Low-bandwidth mode

vutuv is already fast. I want to go one step further, because not everybody has fiber at home or Starlink on the roof: members on a slow or metered line now have a switch of their own. You find it under Settings → Appearance → Low-bandwidth mode (vutuv.de/settings/bandwidth), or as a box on the sign-up form. It is off by default and can be switched off again at any time.

Smaller pictures. Post photos, pictures from other networks, link screenshots and profile covers come in a lite version: about the size they are shown at, in a stronger compression. Measured on vutuv.de, a post photo is 12 kB instead of 44 kB, a link screenshot 3 kB instead of 13 kB, a cover 8 kB instead of 34 kB. Avatars stay as they are (for now); they are under 2 kB each.

Full quality on request. Every lite picture carries a small HD control in its corner. One tap loads the full version in place, and it stays loaded while the page updates. The lightbox opens a photo at 1,600 px instead of 2,560 px.

A plain composer. Posts and messages are written in a plain Markdown box. The formatting editor is 155 kB of JavaScript, and in this mode it is never sent. What you publish looks the same to everyone.

No preview while a picture is being checked. A photo that is still going through our image check shows a grey tile with a note instead of the pixelated preview, which would cost as much as the lite picture itself.

Pages compressed harder. Pages are compressed with brotli at level 6 for everyone; in low-bandwidth mode the server uses level 10. A profile page is 24 kB instead of 27 kB.

While working on this new feature, I was able to enhance the web performance of the standard version of vutuv as well. Small improvements add up.