[Commons-l] SVG chessboard transparency

Fri Dec 1 10:03:52 UTC 2006

Erik Moeller wrote:
> The servers appear to be configured to render transparency in SVG
> using a chessboard pattern:
> http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:LithuanianHistory.svg
>   
No, actually this is a background image set using CSS. The chessboard 
pattern is not part of the png (try "view image").
> Is that actually desired by anyone? It seems more useful for debugging
> purposes than for actually using images
It wouldn't be a good idea for Wikipedias, but at least for Commons, it 
is quite helpful: it allows you to see on first glance which images have 
transparency where. This avoids images with a white background to be 
considered redundant to ones with a transparent background, and helps 
people to see which images are suitable for use on a colored background 
(especially for icons) .

I feel this setup is badly needed at least for image description pages. 
I also like to have it on galleries and in categories, but that may be a 
matter of taste. Also, the "chessboard" could easily be turned on and 
off using a bit of JS code... or of course your custom monobook.css.

-- Daniel