Galleries upgraded

[Neil]

This evening I replaced the software used to run the Galleries section of the web site with something that I think better integrates them with the rest of the web site. Hopefully you will all agree! Please check them out if you haven't recently and let me know what you think.

Because the software has been replaced, if you currently directly link to images within the Galleries then you will need to now update these links (this goes for images linked to within posts on this web site as well). So, for example, the URL:

http://gallery.aberdeen-music.com/showphoto.php?photo=12077

Now becomes:

http://www.aberdeen-music.com/galleries/showimage.php?i=12077

In the next few days the URL http://gallery.aberdeen-music.com will become decommissioned and so please make sure you update your links or otherwise they will soon become broken.

Please note I have also taken this opportunity to change how Event Flyers are displayed on the web site. You may have noticed that the there is a new sub-category within the Galleries called Archived Local Event Flyers. From now on our staff will routinely review what flyers have been uploaded to the Local Event Flyers section and move them to this new Archived Local Event Flyers section if the event advertised on the flyer has taken place. This now allows the Event Flyers displayed on the home and forum index pages to be randomly displayed rather than simply displayed by the order that the flyers were uploaded in as before. In addition to this the Event Flyers are now displayed to unregistered users and guests as well as all registered users. So now even more people can view your flyers.

[Flash@TMB]

I don't like this upgrade. Apart from the URL making a little more sense everything else is worse:

1) There no longer appears to be a link to 'My Photos', so now we have to go through a bookmark.

2) Adding albums couldn't be less intuitive or any harder to find.

3) It only lets you add albums into existing albums, not at root level in your gallery. Thus all my albums must go into my January 7th Album which is silly.

4) There is no facility to move pictures between albums which would have been very welcome.

5) It is no longer possible to see how many views you gallery has had, just the individual photos. As someone with a commercial interest, seeing how many hits our gallery got was as useful as seeing how many clicks our banner got.

6) I used to benefit from an 'unlimited' quota. After the upgrade my quota was reduced to 25Mb, which was just slightly bigger than the total I had already used... I have now already reached my quote after uploading the last gig. Please note that when uploading band and gig photos I use a much pixel density (increasing file size) than I do for fluff, that's so that the bands can take copies of these photos and make use of them. So I reckon an larger quota would be justified in this instance.

7) Less photos and galleriers are visible on the home screens. And less random photos show up, which is a shame because the random photos often take people to interesting places.

Any chance of addressing some of these issues?

Oh wait... on the plus side the upload now works a lot better, but personally I rather have shit upload and everything else back the way it was

[Flash@TMB]

Oops should add...

Any chance of sponsers getting separate galeries for their business/band etc. That way I could separate my low volume personal stuff (which mainly relates to bygone days) from the Moorings photos which mainly depict recent gigs.

[Neil]

Originally Posted by Flash@TMB

1) There no longer appears to be a link to 'My Photos', so now we have to go through a bookmark.

A fair point. I've now added a My Photos link under the My Stuff menu.

Originally Posted by Flash@TMB

2) Adding albums couldn't be less intuitive or any harder to find.

My Stuff -> Category Admin -> Add Category

I don't see how that is hard to find. I could rename the word Category to Album if that would make it clearer to people?

Originally Posted by Flash@TMB

3) It only lets you add albums into existing albums, not at root level in your gallery. Thus all my albums must go into my January 7th Album which is silly.

I’ve now fixed this and moved your January 7th album to the root level. I’m still mulling over how to better organise this because as more albums are created then the more unwieldy this will become.

Originally Posted by Flash@TMB

4) There is no facility to move pictures between albums which would have been very welcome.

You should be able to do this by doing the following:

View image you want to move -> Image Tools -> Edit Image -> Select new category

Do you not get this option?

Originally Posted by Flash@TMB

5) It is no longer possible to see how many views you gallery has had, just the individual photos. As someone with a commercial interest, seeing how many hits our gallery got was as useful as seeing how many clicks our banner got.

I’ll mention this to the developers of the gallery software and it may become included in future versions. I certainly don’t think you should be attaching any great commercial interest to the number of people viewing your gallery though.

Originally Posted by Flash@TMB

6) I used to benefit from an 'unlimited' quota. After the upgrade my quota was reduced to 25Mb, which was just slightly bigger than the total I had already used... I have now already reached my quote after uploading the last gig. Please note that when uploading band and gig photos I use a much pixel density (increasing file size) than I do for fluff, that's so that the bands can take copies of these photos and make use of them. So I reckon an larger quota would be justified in this instance.

No-one benefits from an unlimited quota quite simply because there isn’t unlimited disk space on the web server. The new gallery software has a considerably better quota management feature than the last software did hence why you are now running into this limit.

Your limit of 25MB is the same limit as is in place for all other Sponsors and Supporters as detailed on this page:

http://www.aberdeen-music.com/index.php?page=supporters

If you wish to have your limit increased then please contact me privately and I’ll be more than happy to discuss this matter further.

Originally Posted by Flash@TMB

7) Less photos and galleriers are visible on the home screens. And less random photos show up, which is a shame because the random photos often take people to interesting places.

Only one less (four rather than five as before) and that was reduced to decrease the page load time as well as make the page display better for people using lower screen resolutions.

Originally Posted by Flash@TMB

Any chance of sponsers getting separate galeries for their business/band etc. That way I could separate my low volume personal stuff (which mainly relates to bygone days) from the Moorings photos which mainly depict recent gigs.

A great idea. I'm going to overhaul the sponsorship packages available quite soon and certainly make this a new feature available to some sponsors. You can be assured that The Moorings Bar will be one of such sponsors.

Many thanks for the feedback and keep an eye out for the changes to the sponsorship packages.

[Flash@TMB]

Originally Posted by Neil

A fair point. I've now added a My Photos link under the My Stuff menu.

Aaah that's better!

Originally Posted by Neil

My Stuff -> Category Admin -> Add Category

I don't see how that is hard to find. I could rename the word Category to Album if that would make it clearer to people?

I'm guessing a lot of people haven't realised that albums are now termed 'category'. Once I figured that out it took me ages of scanning the pages to discover how to make a new one. I think the old gallery had a link from one's homepage. All your photos and albums were displayed on the screen, then you clicked on add new album or something (but I could be mistaken). Eventually I found it, but forgot where it was on each subsequent visit and spent 10 minutes trying to locate the link. Don't worry - I have it sussed now, but suspect that this feature may be under untilised if other people have trouble locating it.

Originally Posted by Neil

I’ve now fixed this and moved your January 7th album to the root level. I’m still mulling over how to better organise this because as more albums are created then the more unwieldy this will become.

Thanks. I notice that you have also fixed it so that it is possible to create other categories at the root level. Phew!

Originally Posted by Neil

You should be able to do this by doing the following:

View image you want to move -> Image Tools -> Edit Image -> Select new category

Do you not get this option?

I do now, but couldn't find it before.

Originally Posted by Neil

I’ll mention this to the developers of the gallery software and it may become included in future versions. I certainly don’t think you should be attaching any great commercial interest to the number of people viewing your gallery though.

Only because part of my gallery is essentially commercial. I take photos of the bands then post them here. It's nice to see how many people have viewed those photos. Helps give an indication of how popular a band, or gig was.

Originally Posted by Neil

No-one benefits from an unlimited quota quite simply because there isn’t unlimited disk space on the web server. The new gallery software has a considerably better quota management feature than the last software did hence why you are now running into this limit.

Your limit of 25MB is the same limit as is in place for all other Sponsors and Supporters as detailed on this page:

http://www.aberdeen-music.com/index.php?page=supporters

If you wish to have your limit increased then please contact me privately and I’ll be more than happy to discuss this matter further.

No worries, I would like to do this, otherwise I'm out of space. Will PM you.

Originally Posted by Neil

Only one less (four rather than five as before) and that was reduced to decrease the page load time as well as make the page display better for people using lower screen resolutions.

OK that makes sense.

Originally Posted by Neil

A great idea. I'm going to overhaul the sponsorship packages available quite soon and certainly make this a new feature available to some sponsors. You can be assured that The Moorings Bar will be one of such sponsors.

Many thanks for the feedback and keep an eye out for the changes to the sponsorship packages.

Thanks. This will be a big improvement. At present people wanting to see pictures from gigs and events have to know to look in my gallery. When you do this, please could you have a link to it from the sponsers forum header?

Cheers.

[Sue Denim..]

Originally Posted by Neil

A fair point. I've now added a My Photos link under the My Stuff menu.

I've only just noticed that you've added this back in. Great.