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csshtmlsvg

Can I have Multiple SVG images in a single file?

Instead of doing the following:

<html>
<body>
  <embed src="circle.svg" type="image/svg+xml" /> 
  <embed src="square.svg" type="image/svg+xml" /> 
  <embed src="triangle.svg" type="image/svg+xml" />  
</body>
</html>

I would prever to do something like this

<html>
<body>
<embed src="shapes.svg" type="image/svg+xml" id="circle" /> 
<embed src="shapes.svg" type="image/svg+xml" id="square" /> 
<embed src="shapes.svg" type="image/svg+xml" id="triangle" />  
</body>
</html>

with a svg file that may look something like this

<?xml version="1.0" standalone="no"?>
<!DOCTYPE svg PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD SVG 1.1//EN"
"http://www.w3.org/Graphics/SVG/1.1/DTD/svg11.dtd">
<svg xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg" version="1.1" >

  <svg id="circle">
    <circle cx="100" cy="50" r="40" stroke="black"
    stroke-width="2" fill="red" />
  </svg> 

  <svg id="square">
    <rect width="100" height="100" style="fill:rgb(0,0,255);stroke-width:1;stroke:rgb(0,0,0)" />
  </svg>

  <svg id="triangle">
    <line x1="50" y1="0" x2="0" y2="50" style="stroke:rgb(255,0,0);stroke-width:2" />
    <line x1="50" y1="0" x2="100" y2="50" style="stroke:rgb(255,0,0);stroke-width:2" />
    <line x1="0" y1="50" x2="100" y2="50" style="stroke:rgb(255,0,0);stroke-width:2" />
  </svg>
</svg>

It seems as an SVG is just XML I should be able to store all my images in a single file that downloades a single time and is used throughout the site.

Solution

  • You can only have a single root node in an html document. Nevertheless there are various ways to achieve what you want.

    One way is SVG Stacks which works by having all the drawings on top of each other and then just displaying the one you want to see using CSS.

    Another way might be to have a shapes.svg like this with all the drawings in different places

    <svg xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg" version="1.1">

  <g transform="translate(0,0)">
    <circle cx="100" cy="50" r="40" stroke="black" stroke-width="2" fill="red" />
  </g>

  <g transform="translate(0,200)">
    <rect width="100" height="100" style="fill:rgb(0,0,255);stroke-width:1;stroke:rgb(0,0,0)" />
  </g>
  <g transform="translate(0,400)">
    <line x1="50" y1="0" x2="0" y2="50" style="stroke:rgb(255,0,0);stroke-width:2" />
    <line x1="50" y1="0" x2="100" y2="50" style="stroke:rgb(255,0,0);stroke-width:2" />
    <line x1="0" y1="50" x2="100" y2="50" style="stroke:rgb(255,0,0);stroke-width:2" />
  </g>
</svg>

    And then use svgView to show just the bits you want.

    <html>
<body>
<embed src="shapes.svg#svgView(viewBox(50,0,100,100))" style="width:100px;        height:100px" type="image/svg+xml" />
<embed src="shapes.svg#svgView(viewBox(0,200,100,100))" style="width:100px;height:100px" type="image/svg+xml"/> 
<embed src="shapes.svg#svgView(viewBox(0,400,100,100))" style="width:100px;height:100px" type="image/svg+xml"/>  
</body>
</html>

    All of these do mean though that you use more memory in the UA as the whole svg file is loaded 3 times and you just see a part of it each time.