Pictures

Well I have thought about offering this for quite some time when issues come up like people posting pictures on Yahoo and I have decided to put it up for discussion. I have my own domain or actually two domains that point at the same website (www.cooladdress.org & www.the-westons.org). I started with the-westons.org. After 4 or 5 years I found a better web hosting provider. I then got the cooladdress.org domain and created a new website. Once it was up and running I transferred my oniginal domain to them and parked it on my new domain, so both domain names go to the same website.

I started this way back when I was changing dial-up ISPs to DSL and finally to cable. All I was looking for was my own domain for permanent hosted email. I also did not like Yahoo, HotMail, MSN or any of the other free providers. I was shocked to find how cheap full hosting is. It is only $84 per year and $10 for the additional domain at my new provider (www.bluehost.com). I have 15 GB of webspace and up to 2500 email address for that price. I would not even have a problem paying another $10 per year for an additional domain just for these pictures. This would be a totally different website from my present ones.

I am only using about 1 GB of webspace now. I would not want to leave the pictures up forever, but I would be interested in providing space for pictures for 2 or 3 months. I have no problem setting aside say 5 GB of space for these pictures. These could be higher resolution picture of special things. The two things that prompted this are pictures of the 2007 TMs and the 2006 Jubilee.

What do people think? Good idea or bad idea or is it worth doing?

I think it would be a great idea to post them for a limited time. I have to reduce the size of my pictures and still have problems posting all the pictures people have asked to see. it would be nice to post bigger/clearer pictures if even just for a short time.

Bill

As I mentioned in a different thread, WebShots.com is free and you can have about 50 albums with 50 pictures each. You can make the albums private or open to the public. I've used WebShots for years so I joined for a nominal fee and now I can have 200 albums with a couple hundred pictures in each. You can leave the pictures on there as long as you want. I've had some on there since 2001! Here's my pictures - http://community.webshots.com/user/erdman_jf - and you can upload pretty much any size you want.

Bill, I will get another domain and get a new website setup. I am a Network Engineer and one of the three of us has left for another job in the company. I have been pretty busy, because of the extra workload at work, so it might be a month or so before I get it done.

Jim, thanks for the info, but I love having complete control of my website and email. The biggest advantage is email. I can have 2500 email acounts, but unlimited email forwarders. Everytime I register software, signup for a forum, enter a contest or anyhting else that may send SPAM my way, I create a new email forwarder. When email is sent to that email address it gets forwarded to one of my personal accounts. If I start getting SPAM or when the contest is complete, I just delete the forwarder.

I just wanted to update everyone. I almost have things ready to go. I have purchased the new domain name and have a functional website now. Bill is the first users and has put the first photos in an album. I am not quite ready to post the domain name yet. I still need to create some instructions, although Bill found the new album and posted photos before I had a chance to give him any. I am looking for a few more victims, oops I mean guinea pigs, no that is beta test users. If you are interested, please send me a private message.

Thanks, Doug

Another quick update. I have been busily work this evening. The instructions have been created. I think Bill is going to post them in: "TrailManor information you won't find anywhere else". Right now I think the go live date will be Saturday or Sunday. I would like a few more beta test users to try and see if they catch any issues Bill or I missed. I also need to tweak a few of my settings in the new site to make sure it behaves the way I want it too.

Well now I am really ready for some test users. The old version of XoopsGallery I was using was very limited in features. I decided to move to the new feature rich version. Unfortunately that was not totally compatible with the version of the content management system called XOOPS I was using. I have both upgraded now. If you have photos you want to post, but need high resolution or if resizing is to difficult or if it is too difficult to figure out how to do it in the forum, send me a private message. XoopsGallery is user friendly and takes care of any needed resizing automatically. I am also comfortable posting the link to the website which is www.tmphotos.org. I have uploaded a few photos. I have created an album for Bill. Hopefully he will upload some photos so there are more to see. I am working on some basic instructions. When complete, Bill will help me post them in "TrailManor information you won't find anywhere else" and I will also post them on the main page of the new website.

Okay, it is official, the TrailManor Photo Album at www.tmphotos.org is open to all forum users. Bill has moved my instructions for getting an album and uploading/posting photos to: "TrailManor information you won't find anywhere else". As the instructions say, please ask questions about the Photo Gallery on www.tmphotos.org. I can only has 50 Private Messages here, so I would like to use them for album requests.