Cloud Integration - Optimole Settings

The Cloud Integration is an important feature of Optimole that enables you to fetch images from different websites that you own using the same API key without the need to upload them. 

More than that, one way to create more space on your server is by using the offloading function, which will offload your images. 

🖲 How can I enable this feature?

1

Navigate to Optimole Dashboard > Settings > Cloud Integration.

2

Enable the cloud library browsing setting, then save the changes.

From the same page, you can  sync images, meaning that the last uploaded items will be migrated to Optimole's cloud. To do this, enable the offloading images option, then save the changes. This will also remove the images from your server.

Click on the  Sync images button to start the offloading.

After that, you will receive the estimated time for this operation to be finished.

📝 Note: We use the  wp_generate_attachment_metadata hook to offload every new image uploaded to the server, so as long as "Enable offloading images" is toggled to Enabled - your new images are always being offloaded to our CDN.

How can I reverse offloading?

1

Navigate to Optimole Dashboard > Settings > Cloud Integration.

2

Scroll down to the Restore offloaded images option and click on the Rollback Images button.

🗂 Dashboard Management

Once you enable the Cloud Library Browsing and click on Save changes, a new panel inside the Optimole panel will be generated, called Cloud Library. This panel works like the Optimole Dashboard's Library.

It allows you to  access each folder's images, create new folders and subfolders, and directly upload images.

From this place, you can access both  global folders (with images from other websites where you use the same Optimole API key), and local folders (the one you create from WordPress Dashboard).

By default, all global folders will be displayed, but you can control this using the Show images only from these sites field, inside the Cloud Integration tab in Optimole Dashboard.

Images Conditioned by a Domain

Corresponding Global Folder

Using the Dashboard Management, you also have access to Optimole image editing options inside the WordPress editor.

📝 Note: Learn more about the image editing options from this doc.

💡 Common Questions

What happens to my images?

Your images will be transferred to the Optimole cloud-based library and removed from your website. You can still see them by navigating to Dashboard > Media > Library. The only difference is that the images will not be stored on your server and will be served from our global CDN. Only the URL of an image will be used on your pages. 

What happens to my website if I disable the plugin with the images offloaded?

In this situation, the images won't be visible on your website anymore, meaning your website's visitors won't see them also. The solution is to activate the plugin again; this way, the redirect to the correct URLs within the Optimole cloud will work again. You can also roll the images back; however, that's up to you as it's not mandatory to make them visible again. Just activating the plugin back will fix the images.

In case it doesn't work, please make sure that your Optimole's API key is active in the plugin settings and that the URL of your website appears in  Optimole's Dashboard > Allowed Domains.

What happens to my website if my Optimole plan expires with the images offloaded?

In this case, the images won't be visible on your website anymore, meaning your website's visitors won't see them also. The solution is to activate the plugin again and roll the images back - details here.

Is it mandatory to offload images to have Optimole working properly on my website?

No, this feature is purely optional, and it doesn't affect the way Optimole works. Your images can still be optimized even if this feature is disabled.

Will Optimole store several image sizes or only the main one?

One important thing to note is that using multiple times the  add_image_size() function in your theme and plugins will result in the creation of additional image versions upon uploading an image. However, when using Optimole's offloading feature, only the main image will be used so that the variations of the sizes will only be visible in the URL processing. 

This means that Optimole will not create additional images for each size variant; instead, it will serve the different image sizes using URL configuration variations. Therefore, only the primary image will be uploaded to the Optimole cloud, and Optimole will dynamically generate the different sizes as needed.

🎥 Video - Optimole's Cloud Library Browsing and Offloading Feature