inserting images

Quote
David Maxwell
The other thing which we may want to think about is how to manage graphics. I do think we need some means of posting photographs. But how this is best accomplished I will leave to the 2 Michaels (and Sienna)

My own attempt at using HTML button #10 (right after the button for inserting a hyperlink within the message box itself) was at first a no go. A separate script prompt arises in the upper left corner of the screen requesting a URL for the image I wish to insert. 'Cuse me. But my images are jpeg files (and the like) not necessarily already posted on web pages. Still, let's see what happens when I request to insert an image from my farm website here:



Aha! I got the URL for this by clicking 'properties' when I had my cursor over the image at my website. I suspect that this works well with compressed images (as usually found on websites) that are essentially sized to fit within a message. There's no apparent ability to wrap text around the image but I can live with that. Once again, the preview feature is a godsend for seeing that this indeed worked.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 03/15/2013 07:11PM by Michael Phillips.

This is an experiment. I have signed us all up for Photobucket -- photobucket.com. Our username is groworganicapples and our password is apP73S (if you squint and think upside down, the "73" sorta looks like "le" doesn't it?). I have posted there an encouraging picture of the very first plum blossoms of the season here in Caspar, California:


Let's see if that works. Holy moley, it does!!
Here's an apple I just bought at our local food store. How do you grow an apple like this in March?


So here's the trick. Upload an image to photobucket -- easy as dragging it from a list of images or your photo organizer, or whatever tool you use to look at pix with your computer. There's even ways to do it with your mobile phone! Experiment. Report back.

Once the image is up there in cyberspace, look at it in the library. Mouse over, see the little gear in the upper right? Point to it, and select Get Links from the popup menu. Choose the one that's called Direct Link.

Hold that thought! Get yourself to the forum posting you want to add the photo to -- Yes, Virginia, you can have two browser windows open at the same time, check it out! Click the image icon up top in the message box, and paste in the link you just copied over at photobucket.

You're done!



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 03/18/2013 07:13AM by Michael Phillips.

I was using Flickr, and was getting an error message about getimagesize() in a little box where the image should be. I thought it was Flickr issue, but I can reproduce it in Photobucket also:



How did I do this? Right Click on the image (in Photobucket, etc.), choose from the drop-down list "Copy Link Location", plug this in for the image link, and voila! (We talk French up here in Canada ... though I am not sure that our French is italicised!)

So, to make this work, one needs to choose Direct Link and not some version of copying the link, like this:



Let's make sure that this distinction is crystal clear to avoid that error box.

I rather like the idea of getting all the GOA images stored in one place, in a single Photobucket account. It never occurred to me create a "group site" that all forum members can access like this. Good work!



Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 03/17/2013 09:34PM by Michael Phillips.

My mental block lay in finding that "little gear in the upper right" in order to get the direct link. What I see instead is a box entitled Image Links already showing in the right-hand column on the photobucket page where I'm viewing my just uploaded file. Sure enough, one of the choices is Direct Link. Click that choice and the proper url code has now been saved to your clipboard to be pasted over to the forum:


Just to be repetitive in the interest of everyone's success at this, I simply went to a new line after my opening paragraph here, clicked the coding button at the top of the message box (that looks like a moon over two mountain peaks) where one types a message, which in turn produced a script prompt box where I pasted the direct link url provided me in photobucket. And that's why we all now see an image of cherry trees on raised berms.

And now I get the gear part as well ... that's what you see in the photobucket library where all posted images show in a reduced size. Scroll the mouse on the image in question and things are exactly as Michael Potts originally described. On the other hand, if you open a particular image to full size, as I saw upon uploading, then it's as described by me above. Computers offer many pathways to the same result.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 03/17/2013 05:59PM by Michael Phillips.

Thanks.. that works great !!
now then, should I delete my photobucket files as not to litter it with my pix ?

Posting pictures to photobucket (or any photo-sharing site) to get 'em into the forum works because that action results in the image file being given a "home" on the web. That web address is it's URL ... which having no clue what that means ... turns out to stand for Uniform Resource Locator. Anyhow, delete that and the phorum software will no longer have a link to find in order to show the posted image in our grower's forum.

I have no idea if one day the group acount at photobucket will get too crowded. Nor are "we" going there to browse through albums as an individual might. A grower with numerous images to share elsewhere as well might rather create a personal account. Either works ... as long as you use the Direct Link version of the URL.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/24/2013 09:55AM by Michael Phillips.

Bad news friends...
When writing my post about the recent bear visit (http://groworganicapples.com/phorum/read.php?25,2087)
I wanted to embed the images within the post, but then problems occured. Hence I simply inserted a link to an album.

For the image inserting routine to work in this site, we need a direct link to an image file, which ends with the image filename, i.e. something like this for an image whose filename is IMG_999.jpg:
https://host.com/directory_structure/IMG_999.jpg

This used to work fine with Photobucket, the site provided a direct link to the image file and this made it relatively easy to insert an image into a post. However, Photobucket went through a major maintenance yesterday (the site was down for more than 24 hours... and a LOT of people complained) and this doesn't work anymore, because the link provided will now open a web page that includes the image. From what I understand, this permits them to add publicity...
For my part, I used to have pictures on Picasa, but this was replaced by Google Photos - and no direct links are available anymore.
Yesterday, I also tried Flickr and DropBox, but to no avail - these sites don't provide a direct link to the image file.

Result of this is all the images that at one time appeared on this HON discussion forum are now replaced by a blank box. Note however the link in the bottom of this box does open the image.

I guess we'll have to find something else to be able to post images here. Is there a possibility that images could be uploaded to the server of this discussion forum, so we would not depend anymore on an external service that may be shut down or modified without notice?
Claude Jolicoeur

Jolicoeur Orchard
Zone 4 in Quebec

Hopefully Michael Potts sees this update and might have suggestions . . . but apparently the "URL elsewhere" method of inserting an image may be gone for good. The complicated method for network members still exists, whereby you have access to administration pages via the File Uploader if you've been invited to post a grower profile (and thus have been provided password access). See http://groworganicapples.com/phorum/read.php?6,407 noting that non-members won't have access to posts in the Member's Corner. Truth is even I'm not all that inclined to go that route for a mere picture, however. My understanding is that uploading images exposes our site to hacking in a significant way, and bottom line is we just don't have the budget to customize such an upgrade into these groworganicapples pages.

Lost Nation Orchard
Zone 4b in New Hampshire

I made some more test, and I now think the problem might come from the coding in this forum. Has anything been changed?

For example, here I want to show a photo of my Banane amere tree. This picture is hosted on my personal website, so I do have a direct link to it.
The link is : http://www.cjoliprsf.ca/images/photo-frt/banane-arbre.jpg

Now, trying to show the picture in this post doesn't work...

and the picture doesn't appear in the box.
However, cliking the link below does give access to the picture.
What is the problem then? It appears it isn't Photobucket's fault as I first thought...
Claude

Jolicoeur Orchard
Zone 4 in Quebec

I am unable to display your picture on my machine, either by following the link you provide, nor by clicking on the box in your message. (I get a "server error", 500)

Broomholm Orchard
Zone 5b in Nova Scotia

And now, when I go back to it an hour later, it works! I can see Claude's Banane Amère tree, both by clicking on the URL, and by clicking in the little box. I suspect Claude's server was busy/tired/contrary at the moment I tried. So we are back to Claude's original observation - is there something in the forum program which has changed?

Broomholm Orchard
Zone 5b in Nova Scotia

An impatient Michael Potts here.
"It should just be so *simple*" ... well, words are. Words are made up of symbols. A dozen words might consist of 50 or so symbols, taking a millisecond or two to transmit and consuming just about half that many bytes in storage. An image, even a little one like the red apple I posted clear back in 2013, takes up 42,126 bytes. So, for starters, you need to understand that images are very costly in a medium that is valued by transmission speed and storage. More about this below. Bottom line: this is a forum for words, not images. Images are not simple.
To successfully post an image online, you need it to be ONLINE. Is your computer online and accessible to the world 24/7/365? I surely hope not! If so, all your private documents and data are available to the world. Web servers are carefully protected from hackers and malefactors -- and still they get regularly blown up by the slime dwellers of the world -- too big a topic for here. What you need to know is that for an image to be available for viewing online,it must also be always available online. I tried several times to see Claude's banana tree, but HIS server wasn't up to the task. Is that this forum's fault? Not on your life!
Yes, Photobucket has changed its format. We don't care why. But the images thereon are still available for posting. All you need is a little elementary understanding of how browsers work. I'm not going to go through the steps of how to do it; I'm just going to say, FIGURE IT OUT. Hint: try hovering your mouse pointer over the image. Notice anything? What happens if you click?

Follow the prompts, read a little, do what you're told, and THAT's what happens.
It's worth remembering that not everyone is on broadband, and an image like that round-headed apple borer takes quite awhile to download at 1200 baud. Maybe some of our forum members are on dial-up and don't necessarily want to be regaled by your over-large images? This is not a photography website. Nor, my friends, is it a tutorial on using the web.
As a practical matter, your camera or phone may take a picture that's a few thousand pixels wide, but 480 pixels is a good, practical limit for posting on this site. If you don't know how to reduce your image's size to something manageable, in my humble opinion, it's time for you to learn something new.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/09/2016 12:00PM by The Michaels.

I hear that you are impatient, but I fail to understand the source of your impatience. We have had until very recently the ability to embed images into our forum posts, by inserting a direct link to the image, (which was stored on Photobucket, vitiating your concern about storage space on a server available 24/7/365. With the apparent changes to Photobucket, (and apparently all other photo sharing sites) we can apparently no longer do this. Am I correct in this understanding? (And shouting at us, or telling us to FIGURE IT OUT will not improve our understanding.) I have no problem with losing the ability to embed images in postings, (but still have the ability to link to them). As you observe, this actually has a certain advantage insofar as people on slow modems can opt not to use the bandwidth to download the image at all. But if this be the case, a simple confirmation of the fact, and suggestion as to alternative means of including references to images would not be inappropriate.
(I wonder whether this unaccustomed intemperance has something to do with the results of the election. Are we reaping displaced unhappiness?)

Broomholm Orchard
Zone 5b in Nova Scotia

Hello Michael, it comes at a deception to me to see that in your opinion this is only some bad understanding from computer illiterate old chaps... For my part I have been active with computers, including advanced programming and working with Linux, for too many years to count and I do know a thing or 2 about pixels and bytes. Hence it is not necessary to repeat here some trivialities. I agree with pretty much all you wrote, except it has nothing to do with the problem we are seeing.
It is true that the server of my personal web site goes down some times, but this is a free host... and usually, the problem doesn't last too long as David reported above, but again this has nothing to do with the present problem.

So I suggest we try a more positive approach where we would first identify and agree on the problem, and thereafter see if and how it can be solved.

The problem I see is as follows: in a message where a picture has been inserted, a box appears, but there is no thumb-size picture in the box. For example in the message you posted on November 9, I can see a greyish box, in the top of this box, the file name is written, and in the bottom, a zooming symbol and the file name again. But no image inside the box. If I click on the filename, then the picture of the bug appears in a larger box. This is certainly a change somewhere as previously, the thumb-size image appeared in the box.

As I wrote before, I first thought the problem could be caused by PhotoBucket, but I have discarded that possibility as the same happens with images on some other hosts.
I have also thought this could be related to the browser used - could be that some changes in the forum programming would make some browsers incompatible. I have then tried looking at this current thread with Firefox and Internet Explorer under Windows, with Firefox under Linux, and with Safari on a Mac, and none of these display the thumb-size image inside the box. Safari shows a question mark inside a very small box.

Hence the question I ask you: do you see the small thumb-size image inside the box that is embedded in the post?

Thanks,
Claude

Jolicoeur Orchard
Zone 4 in Quebec

After Michael-the-code-wrangler's intemperate attack on Claude this whole subject has gone silent. And I no longer know what the current situation is. Could you perhaps offer a little confirmation and guidance for those of us less adept than the experts?

1) It is no longer possible to embed images in Phorum posts, (as was done some 4 years ago) - Correct?

2) But, if one wants to refer to an image one can do so by posting the image somewhere on the Web, in some sort of photo sharing site, and inserting the URL in one's message, (clicking on the icon with the globe and the thing that looks like a chain.) - Correct?

3) If the answer to #2 is "Yes", can we use the Photobucket account (groworganicapples) from 4 years ago to store images?

Broomholm Orchard
Zone 5b in Nova Scotia

A user in the cider makers topic asked about the ability to insert a link to a graphic into a posting. I was going to give him instructions on how to access the groworganicapples Photobucket account, but when I went to check the URL, I found that it apparently no longer works, (at least the password which Michael gave (apP73S) doesn't.)

I note that when I asked for clarification about inserting images in June of 2017, I did not elicit any response from any quarter. So now I know even less about posting graphics than I did a year ago. Is it still at all possible?? (I could have asked for a p/w reset myself, but if I were to do so, only I would be able to access the Photobucket account, so I reckon it is best done by Michael-the-code-wrangler, with a message to his acolytes as to what the new p/w is.) (I think the Photobucket account is still extant, because clicking on the link in Michael Potts' message in 2016 does actually bring up my photograph of the Round-Headed Apple Borer, (which I still think was a stellar bit of close-up photography, the likes of which I am never likely to achieve again.)

Broomholm Orchard
Zone 5b in Nova Scotia

I would love to see and be able to post orchard photos, is this a dead issue?

Vista Ridge Orchard
Zone 8a in Washington
235 Cider and heritage apple trees, 72 varieties,

I was unsuccessful in eliciting a response to this question when I last asked, and it appears that Karen is equally unsuccessful. BUT, Karen has done something in a recent post asking whether some dramatic appearance on her apple trees represents a horrible fungal disease, (can't quite remember which one it is now...). She was able to link her posting to wherever her image was stored, so that clicking on the little box resulted in the image being displayed on my computer screen. Karen, could you tell us old non-digital natives exactly what you did? Where is the image stored? (In your own account? In an account you created for the purpose? In the old Photobucket account Michael-2 set up many years ago? (And if the latter, can one link to it without needing a password?)) And, once we know how to get our image up onto Photobucket, (or wherever), how does one create the link to it, (again, in as simple and explicit terms as us elders need.) (I think I may have a vague notion here - click on the icon that looks like a globe with a chain link. But then I am not entirely sure how I identify just where the image is stored, (presumably the URL to the image?...)

Broomholm Orchard
Zone 5b in Nova Scotia

Hi David, I have a smug mug account and I uploaded the photo there and copy/pasted the link into the body of the post. I was surprised that it worked but disappointed no one recognized the culprit/cause of the big crack in the bark of my tree. Sorry for the delay in answering, busy times in the orchard now!

Vista Ridge Orchard
Zone 8a in Washington
235 Cider and heritage apple trees, 72 varieties,

Just to let everyone know, I'm aware of the desire for more straight-forward image insertion. Right now my plate is more than full with creating one central mailing list and better communications ability. And other website updates. (Oh yeah, and actual orcharding!) It may be the answer lies in someone who's tech savvy willing to serve as image coordinator. Karen obviously had success recently so there are ways to create a workable link. The software for this discussion forum (Phorum) coupled with not wishing to give the world access to our site admin pages makes it very difficult for humble fruit growers to have instantaneous facebook capabilities. Not to mention that the budget for doing this is well beyond the current fundraising pace of the network. But I am aware . . .

Lost Nation Orchard
Zone 4b in New Hampshire

OK, I have noodled around a little, (to take the burden off Michael). I have not pursued the way we used to do it, as 1) I beleive it no longer works, and 2) I don't really understand how it worked in the first place. But I think I do have a functional work-around.

I have several images stored in a Photobucket account, (My own, not the one Michael-II set up, access to which no longer seems to work). I went to my album of photos, (called my "Bucket" by Photobucket), and clicked on the first item in the list at right, entitled, "Email & IM", which has a simple URL, of the form http;\\etc. A simple left-click copies this URL to one's clipboard. Now, in one's message on groworganicapples, click on the little icon on the top that looks like a globe and chain link. This brings up a little box to enter the URL. Simply paste the saved link, (the one on your clipboard) in here, (Ctrl- V works on my machine). This brings up a second box, asking for a "Title"; enter some suitable description here. (I will enter "Sick Trees" when I do all this for real in a moment). This inserts a bunch of characters into the message screen, which get transmogrified into the previously entered Title. The message in groworganicapples does not display any form of graphic, not even a thumbnail, but the Title appears as an underlined link to the original Photobucket pictures. Clicking on this brings up the picture(s). The back arrow in one's browser brings you back to groworganic apples, (I think... I haven't actually tested this last. This posting is the attempted proof.)

So, here are 3 images of sick trees. (I am unsure of what is affecting the small branch. The tree on the water is probably dying from having its roots immersed in salt water. (I didn't plant it there; if it was fool enough to seed itself on the banks of a tidal river, it has only itself to blame.)

Sick Trees

Broomholm Orchard
Zone 5b in Nova Scotia

Yep! I just checked my message. It does indeed work as I suggested. AND, it comes back to groworganicapples when one clicks the back arrow.

Now I strongly suspect that the exact same method would work equally well with any other photo sharing site. And if Michael-II would be willing to advise us on what the password to get into the old album he set up for us on Photobucket is, (it no longer works, but I was able to call up images from it via old messages on GOA, so it still exists), we will be back in business, linking to a site where the image is stored, but not actually impacting GOA in any way. (And this also circumvents Michael-II's concern about inappropriately large image files.) (If M-II declines to advise on the P/W for the GOA Photobucket account, individuals can simply use any photo sharing site they subscribe to individually. But I am unsure whether it is possible to limit viewing just to the the images you currently uploaded. (One can select the image or images to be linked to, by placing check marks only on the images you want to link to, but once the viewer get into the album, I am not sure whether he/she can roam freely through the entire album beyond the originally linked images. Maybe I should experiment...)

Broomholm Orchard
Zone 5b in Nova Scotia

Last message here. I have added a photo of a Jansen's Seedling apple, (a cultiver selected by the late Fred Jansen, one of the founders of NAFEX over 60 years ago). I clicked OFF all the images except the Jansen's Seedling. If I have got it right, you should be able to see only the Jansen's Seedling, and not the 3 images of sick trees.

Jansen's Seedling Apple

Broomholm Orchard
Zone 5b in Nova Scotia

Really last one... That last didn't work. I have created a separate album, and linked specifically to it. You should now see only the apple, and not be able to see the sick trees,(which are in the main album)

Hopefully the apple alone

Broomholm Orchard
Zone 5b in Nova Scotia

Testing David's photobucket link ...

Gopher Hill Apples
Zone 8 in California



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 12/14/2019 03:44PM by Paul Weir.

Still works for me when I test it. Were you successful?

Broomholm Orchard
Zone 5b in Nova Scotia

Hi David,

Jansen Seedling's photo came through nicely . . . single photo just as you described.

Fine looking apple I might add

Paul

Gopher Hill Apples
Zone 8 in California