The power of PNG compels you!

["Kevin Elmore" <kelmore -at- gmail -dot- com>]

> I used to use GIF as a screen capture format because the JPGs could be
> lossy. Now I'm seeing PNG. Is PNG a non-lossy format that's compatible
> with browsers? I.e. could I use PNG in help files that are web based?

PNGs are indeed quite nice.  In addition to being a lossless format,
it also has an alpha channel.  So, you can have transparency, just
like a GIF, but the transparency is not just all or nothing.  The
result is that you can design a PNG to blend with any background,
whereas a GIF can only blend with a small group of related colors.

One caveat, though:  IE6 does not support PNG properly.  It loads the
images, but it ignores the alpha channel, so your beautifully layered
graphics look horrible as the transparent sections are replaced with
ugly gray blocks.

That has been an issue with some of our eLearning components, as my
company still uses IE6.

But, most browsers (including IE7) do render PNGs properly.

Kevin
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