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Show HN: Fileshifter – Easily convert files and videos between different formats
- Digital-Citizen 8y agoStructurally, the service is hosted online as a website, this means one must upload a copy of their data to be converted. Naturally that raises questions because there's a lot we don't know about this site: who runs it, what are the terms of service (I saw none on the site), what are users granting the site owners to do with uploaded data? Answers to these are almost certainly guesses as this information is not readily available. The site source code is minified Javascript; designed to be terse and at the cost of legibility (variable names are often shortened, useful or long comments eliminated), certainly not the source code a developer would work with when writing the software. How could this have been implemented in a way that obviates all of these show-stopper failings? Respect users' software freedom by offering users one or more programs to do the conversion jobs with reasonable default settings. Distribute complete corresponding source code alongside the rest of the site so as to let the user host an instance of the site on their own. Users so inclined can set this up for themselves and others, or use their software freedom to end up with a conversion service they don't need to guess about.
- mtusman 8y agoHey, thanks for your feedback. I'm the guy that created the site. I agree that more information needs to be listed on the site about how the process works and also agree that the code needs some work. I'm a self-taught programmer and created this to put on my cv and thought it would just be cool to share what I created. I plan to add much more features and pages but just wanted to test what I've already created. To those that are interested in understand out how the website works, the process goes as follows: the files are uploaded to the server and then uploaded to a private s3 bucket where the user will have an hour to download the converted content via a presigned url after which it will be permanently deleted. Furthermore, as soon as the file is converted, the original file is deleted from the server. In hindsight, I should have shipped an "about" page explaining this process.
- bo1024 8y ago- I appreciate these posts that promote software freedom. - The tools `convert` and `ffmpeg` should cover your criteria and the functionality of the site.
- systoll 8y agounoconv too, for the office formats.
- bo1024 8y agoThanks
- knight17 8y agoThank you for suggesting this. I never knew about this. I learnt that it is from/ part of Imagemagick [1]. Unoconv tool [2], recommended in another comment here, is also great to convert documents to and from formats that are supported by OpenOffice (LibreOffice?). Pandoc [3] is also a worthy option to convert between document formats. [1] : https://www.imagemagick.org/script/convert.php https://www.imagemagick.org/script/convert.php, https://www.lifewire.com/convert-linux-command-unix-command-4097060 https://www.lifewire.com/convert-linux-command-unix-command-... [2] : http://dag.wiee.rs/home-made/unoconv/ http://dag.wiee.rs/home-made/unoconv/ [3] : http://pandoc.org/ http://pandoc.org/
- fma 8y agoSo...it's like zamzar?
- paultopia 8y agoInteresting. I tried to convert an iPhone photo from jpg to pdf (from phone) and it threw the following error: "C952B34B-95B4-4908-9018-C224DBB753A1.jpeg - File not in jpg format"
- stevemk14ebr 8y agoWill this be open-sourced? I'd like the idea of a self-hosted version of this. Good work!
- mtusman 8y agoThanks for your feedback. Really appreciate it. I’m looking into open sourcing some features it in the coming weeks and I’ll post an update on the website when that happens, so just keep checking.
- fvargas 8y agoJust curious, why would you want to self-host it?
- wanderfowl 8y agoFor me, often, it's just a bandwidth issue. If a colleague has a 12 GB movie they'd like to transmute, a local app might be a possibility, but an hour long upload followed by a 20 minute long download won't be.
- khedoros1 8y agoWell, that, plus whatever the conversion time would be.
- fvargas 8y agoThe creator mentions in another post that the service does indeed upload the data to a server for processing. But, in general, it being a web app doesn't mean it uploads your data any more than a locally run application might. A web app can just as well do the processing in the browser without it ever leaving your machine.
- metaobject 8y agoUsing a web app requires one to upload their file 100% of the time. Using a local app requires one, I'd expect, to upload their file 0% of the time.
- thomasswift 8y agoCool! I think you need a way to get back to the home screen so that someone can try another conversion. After I did the default png->pdf, there is nothing to click on to go back and try another conversion, besides editing the URL. (maybe a link 'try another' or just home) - but cool thanks for sharing! Edit: on Safari mac 10.13 if that helps
- mtusman 8y agoHey, glad you liked it! I'm working on a new update that does exactly that! So, thanks for your suggestion.
- mtusman 8y agoEdit: Feature has now been implemented
- thomasswift 8y agoWonderful!! I'll give it a try.
- michaelvillar 8y agoIt's nice! Quick feedback for UX improvement: let the user upload a file first, detect the extension, then ask what file type to convert to.
- mtusman 8y agoThanks for the feedback, I'll take it onboard and try my best to implement it.