Photo Sharing Sites Free for Troubleshooters

I mentioned a few days ago that I was starting work on a simple file sharing site for photographers wishing to store their images so that they can maintain control of them as well as link them to forum or blog posts.

I kind of needed to do it for myself as well as the FileUpload Utility webpage script that I wrote many years - while working fantastically - - - did not allow me to view the thousands of images that I have stored in the directory, for managing them. So I have ended up with many duplicate image files in that directory, that are being used on different websites.

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So a few days later - - - I have been working hard building a website application (hand coding from scratch as I always do), that will be pratical as well as relatively easy to use and manage (my motivation behind all scripts that I write). The look of the site is something that should appeal to photographers - simple - bigger thumbnails - key navigation - creation of galleries to store different kinds of content. The Pièce de résistance is the Info section (push the blue "i" button on the top right of each thumbnail) that has assembled code snippets for Sharing your image files - that simply need to be copied and pasted into your document.

DEMO HERE - http://demo.arwpic.com

(uploading and gallery creation and file editing are not activated in the demo - for security reasons. The final product has a secure login page to enter)

So what I am looking for at this time, are 2 or 3 troubleshooters to let me know of issues and offer suggestions - as I finish of the script over the next week. For your coopertaion, you will be provided with a FREE Gallery account that you can maintain as long as you like. The accounts allow up to 1GB of disk space - which will be good for thousands of web sized images for posting and sharing online.

A domain name will be provide for each account such as www.billjones.arwpic.com (doesn't exist so don't bother clicking it). If prefered, a real domain name can be attached to the account. There is no FTP access as everything will be accomplished through this File Manager that I have built.

I do not plan on making this File Sharing Website available to just everyone. I will be hand setting up the accounts so that I can control the type of people that I want using the server. That will be a safeguard for everyone - as people can't sign up and upload malicious files that cause havock with others.

I should have the initial build fully functioning by Monday or Tuesday and that is when I will set up the accounts for those 2 or 3 people who wish to help me out in finetuning the site. Please contact me through this forum or email me if you are interested in the $20/year value for free forever.

Anyone else is welcome to comment on what the Website looks like so far - - - I would be happy to take any suggestions into consideration.


Rob

I want to let you know that I am not trying to pull anything over on anyone - - - I sincerely would love some feedback on this project that I am coding and putting together.

I would also love to have a few eager helpers who I would give free for life accounts to - who would simply let me know as they run into issues while using their site. Nothing more than that, unless they feel the need to provide extra feedback on things that are annoying or could be improved. 6 years ago, when I developed my CrazySite application - I benefitted greatly from the hand full of troubleshooters who helped me out in the same way.

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So an update as well:

As I am progressing, I am trying to provide a much more modern interface - currently a little bit more like Pinterest than a normal gallery. I want it to be as fast loading as possible (unlike my experiene with my Flickr account). I want it to be effortless to manage and operate. I want it cross browser compatable as possible. Different galleries can be created for organizing.

Most useful from the standpoint of people who post the images online or want to share them - - - is the built in feature of providing the code for pasting into documents or webpages.

And something new I started on last night . . .

. . . I am integrating the Pixlr API into the website so that any image can open the editor - where processing can be done - and then saved back to the server. It is now functional in my Demo (saving is not however).


THE LINK TO THE DEMO (you can click on "Open in Pixlr Express") - http://demo.arwpic.com/index.php?action=fileinfo&crnt=2


Here are a few screen shots to give you an idea of the look.



I look forward to your thoughts. Thanks.



Rob

I commend this to you to try out. I trust Robert completely!

Asher

Well - the site is shaping up wonderfully - - - but still in troubleshooting phase. I can still handle 1 or 2 more helpers if there are any volunteers who are inclined that way.

The last few days have been long - with me buring the candle at both ends - trying to get the complex coding done that isn't visible from the front end. Much of it having to do with security and functionality.

The additions completed and added today, have to do with the functioning of your Galleries. This recent coding had to do with providing a Gallery Panel for the purpose of Creating New Galleries, Deleting Current Galleries as well as Displaying the Properties of each Gallery. It is accessed by clicking on the square blue info button at the top of the Galleries Menu.

The Gallery Panel contains editing blocks for each Gallery that will allow customization of different Properties such as . . .

. . . the Title can be customized to a name that suits you
. . . a useful Description can be added to keep track of what a particular Gallery is used for
. . . very importantly, permissions can be set for each Gallery allowing the gallery to be Public (showing on the page when not logged in), Private (the gallery name shows on the menu when not logged in, but a password is required to view the gallery - very useful for showing clients or friends), as well as Hidden (the gallery name does not show in the menu when not logged in, but is available when logged in)
. . . a password can be assigned to each gallery to accomodate logging in to view a Private gallery
. . . lastly, there is a Protected setting - which basically disables the Delete button on the gallery when set to "Yes". This saves accidental deleting of galleries that are valuable

Within the Gallery Panel, New Galleries can be Created as well as current galleries Deleted.

I will be coding for a while yet - getting all that I want in place.

The Gallery has actually morphed into something that I didn't plan at the start. When I came up with the idea last week - it was to have a storage space for images that need to be hotlinked to forums or blogs. It has since turned out to be a wonderful online gallery for displaying sets of images to friends or clients. An elegant, modern interface and I am working hard on making it as fast a loading site as the large 220 pixel thumbnails will allow. As well it has remote file downloading ability and built in image editing. I'm pretty tickled with what's coming together.


Rob

I just gave the Remote File Uploading a real workout on my own Gallery where I will be storing all of my finished work (non-professional).

I downloaded 148 files from my Facebook account - - - and it went flawlessly. I just right clicked on the Facebook image and clicked on "Copy Image Location" and then pasted the url in the Remote Download input - - - and voila. Couldn't be any easier (except for having to do them one at a time)

The Buskerfest I shot this summer is the first Facebook Grab that I tried with the 148 shots - http://robertwatcher.arwpic.com/index.php?gallery=13453250425987


Let me know if that many thumbnails are taking too long on your system. I will probably incorporate a Lazy Load similar to what you see on sites where when you reach the end of the visible page - more thumbnails load in.


Rob

I made some more major headway today - getting the customizing of galleries set up - rewriting more of the html code to be more stable on a variety of web browsers . . .


. . . and the really cool thing is that very nice image editing is totally incorporated into the Groovin Gallery. That means - not only can the image be taken directly into Pixlr from where it resided - but also after alterations are made, it then saves the new file back to the arwpic.com server and is placed into your specified Gallery.

So all kinds of normal color correcting and cleaning up and cropping and resizing can be done effortlessly online - - - but as well all kinds of cool effects from faded colors to textures to borders and abstracts like this. And then once the image was saved into my gallery, I just had to grab the preformatted code with the tags to paste here:

[CENTER][IMG]http://robertwatcher.arwpic.com/13453386514790/Copy_13431912278135_wierdbuilding.jpg

ORIGINAL shot from one of my galleries at robertwatcher.arwpic.com that was opened and then resaved after editing:




OR THIS AND THIS (just for the fun of it)





[/CENTER]




Rob