Posting In Line Photos hosted on MEM

[Kim]

Here’s the method I’m trying out to keep my photos hosted on MEM, but still be able to embed them in line.

Again, I’m not sure if this is good, but it’s an experiment.

• Create your update as usual, and put the “[ img][/img]” tags in the places where you know you’ll want the photos.
• Attach the photos at the bottom of the post, like you would do normally.
• Now proof read and post your update.

At this point, all your in-line images will show up as broken links.  Like this: But well fix that next.

• Now edit your post by clicking on the edit icons at the bottom of the post . (You have to use the one at the bottom!)*
• In the edit window, scroll to the bottom and you’ll see your attached pictures.
• Click on the first attachment to make it big.
• ’other click’ on the that picture.  In Chrome, a pop-menu comes up, and one of the options is “Copy Image Address”. Choose that option. (don’t know if this works in other browsers, but I’m sure there’s a way to do the similar thing).
• Now scroll up to the “[ img][/img]” tag where you want this picture to show up and paste the image link between the img tags.
• If you accidentally got the link to the thumbnail all you have to do is edit the image number.  It should look something like this:
  “[ img]http://www.modelenginemaker.com/index.php?action=dlattach;topic=5264.0;attach=67042;image[/img]”
• Note that the “attach=” number is even?  That means it’s the thumbnail.  To get the big version, just decrease it by one so that it shows “attach=67041” Of course, if you copied the link to the big image, it will already have the odd number and be pointing to the big one. You can verify this by doing Preview.

The odd/even thing might not always hold true, I don’t know.  But it did for me with the few posts I’ve done this way.

Give it a try and see what you think. Is it worth the hassle? I’m not sure it’s much more hassle than using other hosting sites – other than your post will be exposed to everyone as a NEW post while you’re still working on it.  That’s not ideal, but from the perspective of constructing the post, I’m not sure it’s much harder.

Also, I don't really like having the pictures show up twice in the post.  It kind of interrupts the narrative.  But it may grow on me.

Kim

*The Edit at the bottom of the post will show you the attachments. The "Modify" at the top of the post allows you to change your attachments, but you can't get the links to them there.

[Kim]

OK, ignore the odd/even thing.  That was accidentally true, but it doesn't always hold.

The safest bet is to get the link to the image you want to show, whether its the big one or the small one.

Sorry for the extra confusion.
Kim

[Flyboy Jim]

Thanks Kim, I'll give it a try. Or at least I will if I ever come up with something new to post! 

I know a lot of us are using hosting sites like Photobucket (or at least used to) so I'm wondering if all of us start posting photos directly on the forum it will use too much bandwidth. Maybe someone who knows more will address that.

Jim

[b.lindsey]

Jim, I will let one of the admins address the storage issue. One thing that will help though is to resize pictures for posting ON the forum to no more than 800 x 600 pixels. Jo mentioned this recently in a separate thread and I have been on the same soapbox for years. We still have members that post pictures the size they were taken, sometimes 3600 x 2400 pixels. The difference in storage space is the difference between 2.4 megabytes (full size) and 1.4 kilobytes (reduced size). Given the current situation with PB, this becomes even more important.

Bill

[Flyboy Jim]

Jim, I will let one of the admins address the storage issue. One thing that will though is to resize pictures for posting ON the forum to no more than 800 x 600 pixels. Jo mentioned this recently in a separate thread and I have been on the same soapbox for years. We still have members that post pictures the size they were taken, sometimes 3600 x 2400 pixels. The difference in storage space is the difference between 2.4 megabytes (full size) and 1.4 kilobytes (reduced size). Given the current situation with PB, this becomes even more important.

Bill

Thanks Bill.

I always take my build pictures at 640 x 480, so no problems there.

Also I just saw the post from Ade, so will be going that route. Good news for sure! 

Jim

[Ye-Ole Steam Dude]

Hey all,

I just loaded FastStone Photo Resizer and it is very easy to use. It will allow you to resize a complete folder of photos at one time.

AdeV has the link on his posting.

[Hugh Currin]

I find I can't respond to, or ask questions, in Ade's announcement about in line pictures. So let me ask here, hopefully someone authoritative will respond.

Will it be better for MEM if I store forum pics with Ade or on my own site? With Ade the threads will be protected, but his server will tend to fill up. (Although small size pictures take very little space) If I keep them they are off site and may be lost, upsetting past threads. I can do either.

To store with Ade I have to trust Ade and MEM not to use my pics for commercial purposes. This has been the philosophy of MEM but I don't think it's in any "by laws". It would ease my mind if this was the official policy of MEM and written somewhere.

Would a fund raiser to get Ade a larger hard drive for pics be appropriate?

Thanks.

Hugh

[b.lindsey]

Hugh, if you are concerned about loss of control then I would suggest that hosting your own pictures is the best option. I understand your point but i think formal by-laws offer little if any real protection in this day.

To wit, as an example I just copied one of Chris' in line photos and saved it to my desktop. Now I can attach it below or use it in any other way as if it were my own. (sorry to use you as an example Chris).

You can always watermark your photos as Marv does for added identification as well.

Bill

[Jo]

Hi Hugh,

We tried to explain the philosophy of MEM back on the home page we said: http://www.modelenginemaker.com/index.php/topic,2.0.html

Bringing us up to date: There are five Admins across 4 continents, we equally own the forum, we each are resident in our own legal system ( this makes any legal challenges for a single commercial entity to take over the site extremely difficult  ), we are all committed to furthering the design/build and construction of model engines. All decisions relating to the forum are discussed and are voted on. The legal statement on the forum says you own the copyright, that statement means we cannot take away your copyright from you in the future . 

MEM was initially formed because other model engine sites turned commercial and we didn't like our efforts being exploited   


If you store your photos here it means that the photos will exist as long as the forum and your thread exists (which we intend on being a very  long time ) if you store them elsewhere then the photos last as long as that remote storage area lasts (and you pay for that and your annual Internet address registration). If you want to post pics big pictures or to use them on multiple sites then it might be better that you host them on your own storage, but currently the cost is modest.

It never hurts to have a back up of your threads/pictures in case of computing/internet failures 

Jo

[AdeV]

I find I can't respond to, or ask questions, in Ade's announcement about in line pictures. So let me ask here, hopefully someone authoritative will respond.

Will it be better for MEM if I store forum pics with Ade or on my own site? With Ade the threads will be protected, but his server will tend to fill up. (Although small size pictures take very little space) If I keep them they are off site and may be lost, upsetting past threads. I can do either.

To store with Ade I have to trust Ade and MEM not to use my pics for commercial purposes. This has been the philosophy of MEM but I don't think it's in any "by laws". It would ease my mind if this was the official policy of MEM and written somewhere.

Would a fund raiser to get Ade a larger hard drive for pics be appropriate?

Thanks.

Hugh

Hi Hugh,

To send me a private message, just click on my username next to this post, then on the Profile page that appears, just below my name click on "Send PM", that should bring up a box that looks almost exactly like the one you type a normal post in; except when you send it, it only comes to me 

To answer some of your other questions/points:

Will it be better for MEM if I store forum pics with Ade or on my own site? - It doesn't' matter, they're both on the same server! Images stored on the forum are, however, guaranteed to stay with the forum for all time; images hosted in a separate gallery may end up as broken links if the gallery moves, closes, etc. At some point, we will get a dedicated virtual server for MEM & its subsidiary services alone, but the LEF gallery will stay where it is, so it should be good for many years yet.

With Ade the threads will be protected, but his server will tend to fill up. (Although small size pictures take very little space) If I keep them they are off site and may be lost, upsetting past threads. I can do either. - Never fear; MEM is under multiple ownership, and although I've not done it yet, I'll give the other admins admin access to Coppermine, so pics will be safe if I go off the rails or kark it or any other disaster scenario. Also, it's being backed up daily, so we should be safe from too much data loss in the event of any issues, or an admin going rogue, etc. As above, once we move MEM back onto a dedicated server, we'll set up a proper MEM gallery with it, so either add pictures to the forum, or host with coppermine, the choice is yours. Just don't do both, because then it uses twice as much space on the same machine!!

To store with Ade I have to trust Ade and MEM not to use my pics for commercial purposes. This has been the philosophy of MEM but I don't think it's in any "by laws". It would ease my mind if this was the official policy of MEM and written somewhere.

That's a great point, us Admins will have a conflab and I'm sure that'll be written up somewhere. Not sure where yet... In the meantime, rest assured I have no commercial designs on anyone's photos, not even my own (not the machining ones anyway... maybe if I happen to snap a super arty pic one day...)

Would a fund raiser to get Ade a larger hard drive for pics be appropriate?

It's kind of you to offer, at the moment I don't mind paying the hosting fees as it's only US$20/month, and I'm using the server for my own purposes. I'd like to avoid asking for money for as long as possible; this is my way of repaying the kindness and skills you all show in freely sharing your knowledge, tips, hints, and your fabulous engines. You'll notice that I, of all the admins, post extremely infrequently here - that's mainly because I hang out on MadModder (and the Lister Engine forum), and because all the engine work I'm doing is full sized, not a model to be seen. One day, I'll post up some of my engine exploits, but we'll have to have a new "1:1 scale" board for me to post in!  In the meantime, $20/mo is a tiny price to pay, and it's not like I'm struggling to earn it.

So - enjoy! And one we get those non-commercials codified, we'll get 'em posted up somewhere.

Cheers!
Ade.

PS: I took so long to answer that 2 replies came in while I typed! We all seem to be saying the same thing anyway. And as Jo said - 5 admins were chosen because a) It's unlikely 3 of them would decide to sell out, b) A vote can never be tied, and c) if an admin moves on for any reason, the forum keeps continuity.

[Ye-Ole Steam Dude]

I find I can't respond to, or ask questions, in Ade's announcement about in line pictures. So let me ask here, hopefully someone authoritative will respond.

Will it be better for MEM if I store forum pics with Ade or on my own site? With Ade the threads will be protected, but his server will tend to fill up. (Although small size pictures take very little space) If I keep them they are off site and may be lost, upsetting past threads. I can do either.

To store with Ade I have to trust Ade and MEM not to use my pics for commercial purposes. This has been the philosophy of MEM but I don't think it's in any "by laws". It would ease my mind if this was the official policy of MEM and written somewhere.

Would a fund raiser to get Ade a larger hard drive for pics be appropriate?

Thanks.

Hugh

Not a bad idea Hugh, I would be willing to donate to a fund to help this Forum.

[AdeV]

We tried to explain the philosophy of MEM back on the home page we said: http://www.modelenginemaker.com/index.php/topic,2.0.html

Good grief, has it been 5 years already !? Well, very nearly.... we should have a birthday party! One rule - you have to turn your own "glass" on your lathe 

I notice I wrote in that post "you've got 5 years at least" referring to the hosting costs. Well, it's a smidge more expensive, but it's still cheap. So you can have another 5 years I reckon, then I'll review it again.... 

[Hugh Currin]

Hugh, if you are concerned about loss of control then I would suggest that hosting your own pictures is the best option. I understand your point but i think formal by-laws offer little if any real protection in this day.

Bill: I'm not too worried about losing control of my pictures. Once they are on the 'net I figure that's lost. But I remember the frustration when the last forum was sold wholesale for $. If pics are stored externally one can at least move them negating the threads they support. I might worry more if I were doing amazing builds, as many of you here do, but mine are pretty pedestrian.

We tried to explain the philosophy of MEM back on the home page we said: http://www.modelenginemaker.com/index.php/topic,2.0.html
.....
If you store your photos here it means that the photos will exist as long as the forum and your thread exists (which we intend on being a very  long time ) if you store them elsewhere then the photos last as long as that remote storage area lasts (and you pay for that and your annual Internet address registration). If you want to post pics big pictures or to use them on multiple sites then it might be better that you host them on your own storage, but currently the cost is modest.

It never hurts to have a back up of your threads/pictures in case of computing/internet failures 

Jo: Thanks. I suspect I read that at the start but my memory has never been good. That does give the philosophy though.

That's kinda why I asked. If stored with MEM there's a better chance of the threads staying intact. The question is storage space and this seems a non-issue.

I always keep backups of my pics, but fall down keeping copies of the text. Lazy I suspect.

Thanks.

PS: I took so long to answer that 2 replies came in while I typed! We all seem to be saying the same thing anyway.

Ade: I think this is right. Nice to know everyone has the same understanding. Thanks.

I'll likely start saving pictures with MEM. It's a bit of effort doing a build log and keeping pics with it makes it more stable. I like to keep pics in line rather than at the end of a post, flows better. This new scheme will allow that.

I do trust MEM to stay true. I think many of us are ex-pats from past forums. But it is nice to hear that stated.

Thank you.

Hugh

[Flyboy Jim]

I got the password from Ade and opened my account on Coppermine. Once I updated my Flash player, I was able to upload my Parsell & Weed pictures to Coppermine in bulk. They were already sized 640 x 480, so didn't have to resize them before uploading. Did a test post to preview the inserting process. Went well and I can add text between pictures. 

Jim

[Kim]

Great!  Glad to see people are starting to use the new system Ade made for us! Thanks Ade! 

I've started to play with it some this afternoon too.  I was trying to figure out how to do the galleries.  I've got some galleries made, but I'm trying to figure out if you can make nested galleries.  That's the way I was doing PB. I'll make it work regardless, but if there was a way to have galleries inside of galleries, that would be helpful to me at least.  Let me know if you figure out a way to do that.

Thanks,
Kim

[Kim]

OK, I've found the answer to my own question.  From the Coppermine documentation:

In Coppermine, uploaded files go into albums. Albums can contain files, but not sub-albums. Albums can go into categories. Categories can contain sub-categories and albums, but they can not contain files.

So you can't create sub-albums (I was calling them galleries in my last post - wrong terminology).

Coppermine supports one level of albums in your gallery.  The rest of the sorting is to be done by categories, and in the province of the admins.

One level it is.  Question answered
Kim

[Hugh Currin]

Kim:

It sounds like you are up to speed with coppermine. I just created an account, found my gallery, created an album, and uploaded a couple of pictures. How do I link the pictures to a post on MEM?

I go find the picture I want to link, right click on it, and copy link. Adding that link inside image tags in my post works, sort of. It brings in the image but not full size. I've scaled the image to the size I want to post before uploading. How can I link the full size picture? Have you figured this out yet?

Thanks.

Hugh

[Flyboy Jim]

OK, I've found the answer to my own question.  From the Coppermine documentation:

In Coppermine, uploaded files go into albums. Albums can contain files, but not sub-albums. Albums can go into categories. Categories can contain sub-categories and albums, but they can not contain files.

So you can't create sub-albums (I was calling them galleries in my last post - wrong terminology).

Coppermine supports one level of albums in your gallery.  The rest of the sorting is to be done by categories, and in the province of the admins.

One level it is.  Question answered
Kim

I discovered the same thing Kim. No big deal for me since I'm just going to use Coppermine for my machining related pictures.

I'm about 1/3 of the way through my P & W build, converting the pictures from Photobucket to Coppermine. For some reason Photobucket hasn't cut me off yet (keeping fingers crossed) which makes it easier to match up pictures for the conversion. I'm hoping I can get all my build threads converted before they go away.

Jim

[Flyboy Jim]

Kim:

It sounds like you are up to speed with coppermine. I just created an account, found my gallery, created an album, and uploaded a couple of pictures. How do I link the pictures to a post on MEM?

I go find the picture I want to link, right click on it, and copy link. Adding that link inside image tags in my post works, sort of. It brings in the image but not full size. I've scaled the image to the size I want to post before uploading. How can I link the full size picture? Have you figured this out yet?

Thanks.

Hugh

Hugh, I had the same problem. Here's the solution. When you have the picture displayed that you want to post then click on it. It will bring the picture up in a larger size, then right click (or in my case as a Mac user "control click") and then click on "copy image address". Then in your post on MEM click the "insert image" button  and paste the image address there.

Hope this helps.

Jim

[mklotz]

FWIW, the fixes have already begun to appear.  Is PB really stupid enough to think that, with all the software geeks on the internet, all of them would abstain from finding a way around PB's ransomware approach to corporate policy?

All the images in this post of mine...

http://www.modelenginemaker.com/index.php?topic=5118.new#new

were blocked and replaced with PB's ransomware meter icon.

Here's what I did for the first of the blocked photos...

Right click on their nasty little meter icon and  select "copy image location"

Now, go here...

https://fixphotobucket.com/

and insert it (Ctrl-V) where it says.  Copy the link they return (Ctrl-C)

I then selected the modify post option and deleted the blocked link to the first picture.  Then I used the "insert image" icon to create the image tags that look like -

Code: [Select]

[img]...[/img]

and inserted (Ctrl-V) the new link...

Code: [Select]

[img=https://s3.amazonaws.com/static.fixphotobucket.com/tools/Miterset-1_zpsahgwhptj.jpg]

between them.

so now I've got something that looks like this...

Code: [Select]

[img][img=https://s3.amazonaws.com/static.fixphotobucket.com/tools/Miterset-1_zpsahgwhptj.jpg][img]

Still a bit of work to do.  I'm not going to attempt a lecture on HTML grammar so I'll just say that that the "img=" in front of "https:" and the "]" just after "jpg" have to be removed.  When that is done we have something that looks like this...

Code: [Select]

[img]https://s3.amazonaws.com/static.fixphotobucket.com/tools/Miterset-1_zpsahgwhptj.jpg[/img]

I saved the modified code and, if you visit that post of mine, you should see the first photo now unblocked.

It's admittedly tedious and I have no idea if PB will litigate this fix away or bump off its creator but it does show that there are workarounds.  I'm sure that forum administrators are already thinking up ways they could construct a script to automate this or something like this.

[Jo]

Jim, In internet explorer it is just right click and select copy



Jo

[Firebird]

Hi

I have signed up to a site suggested by Marv   USE.com

I have posted a couple of test pics in my Conway topic.

Very easy to use and has no limits and is free

I doubt I will have the patience to re-post all my photos but if there is anything anyone wants to see give me a shout

Cheers

Rich

[Hugh Currin]

Hugh, I had the same problem. Here's the solution. When you have the picture displayed that you want to post then click on it. It will bring the picture up in a larger size, then right click (or in my case as a Mac user "control click") and then click on "copy image address". Then in your post on MEM click the "insert image" button  and paste the image address there.

Jim: I know I tried this without success. However, it seems to work for me know.

Thanks.

Hugh

[Dave Otto]

Not that it is a big deal but  has anyone figured out if you can re-order the pictures in the album? I have started uploading some of my Pacific pictures and have the first two build installments switched over to coppermine. I find that if I copy and paste the text into Word to edit the img tags for that post, then paste it back. It is easier than trying to work in the small text window of the forum software.

My plan is to try to pick away at it a little bit each day. I hope this is the last time; I went through this when Web Shots quit allowing linking of photos.

Dave

[Kim]

Not that it is a big deal but  has anyone figured out if you can re-order the pictures in the album? I have started uploading some of my Pacific pictures and have the first two build installments switched over to coppermine. I find that if I copy and paste the text into Word to edit the img tags for that post, then paste it back. It is easier than trying to work in the small text window of the forum software.

Dave, the only thing I've found is the little 'sort' selection on the right side in your album view.  It seems to let you sort acceding or descending by Title, Name, Date, or Position.  The 'Name' one works and will sort by file name.  Actually, they all change things, but since I had them named in order (mostly likely time order) it all came up about the same.  And I don't know how to change Title, or position.

Anyway, I used a free utility called: Bulk Rename Utility to prefix all my photos with the name of the directory they are in (I make a separate sub-directory for each post) so this is how I'm planning to sort my photos.

Also, when you copy the image link into the [ img][/img] tags, you'll see the URL looks something like one of these:

http://lister-engine.com/coppermine/albums/userpics/10008/thumb_039a-Crank-02-DSC_3076.JPG

http://lister-engine.com/coppermine/albums/userpics/10008/normal_039a-Crank-02-DSC_3076.JPG

http://lister-engine.com/coppermine/albums/userpics/10008/039a-Crank-02-DSC_3076.JPG

Depending on what size of image you copy the link from.
If you delete the "thumb_" or the "normal_"  you'll get the original file you uploaded (the third link there).  The other two are smaller versions of it.

I'm planning to do like you Dave, just start from the beginning and go through them a few at a time till I get them all updated AWAY from PhotoBucket.

Best of luck everyone!
Kim

[10KPete]

Copper Mine is showing a lot of new "business" the last 72 hours! And they're all MEM folks moving their stuff.

I Love It!!!        Now maybe, just maybe, I'll start posting some pics since it won't feel like chaf in the wind.

Pete

[PStechPaul]

There is another "shortcut" that I use for posting images. If you right-click on an image that you see in your browser, and select "Copy Image" (using Firefox, anyway), you can then paste it (Ctrl-V) into the post. I did that for the MEM logo:

[Dave Otto]

Thanks Kim

That saves a couple mouse clicks on each photo, pretty easy to delete the extra characters after pasting the [img] tag.
I got a few more installments done yesterday and today.

Dave

[MJM460]

Hi Ade,  I think we have all been a bit remiss in not taking up your suggestion of a 1:1 scale board a few days back.  I for one would be delighted to see what you are doing full size, 1:1 is just another scale after all.  We even have some 2:1 threads, though admittedly they are 2:1 models of a smaller model.

In fact, I have not noticed anyrules on limitations to the acceptable scale on any of the boards anyway, so probably no new board required.  I doubt that we will be overrun 1:1 enthusiasts as I guess they deal with different problems to the normal ones here, but your posts, of all people belong and are very welcome here.  It would be great to see what you are doing.

Thanks again for all you do for our community.  You and the other admins and moderators make this a great place to hang out, and your effort is much appreciated.

MJM460

[Kim]

I've completed uploading the pictures and updating all the links in my posts for my current build ("Steam Tractor 3/4" (Rudy K)") and my first build on this site ("Marine Twin Cylinder Build (Steamech)").  It does take a while, but it feels good to get them of PB.

It has been interesting going back over my builds.  It is AMAZING just how much excellent advice I've received from all of you over the last five years!  I have learned so much, and it has all be thanks to the kind people on this forum.

So, let me say again, Thank You!

And thank you Ade, for resolving this picture hosting issue.
Kim

[AdeV]

Hi Ade,  I think we have all been a bit remiss in not taking up your suggestion of a 1:1 scale board a few days back.  I for one would be delighted to see what you are doing full size, 1:1 is just another scale after all.  We even have some 2:1 threads, though admittedly they are 2:1 models of a smaller model.

In fact, I have not noticed anyrules on limitations to the acceptable scale on any of the boards anyway, so probably no new board required.  I doubt that we will be overrun 1:1 enthusiasts as I guess they deal with different problems to the normal ones here, but your posts, of all people belong and are very welcome here.  It would be great to see what you are doing.

Thanks again for all you do for our community.  You and the other admins and moderators make this a great place to hang out, and your effort is much appreciated.

MJM460

Hi MJM,

Well, as one of the admins, I guess I've got a pretty good chance of getting any board I liked added  - but you'll be glad to hear that I only use my powers for good  ...

I'll be posting irregular updates on my engine stuff at Madmodder, but chances are I'm sure I could find a board to pop a few posts in here. So far though, all I've done is take 1 1/2 V12s to pieces, cleaned the big bits of one of them, then stuck it all in boxes and moved to a new workshop... so it's not like there's much in the way of exciting stuff to report yet.

Thank you for your kind words - none of us are in this for the accolades, but they never hurt when they're forthcoming