Improving TXP Image Management

jameslomax · 2009-07-24 17:03:01

what about now?

I have, quite literally, been waiting years for txp image management to improve.

Bloke · 2009-07-24 17:18:03

jameslomax wrote:

what about now? I have, quite literally, been waiting years for txp image management to improve.

Well I’m on the team now. I want image support to improve so I’ll do what I can to help make that happen. No promises of course, but it’s an issue close to my heart :-)

If I get a chance to review this colossal thread and distill it down to something that makes sense for the majority of users, we can go from there. Of course, if somebody with more free time / better vision than me would like to consolidate the central ideas in this thread and present them for discussion either here or in a new topic, it would help immensely.

P.S. If you look on the issues tracker you’ll see that item #4 is a grid view for images. Once the UI obstacles are tackled, it should pave the way for some of the other things to improve image support.

iblastoff · 2009-07-24 18:06:33

there was sort of a thread summary posted here but it didn’t seem to get too far:

http://textpattern.net/wiki/index.php?title=Talk:Improved_Image_Handling

personally my biggest beef with image handling is the way they don’t seem to have any real integration or sensible workflow with articles at all (at least out of the box.) it seems kind of silly to expect a user to:

1) click away from the article write tab you’re working on to navigate to the image tab
2) upload an image. memorize the silly image number
3) go back to the article tab to load the article you were working on just so you can return to the write tab and manually type in the number to attach to the article

now, of course certain plugins improve this workflow but from my viewpoint, the way it is out of the box doesn’t work at all and should be a core issue to fix.

Last edited by iblastoff (2009-07-24 18:08:23)

masa · 2009-07-24 21:28:13

Bloke wrote:

If you look on the issues tracker you’ll see that item #4 is a grid view for images.

Yes, multiple columns would be brilliant to have.

Now to take this even further, I would love to see image names, alt texts and captions displayed and the option to do quick edits right within that grid without the need to click on individual images – that would be delirious :-)

As Steve mentions a simple image upload from the write tab would be a nice addition, but personally I’ve found that once you show your end users how to open the write tab and the images tab in separate browser tabs and switch between them, this is hardly an issue anymore.

If an image upload from the write tab would be implemented, you’d also need to add some kind of limiter/automatic resize function (e.g. blogger). In my experience 95% of users just don’t have any understanding of pixel sizes and will happily try to upload full-size jpegs from their 12 MP cameras.

jameslomax · 2009-09-21 18:37:55

“the way it is out of the box doesn’t work at all and should be a core issue to fix”

I agree – it doesn’t actually work, and given the importance of images (magazines, catalogues, newspapers, e commerce…..you name it, you use images), I don’t understand why this has been so neglected, for literally years.

jsoo · 2009-09-23 14:52:00

frangarcia wrote:

I think it would be nice to have the possibility to manage de images as well as the articles can be managed using a massive way to do some actions, like changing the category, the author or just deleting them.

As of Txp 4.2.0 we can now change image authors via the multi-edit form in the main image list. (Something I’ve wanted for years.) If this was announced I missed it; don’t see it in HISTORY.txt (or mentioned here, or anywhere else). But there it is. You’ll only see the option if you already have multiple image authors.

THANK YOU, DEVS!

philwareham · 2009-11-17 13:10:20

Hi there,
Anyone know if there are planned improvements to the admin images section now that TXP4.2.0 is out of the door? From what I have read on this (rather lengthy) topic people are really craving the following…

1. A better gallery view structure for the images section, based on multiple columns and possibly category folders etc.
2. A way to find and delete unused batches of images, or an indicator as to if and where an image has been used at all in articles.
3. A more intuitive way of inserting images into articles instead of jumping between multiple pages of the admin area.

kvnmcwebn · 2009-11-17 13:59:34

It has been said before but image names instead of id’s would be great at some stage.
It would help search engine rankings for photographers and artists websites big time.

philwareham · 2009-11-17 14:09:43

kvnmcwebn wrote:

It has been said before but image names instead of id’s would be great at some stage.
It would help search engine rankings for photographers and artists websites big time.

Yeah, I second that. Although TXP does rename image files on upload (to their ID no) it still keeps a record of the original filename so I guess it would be really easy to spoof that filename instead of the renamed image. I’ve always found it strange that for file uploads TXP keeps the original filename intact but for images it renames them.

Bloke · 2009-11-17 14:22:24

philwareham wrote:

Anyone know if there are planned improvements to the admin images section

Planned yes. Implementation time scale depends on whether I still have a job next week or not :-o

A better gallery view structure for the images section

Some kind of grid-based layout would be nice, though I’m struggling to make the multi-select a reality. Nothing seems intuitive enough, and loading jQuery UI as a component to allow draggable selections is not really an option (it’d double the size of TXP’s codebase for a start!). Needs some more thought.

A way to find and delete unused batches of images, or an indicator as to if and where an image has been used at all in articles.

Unlikely to be implemented. Think of the myriad different ways an image could be used: it could be a number in a custom field, the image name or number itself in an article image (perhaps as a list if using a gallery plugin), it could be used in a txp:image, txp:thumbnail or gallery plugin tag, or simply referenced by category in a Form. And that’s just off the top of my head. Keeping track of and/or finding all instances of an image is probably not going to add any conceivable benefit compared to the amount of code it’d take to make it bulletproof. Always willing to be shown a way of doing it, but I can’t see it happening.

A more intuitive way of inserting images into articles instead of jumping between multiple pages of the admin area.

Plugin territory. There’s no way the core could anticipate all the needs of users and present something usable. Some might simply want a dropdown list of images near the article_image field. Some might want image thumbs to be shown down there. Some might want the fullsize image to be shown on hover. Some might want a full lightbox image chooser. Whichever one we choose, someone will want something else or it won’t fit.

Given the intense platformisation effort that wet undertook for 4.2.0 and the effort I’m going to behind the scenes to make the admin-side DOM a little more pleasant to work with, hooking into the existing markup and providing plugins to fill the above needs is the way forward.

I would add that a personal item (4) on the list should be better client-side image display tags and to (internally) promote images to first class citizens alongside files and links. That’s also very much a goal of mine. Balancing the number of tags required to get stuff out of the database vs making it too unwieldy is the focus of my current inner turmoil :-) For example: <txp:image_width />, <txp:image_height />, <txp:thumbnail_width />, <txp:thumbnail_height />, <txp:image_extension />, <txp:image_date />, blah blah is waaay too much clutter. <txp:image_info type="thumbnail_width" />, and so on is perhaps too terse and some of the tags require options which need to be served to specific tags. So there has to be some compromise between functionality and verbosity. I whittled it down to a group of tags with related attributes (I can post my current thinking if you’re interested). Any pointers, thoughts or improvements greatly appreciated.

As far as renaming images goes, I think the numbering system is too ingrained to change. But if anyone knows more about search engine image meta data and how it’s used, please enlighten us. I can’t believe that an image becomes unsearchable on Google Images, for example, just because it’s called DSC_1783.jpg instead of MyShavedPoodle.jpg. Somewhere along the line, the search engines must grab some meta information about that image so it’s indexable. If that’s all it takes to make the images more visible then that’s what we should do, imo. Is that where alt and title come in, or are there new attributes in HTML5 that we can support?

Last edited by Bloke (2009-11-17 14:23:08)

lunchbox · 2009-11-24 02:28:08

Having read through the majority of this thread’s 300+ posts, I’m still at a loss as to why Textpattern insists on renaming images when they’re uploaded. I understand the bit about conflicting file names, but I don’t see why images can’t be treated like other files: with a unique ID for hooking purposes and a proper filename for semantic ones. Am I missing something? Is there perhaps a plugin or established workaround that allows for this functionality? Do I need to upload all of my images via the Files tab and forgo the help of the various image tag hooks just to have functional filenames?

I apologize if I’m way out to lunch on this, but it just seems like a peculiar way of doing things, especially when all other file uploads are treated in the way that I’d like images to be treated.

Quite apart from that, it’s incredibly disconcerting that this thread has been around for what will soon be four years, with (as near as I can tell), very little to show for it. I saw several offers from people in this thread to “ransom” (which means “fund the development of,” I presume) a plug-in if one was forthcoming, and still nothing has happened. Can someone explain this to me? I’m brand new to Textpattern, and would very much like to like it – I bought the book and everything – but this sort of thing is frankly terrifying to someone approaching the platform from the outside.

masa · 2009-11-24 13:51:29

lunchbox wrote:

I understand the bit about conflicting file names, but I don’t see why images can’t be treated like other files: with a unique ID for hooking purposes and a proper filename for semantic ones.

This comes up every now and then, but telling from past discussions, this is highly unlikely to change. Textpattern has worked like this since the beginning and the required changes would probably be substantial.

It bothers neither me nor my clients. I prefer simple sequential numbering to the randomish, long, alphanumeric text strings that some other CMSs assign to images.
Are there actually any CMSs, that don’t assign their own internal names to images?

If you’re worried about search engines, you should make sure to write descriptive alt texts and captions for your images. Google image search examines the surrounding text to decide whether an image is relevant. And it does a really good job of finding images despite them having cryptic names.

That said, this thread, as far as I recall, is mostly about improving the Images tab and image handling from a user’s perspective. Some issues, like the ability to change the category/delete multiple images at once, have been addressed since. Others, such as a multi-column display, would be very nice to have and present a real improvement in terms of usability.

Last edited by masa (2009-11-24 16:08:41)

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#337 2009-07-24 17:03:01

Re: Improving TXP Image Management

#338 2009-07-24 17:18:03

Re: Improving TXP Image Management

#339 2009-07-24 18:06:33

Re: Improving TXP Image Management

#340 2009-07-24 21:28:13

Re: Improving TXP Image Management

#341 2009-09-21 18:37:55

Re: Improving TXP Image Management

#342 2009-09-23 14:52:00

Re: Improving TXP Image Management

#343 2009-11-17 13:10:20

Re: Improving TXP Image Management

#344 2009-11-17 13:59:34

Re: Improving TXP Image Management

#345 2009-11-17 14:09:43

Re: Improving TXP Image Management

#346 2009-11-17 14:22:24

Re: Improving TXP Image Management

#347 2009-11-24 02:28:08

Re: Improving TXP Image Management

#348 2009-11-24 13:51:29

Re: Improving TXP Image Management

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