Gmagick vs Imagick

ltk19

Hi,

I am installing new providence 1.7.17 and would like to know which plugin for processing images is better. I found that CA recommends users to use Gmagick which is a php extension. Since I am a Windows user and have difficulties to build Gmagick from source. I know that Imagick is another choice, may I know what is the difference between them? Which one is better? Many thanks.

sjenson

Gmagick has worked better for processing colors when an image is being uploaded to the server; however, this detail might have changed over the years. If you go with Imagick and the images seem to be faded, then you might want to switch to Gmagick.

seth

Gmagick is faster and requires less memory than Imagick. There were issues with Imagemagick and color management at one point that caused the issues sjenson referenced, but if you're running a recent version of ImageMagick that should not be an issue.

AdminBoB

I have been discussing with our host about Gmagick vs Imagick, as I had asked them to install Gmagick on our server since in the Providence Manual (https://docs.collectiveaccess.org/providence/user/setup/install/RHEL) it specifically says to use Gmagick and it seems that the two cannot coexist at the same time as it returns a 'Cannot load module 'imagick' because conflicting module 'gmagick' is already loaded' error. Here is there reply:

Gmagick vs. Imagick
Regarding php-gmagick, it's important to note that Gmagick is not well-maintained for the latest PHP versions. The latest available release (2.0.6RC1) is still in beta, which can cause compatibility issues with PHP 8.1-8.4.

Instead, we highly recommend using Imagick (php-imagick), which:
Is actively maintained and stable for up to PHP 8.4
Supports more image processing features than Gmagick

Based on what I am reading in the post, are you saying that either can be used? I would rather NOT use a beta and less maintained product (Gmagick) if we can use Imagick which seems like it is becoming more the standard, this while understanding @seth concerns that there might be some image fading issues. This will be especially important when we upgrade to the 2.x versions of Providence and Pawtucket2 which use PHP 8.2. (We have had to roll back to 1.7 until we resolve some database issues... something for another post).

Additional note: I am also unclear as to the order of preference on this, What would the ideal installation be:

Gmagick alone
Imagick alone
GraphicsMagick alone
ImageMagick alone
GraphicsMagick and Imagick together
ImageMagick and Gmagick together
ImageMagick, GraphicsMagick, and Imagick all together
ImageMagick, GraphicsMagick, and Gmagick all together

Comments would be appreciated on this.

monica

AdminBoB Can't really answer on what is the best, but I only have Gmagick on a PHP 8.2 system. The php-gmagick library is installed through Ubuntu apt.

The whole point of having the system support the different libraries, is so no matter your hosting environment there is usually something there by default that will work. So if your host says it wont install gmagick, then stick with imagick.

AdminBoB

@monica Thanks for the reply. We will go with imagick alone then.