >> > > >> service > >> > > >> whenever a user loads a page. Especially, if it has to load several > >> > > >> profile photos on every page load, on our site. I could be wrong > >> > > >> here. > > >> > > >> What do you guys think the best approach for this is? > > >> > > >> Hoping to hear from you soon. > > >> > > >> Best regards, > >> > > >> Chris > > >> > > -- > >> > > Abraham Williams | Community Evangelist |http://web608.org > >> > > Hacker |http://abrah.am|http://twitter.com/abraham > >> > > Project |http://fireeagle.labs.poseurtech.com > >> > > This email is: [ ] blogable [x] ask first [ ] private.
