Photos - a painless process

[Cairns888]

I agree with John. FB is not the answer.
Maybe an updated forum altogether?

Some ideas are

- easier uploading of pics.
- medium thumbnails used on forum and if you right click and open in a new tab the larger version is there if you need to zoom in on the car or bikini. (That way it keeps the forum page from bogging down)
- different headers and sub headers for example.
Technical section is a header with e.g tuning, engine, gearbox, interior, exterior, wheels, seats etc as sub headers. A lot easier to search and flick through.

This forum has been my number one source so why not spend the money on it. It has saved me a lot of $'s and helped me in love of old rusty cars.

It's a great thing and to compare it to the other forum's it is a trustworthy, personal place were you can talk freely.
I don't know why it is censored.


Jim

[griffiths_r]

some great ideas...

now that we have someone willing and able to put in the effort (big thumbs up to Uwe!!)... we are more than happy to spend the money...


this round of website changes is only closing a security loophole and setting us up so we can migrate to the latest and greatest software version - keep in mind nothing has been really done to the back-end of this forum since it was created, so we're a bit behind - expect changes over the next few months!


oh and as for censorship - didn't even realise it was censored. don't mind either way, we have moderators to step in when things getting out of hand. and generally everyone plays nice.
while we're at it... keep in mind that this is not a private forum like rgruppe. everyone out there (nice, and not) can read everything you type...



once again, Uwe - the club runs on the generosity of people like you and we can't thank you enough for putting in time with no pay cheque at the end...

[Fishcop]

That's awesome that we've got Uwe. To my mind, members like Uwe should probably get 'free' membership renewal as demonstration of appreciation It's also very cool to learn we do have the capacity to 'upgrade' and it is probably a little overdue

The other stuff I can live with... I accept the board is made up of all people and personalities - I'm comfortable keeping my gutter-mouth in check (hell, I write for a Minister and have to moderate heavily ). I just think that as Aussie car enthusiasts, a little of the expressive vernacular can be fun. God forbid that anyone would get me to moderate - I'd tell you all to go and get ****ed!

[jason]

The comments around external images are very valid, especially in the case of dropbox - if a user moves the files then you're just left with broken links. Facebook also seems out, so that leaves the forum itself.

The forum software that this website is running on is more than 7 years old. It might not seem like that is very old, but believe me it is. In 2006 the internet was a very different place and people access to it was limited to low speed connections.

The company that produce this forum software (vBulletin) are still the leader in the forum software and an upgrade to the latest version should be a relatively straight forward process and not very expensive - probably in very low $100s. Website hosting is now also very cheap. It should cost no more than $100 per month. There are a huge number of companies that will complete the upgrade and migration at the same time.

An upgrade to the latest version would really change the usability and image handling. Here's a couple of examples of newer version of the same software used in this forum.

early911sregistry is a 2011 version

pelicanparts forum is a 2010 version

From 2010 onwards vBulletin made big improvements.

[stf911]

Hi guys, this is a good thread with great ideas.

Have you heard of the a the Tapatalk app for ios and android?
It's basically a front end for forums like this and makes everything easier than browser based access to forums. I believe pelican and other Porsche enthusiast BBS' support it.

I don't think our version of the BBS is supported but if we were to be compatible, asides from upgrading, nothing has to change on our back end and users then have a choice in regards to how they access this fabulous resource.

https://itunes.apple.com/au/app/tapatalk-connecting-communities/id307880732?mt=8

Download this free app, start it, skip sign up, search Porsche and you'll see pelican parts. Give it a shot.

I'm using it on my iPad.

Cheers!

[jason]

Hi guys, this is a good thread with great ideas.

Have you heard of the a the Tapatalk app for ios and android?
It's basically a front end for forums like this and makes everything easier than browser based access to forums. I believe pelican and other Porsche enthusiast BBS' support it.

I don't think our version of the BBS is supported but if we were to be compatible, asides from upgrading, nothing has to change on our back end and users then have a choice in regards to how they access this fabulous resource.

https://itunes.apple.com/au/app/tapatalk-connecting-communities/id307880732?mt=8

Download this free app, start it, skip sign up, search Porsche and you'll see pelican parts. Give it a shot.

I'm using it on my iPad.

Cheers!

The newer version of vBulletin (Typ901 forum software) also have a mobile version.

I've just checked out the vBulletin website and they will host the whole forum and manage all upgrades starting at $15 per month. This doesn't include initial migration.

http://www.vbulletin.com/en/vbulletin-cloud/

[stf911]

That sounds great too!

[griffiths_r]

The newer version of vBulletin (Typ901 forum software) also have a mobile version.

I've just checked out the vBulletin website and they will host the whole forum and manage all upgrades starting at $15 per month. This doesn't include initial migration.

http://www.vbulletin.com/en/vbulletin-cloud/

relax guys... Uwe has it all in hand!!!!! we had to do this upgrade first, so that we can then migrate to the latest version...

having vbulletin host the site is an interesting option, but will defer to Uwe on that one too!

[CamBiscuit]

Rich

Will the next uprade restore photos appearing on the thread without having to click on them? Sorry its annoying the bejesus out of me!
Thanks

[griffiths_r]

Uwe can jump in here...

i think it has a lot to do with the settings we've decide upon. the settings historically have been based on trying to keep the overall size of the forum in reasonable shape for the future - but if say vbulletin will host our site up to 25Gb for $15 per month, then that starts to become an irrelevance...

watch this space...

[911jack]

The current system is able to handle in line images via settings to what ever resolutions and file sizes required, the thumbnail size (which determines whether it displays or shows a link) can also be set.

None of these settings where changed but the update process of jumping up many versions has put "many" new code improvements in place overwriting old code that was there. As the system has started to enforce the settings now leads me to suspect that there may have been some code hacks in place that have now been replaced.

There's a good chance the update has also put in the 'Oh ****' censoring which can also be controlled by settings. If the consensus is to remove it then it will be done.

Since being made aware of the image issue and a quick discussion, it was decided to keep what we thought were the original controls for image handling. As this is not working for us after the update, its time to decide what image format works best for us from a posting and hosting point of view.

We need to decide on

1. the inline thumb nail size
2. the maximum image resolution (width and height)
3. the maximum files size of the image
4. censoring

The image file size should be optimal for hosting and this can be minimised by using 72dpi when resizing our HD camera images where possible.

Keeping the images on our server is the goal for not having broken links down the track and therefore keeping quality content, the disk space on the server can and will grow to what is required, that's not an issue.

Also having pages load quickly is at the top of the list for that smooth browsing experience.

The forum is for its members and hopefully we can decide on something that displays well and stores well.

Sooo, what realistic image resolutions would we like to make it sweet???

[jason]

The current system is able to handle in line images via settings to what ever resolutions and file sizes required, the thumbnail size (which determines whether it displays or shows a link) can also be set.

None of these settings where changed but the update process of jumping up many versions has put "many" new code improvements in place overwriting old code that was there. As the system has started to enforce the settings now leads me to suspect that there may have been some code hacks in place that have now been replaced.

There's a good chance the update has also put in the 'Oh ****' censoring which can also be controlled by settings. If the consensus is to remove it then it will be done.

Since being made aware of the image issue and a quick discussion, it was decided to keep what we thought were the original controls for image handling. As this is not working for us after the update, its time to decide what image format works best for us from a posting and hosting point of view.

We need to decide on

1. the inline thumb nail size
2. the maximum image resolution (width and height)
3. the maximum files size of the image
4. censoring

The image file size should be optimal for hosting and this can be minimised by using 72dpi when resizing our HD camera images where possible.

Keeping the images on our server is the goal for not having broken links down the track and therefore keeping quality content, the disk space on the server can and will grow to what is required, that's not an issue.

Also having pages load quickly is at the top of the list for that smooth browsing experience.

The forum is for its members and hopefully we can decide on something that displays well and stores well.

Sooo, what realistic image resolutions would we like to make it sweet???

Hi Uwe, it sounds like you're well across all of it so most of the suggestions below are to help other members understand the mechanics of image management...

It would be great to never have to resize an image prior to uploading to the forum.
Most digital cameras now take very large images and rightly so to future proof them. The forum software can automatically resize the image on upload. If the forum software sets a maximum resolution in pixels to W x H of both 1000px while retaining the aspect ratio, then it would be in keeping with most modern BBS at the moment. Landscapes would be approx 1000 x 700px and portrait would be reversed. The reason for choosing 1000px is that the worst screen resolution that anyone is using now would be 1024px and therefore the image will fit without having to scroll from side to side. Most basic widescreen monitors and newish laptops are 1440px minimum.

The size of the image is determined by the pixel resolution x quality. So, a 60% quality jpeg of 1000 x 700px would be 100kb. This gives 10 photos per Mb and approx 10,000 per GB.

Any small to medium BBS should have at least 50-100GB of storage capacity or the equivalent of half a million photos.

Loading web pages with photos of less than 200kb is normally very fast unless the web server hosting is very far away. For a geographically specific forum like typ901 keeping it in Australia is a great way to keep the current snappy performance.

What Uwe is going to do is no small task, so he'll deserve a lot of appreciation once complete!

jason

[griffiths_r]

What Uwe is going to do is no small task, so he'll deserve a lot of appreciation once complete!

+1

[911jack]

Jason's reply for the thumbnail size of 1000px makes sense and is now active.

The system will accept any image resolution but the file size must be within 256kb at this time, if the image is over the thumbnail size of 1000px it will show as a link at this time.

After a bit of playing around in the system it seems the image processing software on the server is not functioning, it is not creating the reduced size thumbnails. This is likely due to moving from php 4 to the latest php 5, its the software environment that is driving the system, the image processing modules may not have been turned on for our new environment.

I have put in a support call with the hosting service.

Once that is sorted, the next step is to look at auto resizing uploads so we don't need to it manually.

Please keep attaching images inline to the posts if you can so that we can preserve the quality of the posts in the future, ie no broken image links to external services.

Our next jump into vBulletin 4 should make it all easier I hope.

[e72phil]

I just found another disturbing problem with resized images. I searched some old threads I posted about the Essen Show and the large images I had posted are now all resized down to smaller sizes despite having been posted as larger highres images.

Does this mean all previous images have then been resized with the new software upgrade ?


One of the big drawcards for (paid) member of this site are the photos, especially on threads like Fishcops restoration thread.

If we just have links posted, does this mean that non paying lurkers are able to access all images without becoming members ? I know they cannot post replies etc but many only want to see the pics.

I think we need to seriously look again at the image posting limits and consider paying more for storage since this Forum is our main asset and a resource enjoyed by all members.

What does everyone think ?