Closed What Just Happened?
- Thread starter driftaguy
- Start date
Okay - a travel thread is an acceptable place for attachments, you could also request a Mongolia gallery though! My point was that I don't want people uploading zoo photos as attachments in lieu of putting them in the gallery.
Either way, there is a limit on how large photos can be when uploaded as attachments - unlike the gallery, there is no auto-resize facility for images uploaded as attachments.
I've removed the limits on the dimensions of the image (theoretically you can upload a 50 megapixel image), but there is now a limit of 2MB on file size for attachments.
You either need to reduce the quality - JPG quality of around 70 is more than sufficient for web use and 4000x2500 images should typically be less than 500KB in size anyway ...
... or resize them down to something reasonable for viewing on a website. There's no point uploading full sized photos, since even the highest resolution 30" monitors are only around 2560x1600 resolution.
Uploading full sized high resolution JPG images is only going to take up more space on my servers (and cost me more for backups!), and more importantly, is just going to slow things down for everyone (both for yourself uploading them, and for everyone else viewing them).
My suggestion before uploading, is to resize your photos to something sensible like 1600x1200 (more than enough for 95% of web users) with a JPG quality of around 70 to shrink the file size.
These are the settings I use for photos I upload to my personal blogs and the JPG files are generally between 200KB and 500KB in size.
I use Adobe Lightroom to manage my photos and I have some export presets ready to go for uploading to websites, so it's simply a matter of choosing the photos I want to upload, then exporting them all in bulk at the settings I've chosen - it resizes them and sets the quality automatically, it literally takes only two clicks to do it all for me and make a copy of the files ready to upload to the site.
Note that the gallery doesn't have this size restriction - it will resize photos automatically for you when you upload, so uploading full size high resolution JPG images to the gallery won't cause any problems at my end - it will just take you longer than if you resized them down first.
Also note that the next version of ZooChat (using XenForo forum software) will have auto-resizing for attachment uploads, so that will make things a bit easier in the future too.
Just FYI - for those of you with very slow links, I've also tweaked some of the settings to allow more time for the upload to complete before it times out - that should hopefully prevent a few more errors too.
Difficult to tell - there is a LOT of work to make this happen. I mean, the site has to be completely re-built from the ground up. We're talking months of work.
While I'm doing that, I'm not doing paid work, so it's really difficult to schedule it in.
Over the next couple of months I'm hoping to build my business to the point of being able to take on another developer to do a lot of the work for me. That will help a lot by freeing me up to work on projects like ZooChat.
I've been thinking of setting up a Kickstarter campaign (Kickstarter) to help fund the redevelopment of ZooChat, but I'm not sure we have a large enough membership base to generate the amount of capital I would require. If I had funding, I could start pretty much straight away on the work.
nanoboy
Well-Known Member
Two things:
1. I always assumed that there was a file size limit for photos. Also, I thought that uploading photos were moderated (ie out of focus or duplicates were deleted) so as to not cost storage space and money.
2. Do the Kickstarter thing! Think global. The worst that happens is that you don't reach your target and you are no worse off. I'll pitch in.
1. I always assumed that there was a file size limit for photos. Also, I thought that uploading photos were moderated (ie out of focus or duplicates were deleted) so as to not cost storage space and money.
2. Do the Kickstarter thing! Think global. The worst that happens is that you don't reach your target and you are no worse off. I'll pitch in.
The gallery automatically resizes photos, so that's never been a problem. It was photos directly attached to posts where the problem occurs.
While we do moderate photos which have been uploaded and will remove problematic ones - it's a bit ad-hoc at the moment - we can only take action if we notice a problem (or are told about it by a member).
I'm hoping to completely re-think the way the gallery works for the new version of the site, which will make it easier to view photos, which in turn will also make it easier to moderate them.
One thing I've already thought about and discussed elsewhere is the idea that there are two levels of photo gallery - the first being a "personal" space where members can upload what they like and have full control over the photos (including the ability to remove them if they choose), but then there also being a second "master" area where photos that members have uploaded can submit photos to consideration to be included. These submitted photos will need to be approved (by the members??) before they are accepted to the master gallery.
I'm not sure of the exact mechanisms yet, but I'm thinking some type of voting system where the best photos are selected ... there will be a "cost" to vote - not a $$ cost, but rather you'll only be allowed a certain number of votes, so will be encouraged to use them wisely (to prevent abuse).