Rob, Any chance you can program it into the UserCP so that we have the options whether or not we want the pictures to show up as full pictures or thumbnails first? Thumbnails take all the fun out of the huge picture pages .
My IE5 keeps locking up when trying to click on the thumbnail! - Netscape wants to save the file to disk!!! Argggghhhh!!!
OK, this is something we may want to tweak. I just thought it would be better to have thumbnails so the thread loads quicker and then you can see a higher quality image if you want by clicking on it.
I definetly understand your reasoning but you could/should have it as an option in the UserCP- I have no problems with load up time on my school internet and would rather see the picture .
The problem for browsers is that the expanded image is sent as MIME type "unknown/unknown", rather than "image/jpeg", so the browser doesn't know what to do with it. Mozilla-based browsers (netscrape, galeon), ask for a helper app or save to disk. This can be fixed by fixing the mime type in the expanded image transmission html. I don't know if that's a vBulletin bug or something user settable. (evolutionm.net, also using vBulletin, displays all attachments full size, so I haven't encountered this before.) Also, FWIW, the settings on the other vBulletin forums let you see the attachments without having to log in first. I think that's a site option, as I've seen it both ways. Once the transition load is off, you might poll the members as to which way they prefer it, as some people might prefer to disable cookie logins and only enter login data to reply (as on the old board).
I concur, while change is good - too much may be a bad thing. Let's keep some similarities b/w boards. I vote for keeping original 640*480 images... --Dan
Well, we got spoiled. As "http://ferrarichat.com/forum/faq.php?faq=vb_read_and_post#faq_vb_attachment_explain" illustrates, "the board should not be used as an extension of your hard disk." I'm making a Yahoo site where, amongst many other things, images I've messed around with will be kept. It's tricky, as the page layout is based on The Golden Mean - somewhat related to Fibonacci Numbers. Butt, I digest. Point is, as with other forums I'm in (that allow one to provide links to their own images, let alone any page) Let somebody elses server (Yahoo-GeoCities, for example) provide the thrills and spills of pictures and such to upload. Bear in mind there were over 300,000 messages posted on the former location. 300,000. Dayum. Untold amounts of Megabytes - likely Gigabytes - were of images alone. Those Images load up each and every time the page is retrieved, thereby increasing the amount of K-M-G-byte traffic, as Images vastly outsize Text. Not only does this load up a server, but in turn slow it slows down the amount of time that it takes any one of us to load up a given page. It's important to bear in mind that there are simultaneous users punching in and out of any variety of threads at any given time. This is quite taxing, and, if I may paraphrase - tax is a penalty. Instant gratification comes at a price, as Paul Reubens aka PeeWee Herman might say. First and foremost, F-Chat has proved itself to be an indespensible resource for those who appreciate, attain, maintain, sustain, want, and a whole lot of other and/or's that revolve around the legendary Ferrari. Why, really, should F-Chat's server become the end-all be-all for hosting full size Images that upload each and every time a Topic is checked, too? Like I mentioned at the outset, we got spoiled. This puppy - this new Forum, is built not just for speed, but for handling - By gawd, it's a winner, and we're Test Driving the new model. Kinda like F-1, no? As a compromise, perhaps a slightly larger default thumbnail size might ease the transition. In the meantime, I just need to figure out how to do links right...
I don't see how making thumbnails will help with disk space? It still hosts the picture on Fchat's server? Unless the archived pages contain pictures thus making the files bigger? Even if that is the case, megabytes are not the expensive part of a large messageboard. Maybe I am way off, I would like to see the large pictures back though.
Makes sense, although it has been said before, maybe an option for it? Perhaps you are already working on this. Aren't most on broadband connections though?
I think that will help a lot... might even make it 320 to minimize the distortion of the common 640 sized pic. It needs to be big enough that you can fully evaluate it and are often satisfied... only needing to click through if you think... oooo, sweeet. However, as others have noted... if you haven't already fixed the mime type, that is urgent... it needs to pop the picture up cleanly... causing downloads is not cool.
