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I've been doing a bit of research to find out why Windows 7 won't support animated GIF images in the photo viewer natively.

People have suggested various third-party software (AKA not the built-in windows photo viewer) to solve this shortcoming. But since the photo viewer uses WIC (Windows Imaging Component) to decode images, this system can be used to add support for just about any format. I'm guessing this means I could make a replacement GIF codec to replace the built-in one, but before I do I need to know something.

So, what I'm asking is, is the reason the photo viewer doesn't support animated gifs is because of the fact that WIC only supports still images? Or is it that WPV doesn't have supported coded in for animated formats but WIC codecs can support them? If it's either of these reasons, I guess I have no reason to start this project (creating a WIC codec for animated GIFs).

...or did Microsoft seriously not get around to adding the support themselves?

PS: A program called FastPictureViewer supports animated gifs in the photo viewer, but you can only "view individual frames within animated GIFs". A clue as to the limitations of this platform (WIC) or the limitations of WPV?

athairus
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    Not really a programming question ... – bryanmac Oct 15 '11 at 01:28
  • I work at MS down the hall from the team that builds Photo Viewer in Windows and Windows Live. Likely , the decision to not support animated GIFs is more due to limited developer resources and time than it is a technical reason with WIC or the codec libraries involved. They just don't have the time to support every format and feature customers ask for. So it's nor surprising that the core scenario of "photos" (originating from a digital camera) gets a higher priority than support for 8-bit animations. I'll pass your feedback on to them. – selbie Oct 16 '11 at 00:01
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    Also, if you need an animated GIF library. I know for certain that GDI+ supports animated GIF files. And if I recall, WIC as well. Look at Image::GetFrameCount and Image::SelectActiveFrame. http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms535402%28v=VS.85%29.aspx – selbie Oct 16 '11 at 00:03
  • I was kinda surprised to hear that. Microsoft seems like such a huge company that I thought they'd have enough developers to handle anything their customers throw at them... well, thanks for getting the ball rolling, at least! Wish there were more MS employees looking at some of the other forums for little quirks like this... if you want, there's a few other little quirks that should be quick fixes for their respective teams that I've noticed & could tell you about. – athairus Oct 16 '11 at 03:05
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    This is not off-topic if the OP wants info to develop a decoder (which seems the case). Voting to re-open. By the way, did you get around it? – Camilo Martin Aug 06 '13 at 16:36

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