Re: Images in PHP and MySQL

> 1) there is no need to fiddle with directory permissions to write images. > 2) if the content is sensitive you have the added security of the database > password (and the fact that the database is ususally not directly > accessible). > 3) a mysqldump gives a backup of all images along with other persistent data > > Other disadvantages follow: > 1) excessive load on the server for loading each image > 2) the load mentioned above causes a slow down in the script > 3) images usually need to be written to file before using GD for > manipulation, inclusion in PDFs, etc. > That's a very good list. I just wanted to pipe in on this one thing: "3) images usually need to be written to file before using GD for manipulation, inclusion in PDFs, etc." There is actually a function for this: imagecreatefromstring() I'll don't want to touch the rest of this topic though. :-) Jim Grill