Image Importing Guide please

[CivilizationAce]

Currently there are a number of guides regarding image use.

• Some focus on Leader images.
• Some mention Icons.
• None (as far as I can tell) say much about civilization Banner icons.
• Some focus on textures for 3D.

I'll call those four LIB3, and I'm only presuming that there are only four fundamental types, so please enlighten me if there are more.

Almost all of these guides seems to work upon the assumption that we all know how to get images into the system in the correct format – They start at square two.

When any of these guides do mention importing the files they mention it in passing, without details, and upon the assumption that what works for one of the LIB3 types will work for the others, which as far as I can tell is NOT true.

Some of us didn't come to this knowing anything about image format types, alpha channels, or image editors.

The list of stuff we need spelt out is not short:

1. What format does Asset Editor need each of the LIB3 image types to be in before it imports them?
2. Or is more than one format suitable for some or all of the LIB3 types?
3. What software can save images in that format (or any of those formats)?
   
4. Which if any of the LIB3 image types need an alpha channel?
5. Which if any of the LIB3 image types need to NOT have an alpha channel?
   
6. How can we tell if an image has an alpha channel?
7. How can we tell the format an image is already stored in?
8. Do Mip Maps matter and if so how?
9. Can any of the LIB3 image types support partial transparency (in a single pixel, as opposed to a mix of totally opaque and totally transparent pixels)?
10. What class types to use for each LIB3 type when importing using Asset Editor.
11. Is there any software that can edit an already imported .dds of any of the LIB3 types without breaking the format?

It's probable that there are other questions we need answers to, but that I don't know enough yet to even know the questions, i.e. what we need is a guide, not just a few answered questions, not that I'll turn down answers

Please help.