Last modified: 2011-03-13 18:05:15 UTC
The default image size in category is 120px wide or 120px high. If an image's real size is bigger or smaller than this value, it will be resized to meet 120px. Bigger image may look good, but smaller image may look bad. For example, smaller images in [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Icons this category] are hard to see. Therefore I suggest if an image is smaller than 120px wide or 120px high, just show it in it's real size, not expand it to 120px.
A small revision to my suggestion. My suggestion is if an image is smaller than 120x120 pixels, just show it in it's real size, not expand it to 120px wide or 120px high.
We used to do it that way, but changed it to scale them up instead. It's debatable which way is better: icons hard to see because they are too small or icons that are scaled. For now I'm going to WONTFIX this (possibly it should be duped if someone can dig up an earlier bug on the scaling issue, but offhand I only see one specific to SVG).