Scour SVG Optimizer

Warnings

• breaking Scour is designed to optimize SVG files, which involves changing their internal structure and potentially semantics. This can lead to unexpected visual changes or even broken files, especially for hand-edited SVGs or those relying on specific structural details. Always test the output and never overwrite your original files.
  Fix: Always save optimized output to a new file and visually inspect for unintended changes before replacing originals. Use version control for SVG assets.
• gotcha Older applications that embed Python (like some versions of Inkscape) might use a specific Python interpreter (e.g., Python 2.x) and thus require `scour` to be installed for that specific environment, even if you have `scour` installed for your system's default Python 3.x. The `pip install scour` command typically targets the default Python environment.
  Fix: Ensure `scour` is installed for the exact Python interpreter used by the embedding application (e.g., `python2 -m pip install scour` if the application uses Python 2, or use the application's built-in Python package manager if available). For programmatic use, ensure your environment uses Python 3.4+.
• deprecated Installation via `setup.py install` (which `pip` might implicitly use for older packages) is being deprecated in pip versions 23.1 and later for packages that lack a `pyproject.toml`. While `scour` still installs, this might lead to future warnings or require `--use-pep517` if `wheel` is not installed.
  Fix: Ensure `wheel` is installed (`pip install wheel`). While `scour` doesn't currently have a `pyproject.toml`, future `pip` versions might handle this more gracefully or the project might eventually adopt PEP 517 metadata.
• gotcha While Scour's optimizations are typically lossless, enabling certain 'aggressive cleaning' options or encountering specific SVG structures can potentially lead to information loss or subtle rendering differences. The project's goal is an 'identically rendered image', but this is not an absolute guarantee for all inputs and all options.
  Fix: Carefully review the documentation for each optimization option. Always visually inspect optimized SVG files and consider generating a diff against the original if precise fidelity is critical. Debian's `scour` package even performs an image comparison to avoid significant visual changes.

Install

• pip install scour Install latest version

Imports

• scour

  from scour import scour

• sanitizeOptions

  scour.sanitizeOptions(options)

  Used to get and modify a clean options object for optimization.
• scourString

  scour.scourString(svg_string, options=scour_options)

  The primary function for optimizing an SVG string.

Quickstart

This quickstart demonstrates how to programmatically optimize an SVG string using Scour. It initializes options, customizes them (e.g., to remove metadata and comments), and then processes the SVG content. It's crucial to understand the available options to achieve the desired optimization level.

import os
from scour import scour

# Create a dummy SVG input string (replace with reading from a file)
input_svg_content = '<svg width="100" height="100"><circle cx="50" cy="50" r="40" stroke="black" stroke-width="3" fill="red" /><!-- A comment --><metadata><dc:title>Test SVG</dc:title></metadata></svg>'

# Get a clean scour options object
scour_options = scour.sanitizeOptions(options=None)

# Customize options (example: remove metadata and comments)
scour_options.remove_metadata = True
scour_options.remove_comments = True
scour_options.enable_viewboxing = True # A common useful option
scour_options.indent = 'none' # Remove indentation for smaller size

# Scour the SVG string
optimized_svg_content = scour.scourString(input_svg_content, options=scour_options)

# Print or save the optimized SVG
print("Original SVG (snippet):", input_svg_content[:80], "...")
print("\nOptimized SVG (snippet):", optimized_svg_content[:80], "...")

# Example of saving to a file
# with open('output_optimized.svg', 'w') as f:
#     f.write(optimized_svg_content)
# print('\nOptimized SVG saved to output_optimized.svg')