Need help posting pictures?

[Mike]

OK, I really enjoy seeing build pictures, show pictures and run pictures as much as anyone else, but I need to impose some limits. I don't want anyone to take this the wrong way, I'm not chastising anyone for doing anything wrong, so please bear with with me and keep an open mind. We had a new topic started with some run pictures and there were 60 attached images in the one post. I didn't bother adding up the sizes of all 60 images, but based on the average size, that one post added about 16 megabytes to the site's dwindling resources. We simply don't have room for 16 meg posts to start popping up, so I've had to insert some limitations on how much room can be consumed by a post's attachments. Sorry, but it had to be done.

But I'm hoping this topic will make life a bit easier for all of us. I'm going to show everyone how easy it is to open a Photobucket account, upload images to it and then link to those images from right here within the forums.

Step One - Visit Photobucket and register for a free account, if you have not already done so. The red arrow in the image will show you where you need to click to register. (Apologies, just as I grabbed that screenshot, TweetDeck displayed a new tweet to my desktop.)

Step Two - Upload images you want to share with others to your Photobucket account. See the big, green button? Click away, locate the image you want to upload to Photobucket and you're on your way.

Each image you upload will allow you to select the album you want to store it in, or the image title and/or tags you want to assign to it. Once you've done all that, save the image and you're finished.

Step Three - Sharing images is easy-peasy. All you need to understand is the very simple procedure of copying data to your operating system's clipboard and then pasting that data in another location. So pay attention and I'll show you how deadly simple this is.

Windows Users - To highlight text, press and hold down your left mouse button, highlight the text you want to copy and then release the mouse button. Now, press down the Ctrl key on your keyboard and while pressing it, press the C key, then release both keys. You have copied that text, via Ctrl-C. Now, go to wherever you want that text to appear, click on that document or form, then press Ctrl and the V key at the same time. You have just copied the text from your Windows clipboard to a new location via Ctrl-V. Ctrl-C copies and Ctrl-V pastes.

Apple Users - Follow the same instructions, substituting your command key for the Ctrl key.

I don't want to get all Star Wars techy on you, but you can also highlight text with your left mouse button, then click your right mouse button to select Copy from the pop-up menu. Go to your new document or form and left-click to insert the cursor. Then right-click and select Paste. As I said, this is the high-tech method, because it will require you to differentiate between the left mouse button and the right mouse button. Magic stuff, aye?

OK, now you should be able to copy-n-paste, right?

Select the image you want to display on the forum and hover your mouse button over it. See that menu pop up, below the image? Hover your mouse over the line marked IMG Code and left click. That will highlight the code. Now, you can copy it, with a Ctrl-C (or a right-click/Copy for you high-end technical types). Open up another window or tab in your browser and log into the forum. Decide where you want to post your image and start a post. When you are ready, paste the IMG Code into the forum text entry window with a Ctrl-V. You should see a Photobucket URL pasted into your post. The URL will have an IMG tag at the front end and a /IMG tag at the back end. Both tags will have square brackets([]) around them. Preview your post and you should now see your image, inserted into the forum post. If so, lean back in your chair and repeat after me, "Hot-diggety-damn, I just used a BBCode to insert an image into a post!"

If you're real unsure of yourself, you can always tick the checkbox directly under the image on the Photobucket page and then click on the Generate HTML and IMG Code button. That will show you some image code, most of which you will want to avoid, as I disallow HTML code on the forum. (I might have been born at night, but it wasn't last night!) Copy-n-paste the IMG code from there and copy it to your forum post and you'll get the same result.

If you're really good with the image URL, you can just copy the URL itself, click the Insert Image button -

- and paste the code in there. That will also insert your image into the post. If you are good enough to do that, you're wasting your time reading this topic.

By using the IMG code displayed in that last image here on the forum, I can display a picture of my grandbaby to the site.

The best part about it is that I can display that 114.5 kilobyte image without taking up any space on the server to do it. If I had attached the image to my post, then the image would have been uploaded to the server. I spend a bit of time each day, trying to clean out older, unused and unnecessary files from the server, because if we run out of room it's going to cost a chunk of change to upgrade. Something on the order of $80/monthly. And that's only going to get us about 50% more space and 25% more transfer, so things get very dear, very quickly. We seem to have a small and finite number of members who find the forums valuable enough to donate to their well-being and I don't care to impose on their good nature for any more than they're already donating. My only option is to keep the site lean and mean, so please help me out by using the photo album share sites to store your images. Photobucket exists for that very purpose, so please take advantage of it.

If you're using some other Photo Album site, the principles all remain the same. You need the complete image URL, wrapped in IMG tags, to make it work. And note I said the COMPLETE image URL. Everything in the image URL is required, from the opening h in http to the image file type.

If you're storing images on your own Web site, it's the same deal, all over again. Insert the complete image URL into IMG tags and go with it. If you're using HotLink Protection in an .htaccess file, be sure to whitelist tbucketeers.com so the images will appear here. If you need help with the coding for your .htaccess file, contact me via Private Message and I will get you fixed up with what you need. If you're not sure, try posting an image here. If it does not appear, then you will need to allow this domain.

Questions? Ask away.

 

[Gerry]

OK, I really enjoy seeing build pictures, show pictures and run pictures as much as anyone else, but I need to impose some limits. I don't want anyone to take this the wrong way, I'm not chastising anyone for doing anything wrong, so please bear with with me and keep an open mind. We had a new topic started with some run pictures and there were 60 attached images in the one post. I didn't bother adding up the sizes of all 60 images, but based on the average size, that one post added about 16 megabytes to the site's dwindling resources. We simply don't have room for 16 meg posts to start popping up, so I've had to insert some limitations on how much room can be consumed by a post's attachments. Sorry, but it had to be done.

But I'm hoping this topic will make life a bit easier for all of us. I'm going to show everyone how easy it is to open a Photobucket account, upload images to it and then link to those images from right here within the forums.

Step One - Visit Photobucket and register for a free account, if you have not already done so. The red arrow in the image will show you where you need to click to register. (Apologies, just as I grabbed that screenshot, TweetDeck displayed a new tweet to my desktop.)

Step Two - Upload images you want to share with others to your Photobucket account. See the big, green button? Click away, locate the image you want to upload to Photobucket and you're on your way.

Each image you upload will allow you to select the album you want to store it in, or the image title and/or tags you want to assign to it. Once you've done all that, save the image and you're finished.

Step Three - Sharing images is easy-peasy. All you need to understand is the very simple procedure of copying data to your operating system's clipboard and then pasting that data in another location. So pay attention and I'll show you how deadly simple this is.

Windows Users - To highlight text, press and hold down your left mouse button, highlight the text you want to copy and then release the mouse button. Now, press down the Ctrl key on your keyboard and while pressing it, press the C key, then release both keys. You have copied that text, via Ctrl-C. Now, go to wherever you want that text to appear, click on that document or form, then press Ctrl and the V key at the same time. You have just copied the text from your Windows clipboard to a new location via Ctrl-V. Ctrl-C copies and Ctrl-V pastes.

Apple Users - Follow the same instructions, substituting your command key for the Ctrl key.

I don't want to get all Star Wars techy on you, but you can also highlight text with your left mouse button, then click your right mouse button to select Copy from the pop-up menu. Go to your new document or form and left-click to insert the cursor. Then right-click and select Paste. As I said, this is the high-tech method, because it will require you to differentiate between the left mouse button and the right mouse button. Magic stuff, aye?

OK, now you should be able to copy-n-paste, right?

Select the image you want to display on the forum and hover your mouse button over it. See that menu pop up, below the image? Hover your mouse over the line marked IMG Code and left click. That will highlight the code. Now, you can copy it, with a Ctrl-C (or a right-click/Copy for you high-end technical types). Open up another window or tab in your browser and log into the forum. Decide where you want to post your image and start a post. When you are ready, paste the IMG Code into the forum text entry window with a Ctrl-V. You should see a Photobucket URL pasted into your post. The URL will have an IMG tag at the front end and a /IMG tag at the back end. Both tags will have square brackets([]) around them. Preview your post and you should now see your image, inserted into the forum post. If so, lean back in your chair and repeat after me, "Hot-diggety-damn, I just used a BBCode to insert an image into a post!"

If you're real unsure of yourself, you can always tick the checkbox directly under the image on the Photobucket page and then click on the Generate HTML and IMG Code button. That will show you some image code, most of which you will want to avoid, as I disallow HTML code on the forum. (I might have been born at night, but it wasn't last night!) Copy-n-paste the IMG code from there and copy it to your forum post and you'll get the same result.

If you're really good with the image URL, you can just copy the URL itself, click the Insert Image button -

- and paste the code in there. That will also insert your image into the post. If you are good enough to do that, you're wasting your time reading this topic.

By using the IMG code displayed in that last image here on the forum, I can display a picture of my grandbaby to the site.

The best part about it is that I can display that 114.5 kilobyte image without taking up any space on the server to do it. If I had attached the image to my post, then the image would have been uploaded to the server. I spend a bit of time each day, trying to clean out older, unused and unnecessary files from the server, because if we run out of room it's going to cost a chunk of change to upgrade. Something on the order of $80/monthly. And that's only going to get us about 50% more space and 25% more transfer, so things get very dear, very quickly. We seem to have a small and finite number of members who find the forums valuable enough to donate to their well-being and I don't care to impose on their good nature for any more than they're already donating. My only option is to keep the site lean and mean, so please help me out by using the photo album share sites to store your images. Photobucket exists for that very purpose, so please take advantage of it.

If you're using some other Photo Album site, the principles all remain the same. You need the complete image URL, wrapped in IMG tags, to make it work. And note I said the COMPLETE image URL. Everything in the image URL is required, from the opening h in http to the image file type.

If you're storing images on your own Web site, it's the same deal, all over again. Insert the complete image URL into IMG tags and go with it. If you're using HotLink Protection in an .htaccess file, be sure to whitelist tbucketeers.com so the images will appear here. If you need help with the coding for your .htaccess file, contact me via Private Message and I will get you fixed up with what you need. If you're not sure, try posting an image here. If it does not appear, then you will need to allow this domain.

Questions? Ask away.

Mike
I guess thats why my last few uploads of pics have failed?
Looks like I will have to bite the bullet and try this photobucket thing. You know how suspicious I am of social sites but if you say its OK then thats good enough for me. Be prepared for PM when I get all crossed up.
Gerry

Guess what. I cant see the verification letters. Huh

 

[Mike]

Gerry, you will still be able to attach 500 kilobytes of images to a post.

As for the Re-CAPTCHA, something on your end is blocking third-party images. If you're allowing javascript, then those images are being blocked at some level. Firewall software being the most likely place to look.

 

[Gerry]

Mike
I seem to remember that some time ago we were all limited to 6 pictures. If this worked, is there a need to go back to it. I try to keep the pics to a minimum because I am aware of the costs of running the forum.
Is there any mileage in limiting the number of posts a member can make in any one week or month. Just a thought.
Like you i love to see all the pics and we all go on about 'post some pictures'. so its a shame we cant muster up some more donations and give you a little slack.
What would it really take to go where it is viable to post pics as we have in the last few weeks??

Give us a wish list for donations to cover it and see what comes out of the reply's.

Maybe we can or maybe we stay as we are... who knows without asking the questions..

A word from our sponsors would help here. Is it a bad time to up the anti, considering the present climate or do you (generous, and I mean that) guys think we can do a little more..

Personally I am prepared to forgo a bottle of Merlot (you just have no idea how hard that was to say) or a take away meal, to help to forward the Bucketeers.

Kill me if you want for bringing this up. Over to you guys. Its your place as much as mine

Gerry

 

[deckofficer]

I'm sorry guys, I'm the guilty party. Not knowing there was a real cost for storage of my picture files I basically did what I was told to do by the "regulars" here on the forum, telling me when I first showed up that they all want a lot of pictures. Needless to say, I will only "Photobucket" all future picture posts. One item that did confuse me was the text the website gave me during the downloading process, something like....." 65mb used of unlimited amount" or something to that effect. Go ahead and delete the pictures and I'll do the Photobucket route.

Bob

 

[Gerry]

Bob

I dont think anyone is blaming you. We are all guilty of posting a lot of pictures, as you say we demand them. Its just so easy to put them up and forget the amount of space we take up.
Im guilty of the same thing.
Would nt want to miss out on your pictorials
Gerry

 

[Northstar T]

I don't know if it's any safer, easier, faster, or whatever..... but I've used a site called Pitcture Trail to host most of my photos for several years now and it's been 100% trouble free. the site is not free, but it is very inexpensive. I think I pay 29.95 a year for 500 pics or some such. other plans are available for less and more.

.02,

Russ,

 

[RPM]

Mike
I seem to remember that some time ago we were all limited to 6 pictures. If this worked, is there a need to go back to it. I try to keep the pics to a minimum because I am aware of the costs of running the forum.
Is there any mileage in limiting the number of posts a member can make in any one week or month. Just a thought.
Like you i love to see all the pics and we all go on about 'post some pictures'. so its a shame we cant muster up some more donations and give you a little slack.
What would it really take to go where it is viable to post pics as we have in the last few weeks??

Give us a wish list for donations to cover it and see what comes out of the reply's.

Maybe we can or maybe we stay as we are... who knows without asking the questions..

A word from our sponsors would help here. Is it a bad time to up the anti, considering the present climate or do you (generous, and I mean that) guys think we can do a little more..

Personally I am prepared to forgo a bottle of Merlot (you just have no idea how hard that was to say) or a take away meal, to help to forward the Bucketeers.

Kill me if you want for bringing this up. Over to you guys. Its your place as much as mine

Gerry

We just posted a little item for auction. I know it won't pay all the bills, but every little bit helps.

 

[GT63]

I don't know if it's any safer, easier, faster, or whatever..... but I've used a site called Pitcture Trail to host most of my photos for several years now and it's been 100% trouble free. the site is not free, but it is very inexpensive. I think I pay 29.95 a year for 500 pics or some such. other plans are available for less and more.

.02,

Russ,

I prefer to use Google's Picasa web album, It's free

 

[Northstar T]

I prefer to use Google's Picasa web album, It's free

It's been a 60 year observation of mine that very few things are truely "free". but you almost always get what you pay for.

Russ

 

[Mike]

I'm sorry guys, I'm the guilty party.

Bob, I made the comment I wasn't looking to take anyone to task. So your plea of guilty is hereby overruled. :winkn: There's no way you would have known and the way things were set up, you were allowed unlimited uploads, so you did nothing wrong.

Gerry, I am really dead-set against limiting posts. A simple post doesn't take up much room and I don't want people to start thinking something might not be important enough to share with others. That's not going to be enjoyable for anyone.

For others who have been posting suggestions for other album sites, keep them coming! I used Photobucket as an example because it is the only album site I am familiar with, so let us know about others. An option many of you may have is some available Web space from your ISP. I remember, back around the year 1632, I had a tiny, static Web site with Verizon, as they gave me a wee bit of Web space along with my account. I doubt you're going to get much space and piccies can eat it up pretty quickly, but it is a possible option.

Money. Money is always a gritty issue and with today's economic climate, it's even worse. (Here's where I could really sail into a major, political rant, but Bruce, Jim and Todd would then be required to moderate this post and I wouldn't go without a fight and it just wouldn't be pretty. :no The economy sucks and to make it worse, that doggone December holiday is already staring us in the face, reminding us how it intends to drain our financial resources. I remember the first meeting I had after the church had taken me on as pastor. I laid it out for them, point blank, and told them I was not and would never be a fund-raising clown. I think the chair of the finance committee was near a stroke that day. :shrug2: I did promise the congregation they would get their money's worth in Sunday messages and Bible study lessons. When I retired my pulpit, I had doubled the size of the average Sunday morning turnout, so they were able to bring in more revenue. I just gave everyone the very best I had to give them.

I've always tried to do the same with this site. In all honesty, whenever I came across a new technique I thought would improve traffic, it always got tested on one of the other sites in the network. I never subjected this site or its members to anything unusual. When people made what I felt were legitimate suggestions for this site, I looked at them from all angles and then tried to implement the suggestions in the very best way possible. A year ago, we were in dire straits with the vBulletin forum software. I had been comparison shopping software for months previous, so I made the decision to switch to Invision. Some members didn't care for it and left. That was part of the risk I was taking. I think, for the best part, those of you who have stuck it out have found Invision to be a better platform. The photo gallery is much more powerful than what we had with vBulletin and from the sneak peeks I've seen of the new IP.Gallery updates, we ain't seen nuthin' yet. The script that powers the Tech Library is pretty awesome, but it just refuses to take off and fly. Some of you wanted a member's map and the one we have is extremely simple, but also very flexible. I may miss my guess, but I feel when people get up the courage to use the Classifieds script, they're going to be impressed with what it can do, as well.

The downside to all of this is the expenses involved. It takes a lot of disk space to store the site. The bigger we grow, the more space we use. But we also require more transfer, as we go. If you upload a 1 megabyte post (for example), there is 1 MB of transfer, from you to the server. When someone comes along and looks at your post, there is another MB of transfer, from the server to you. Then if you reply, there is more transfer. Fortunately, we're always pretty safe with our transfer numbers, but that is a metered resource that does have a monthly limit. If we were to go over our allocation, the host will allow us more transfer, but it comes at a very, very dear price. When we moved to this server, back in April 2008, I laughed at the memory allocation. I knew there was no way we would ever come close to using all that RAM. A year ago, the host offered preferred customers a perk in the form of 50% more memory and it was a good thing they did. And if we continue to grow at our current rate, we're going to need that much more, within the next 8-10 months.

I have been kicking around the idea of opening up a general street rod/hot rod forum site. I think our record here supports the fact we have a pretty solid, working formula for forum operation. So much so, that I think I could really give some of the established forums a run for their money. The one thing holding me back is that same demon - money. A general site would not be so narrow in focus and would have the potential for attracting a lot more users, which would mean trying to keep up with the server resources would be even more hectic than it is here. That could be a good thing. I have a pal up in the Chicago area that owns a handful of automotive forums, netting (not grossing, but netting) him between $8K and $10K in revenue, every month. If a forum can provide revenue like that, you can afford to buy more resources. I don't have the exact tally in front of me, but our bottom line for October was a negative $30, or so, because of all the license renewals. The month before, we netted something around $25, so the negative income months get washed out. But when I'm faced with an additional $75 - $80/month additional server expenses to step up to the next level, it's really tough to set back enough money to make that a reality. So, I keep trying to shed dead weight wherever I can.

The reality of all this comes down to the fact that we're going to start splitting the seams on our current hosting package and that is going to happen within the year, if growth holds up to the projections. We have two options; A) purchase a larger hosting package that is priced dearly, or B) start eliminating some of the resources on this site. I don't think anyone wants to see the site reduce its features and functions, but the alternative involves spending money.

I don't mean to speak poorly of hosting companies, even though there are some that deserve it. But they all offer entry level hosting packages that are unrealistically priced. I always get a kick when I see someone complaining about a host that offers unlimited storage and un-metered bandwidth for $4.95/month. But they get people who sign up and within 2-3 months, everyone is disillusioned because their sites will barely run. Well, go figure, you've got a gazillion Web sites trying to run on a server that cannot handle 100 sites. When it comes time to start improving on the packages, the prices start growing by leaps and bounds. This site opened in October 2006 and the annual hosting expense was less than our current monthly expense. I now spend more in a single month than our entire first year cost me. Ask some of the forum members that have been here for the whole ride and they will be able to tell you about clicking on links and then waiting as mush as 60-90 seconds for the page to load. It was painful! But the cost to make the site run like it does today is pretty painful, too.

If you think an additional $80/month for hosting is scary, let me really take your breath away. That move would likely keep us in good stead for 18-24 months. The step after that one? Add yet another $100/month. :wow: See why I mother-hen the resources on this site? In 3-4 years, our hosting expenses could double! :faint: And from there, we graduate into running the site on multiple servers, so the cost doubles again.

What, me worry?

 

[Gerry]

Mike
Perhaps I was not clear on my post. I was suggesting a limit of 6 Pictures per post not 6 posts per month.
I appreciate all your efforts and hope we can come through this. I would hate to lose or find the Buckteers amalgamated with a general rod site.
I ahve also signed up with Photobucket... so there!
Gerry