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kimlaine
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Joined: 17 Jul 2008, 05:36

05 Aug 2008, 08:36

Hi,

thx for your reply.
Another option would be some function to "update theme" so it adds missing settings based on the theme_default.xml. This may be a little tricky though if we delete settings, or move them around. Definitely something to think about!
That's exactly what I'm looking for.

And I fully understand it would be somewhat complicated. Also that it might not be on the top of the To-Do list... There are manual ways to overcome this issue and they are not too difficult either, it is just confusing to find out whether you've misunderstood some functionality or if there is a small difference in the setting-files. I think at this moment it's more or less a "Nice to have" feature, f.ex. the sales, e-mail funtionalities would come much before on my short list. Still I think this could be something to think about to enhance the maintainability of the coming production versions.

Thx for considering,
Kimi
Dance-Corner.net
 
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kimlaine
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Joined: 17 Jul 2008, 05:36

07 Aug 2008, 11:22

OK,

7th August version is now updated and the theme is also modified to utilize some of the new features. Very nicenew possibilities, thx :-)

There is a thumbnail showing above the maincontrols when the scroller in the middle where the amounts are shown, is used. When the maincontrols are aligned Top the thumbnail is still shown above the maincontrols, not under to actually be visible on the stage. Either it should be automatically under the maincontrols or there should be a parameter to deside where the thumbnail is shown.

Any schedule for the e-mail module yet?

Kind regards,
Kimi
Dance-Corner.net
 
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mjau-mjau
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Joined: 30 Sep 2006, 03:37

08 Aug 2008, 02:05

Thanks for the tip on maincontrols thumbnails issue. We'll fix it ...

The email module will be available shortly ...
 
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kimlaine
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14 Aug 2008, 14:58

Thx again :-)

Updated to the 14th August version, the send link module and contac forms are now up'n running. Just fantastic. In the previous version the send e-mail had a log, did not see any glue of it here?

The automatically hiding menu when entering from a link works great for me now also, thx for that.

What I did not figure out yet was the new custom description functionality, did not get the "custom" field visible in the admin even if I tried to follow the instructions, any tips where to look first? Could it be something in the custom theme, I've tried to modify it according to the changes in the structure using Beyond Compare but maybe I missed something?

And again thank you for the continuously great work. I suppose we are close to seeing a release candidate soon?

krgds,
Kimi
Dance-Corner.net
 
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mjau-mjau
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15 Aug 2008, 07:29

Would you be able to provide me login to your admin? I don't see why the custom field should not be available for images ...
 
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kimlaine
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15 Aug 2008, 13:35

Thx for your support. Just rechecked everything and found the mistake in the setup... now everything works fine.
Kimi
Dance-Corner.net
 
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kimlaine
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Joined: 17 Jul 2008, 05:36

Beta now ugraded to the X2 release

24 Dec 2008, 08:26

Just upgraded to the X2 release. Just needed to look into the custom theme and everything seems to be up'n running fine.

Thank you Karl for an exellent job and product :D

Merry Xmas for everyone
Last edited by kimlaine on 25 Dec 2008, 03:51, edited 1 time in total.
Kimi
Dance-Corner.net
 
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mjau-mjau
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Joined: 30 Sep 2006, 03:37

25 Dec 2008, 00:28

Very nicely configured gallery - Nice and compact, and you have focused on the viewing experience! Great for browsing the photos! Also, your web server seems very fast -

I do have a few minor comments:

# In image-mode, the thumbnails in the thumbnailscroller at the bottom are hard to find because you have set them to autohide in addition to the autohide attached to the maincontrols. This means you have to roll mouse to very bottom of the screen before they appear(instead of simply below the image). Personally, I wouldn't use the thumbnailscroller in your gallery anyway, because it looks and works cleanly without - so you could consider removing entirely? On the other hand, the thumbnailscroller actually pre-caches the thumbnails, so maybe it's a good idea anyway? Just a thought-raiser ...

# The large arrow buttons for "next" and "previous" are a bit hard to see with the dark color on the dark background. You could consider changing their color to something slightly more visible ...
 
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kimlaine
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Joined: 17 Jul 2008, 05:36

25 Dec 2008, 04:06

Hi,
mjau-mjau wrote: Very nicely configured gallery - Nice and compact, and you have focused on the viewing experience! Great for browsing the photos! Also, your web server seems very fast -
thx for your comments :D and it has to be pretty fast, some 8 million photos/year are viewed in the gallery...
mjau-mjau wrote: # In image-mode, the thumbnails in the thumbnailscroller at the bottom are hard to find because you have set them to autohide in addition to the autohide attached to the maincontrols. This means you have to roll mouse to very bottom of the screen before they appear(instead of simply below the image). Personally, I wouldn't use the thumbnailscroller in your gallery anyway, because it looks and works cleanly without - so you could consider removing entirely? On the other hand, the thumbnailscroller actually pre-caches the thumbnails, so maybe it's a good idea anyway? Just a thought-raiser ...
Yes, been playing around with this one. At the moment it's a made available for those who like to use it but but aside while just viewing the photos. I think the scroller is usable when the amount of photos in a folder is limited but hard to use when there are more... the scrolling speed is just too fast then to be able to easily pick up the right photo. Anyway, some like to use it and this way it is available.
mjau-mjau wrote: # The large arrow buttons for "next" and "previous" are a bit hard to see with the dark color on the dark background. You could consider changing their color to something slightly more visible ...
Agree, I'll look into that.

BTW, would enjoy some documentation of the css-files that would show exactly where each item effects. Some items are very easy to figure out, some need a bit of try and error before the right item to edit can be found. Have not looked into the documentation lately and it could already be ready, of course?
Kimi
Dance-Corner.net
 
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mjau-mjau
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25 Dec 2008, 05:26

I did a CSS stylesheet reference list here:
viewtopic.php?t=4270

What you are looking for?
 
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kimlaine
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25 Dec 2008, 13:10

Thx, nothing anymore, fine with this :-)

Sorry for not looking for this before mentioning.

Another thing though. There is now some sales functionality already in this version. Basically you have to edit it separately for each photo you want to be sellable... if I remember right you mentioned in one topic earlier a more advanced sales module would be available later. Any schedule for that?
Kimi
Dance-Corner.net
 
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mjau-mjau
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Joined: 30 Sep 2006, 03:37

26 Dec 2008, 01:41

kimlaine wrote:Another thing though. There is now some sales functionality already in this version. Basically you have to edit it separately for each photo you want to be sellable... if I remember right you mentioned in one topic earlier a more advanced sales module would be available later. Any schedule for that?
Yes, there is a basic "purchase" system that allows you to create separate "purchase links" for each image. It is like you say not an e-commerce/cart system.

We will consider some improved e-commerce integration for the next few months, but we would like to get some feedback on how users want it. The basic difference between the purchase system now, and a more "advanced shopping cart", is that the visitor will be able to "add" items to a "cart" before they "check out". Depending on the payment processor, the checkout procedure would vary, so we would most likely go for a default interation with paypal. You would still need to add a few specific parameters to each and every image so they can be forwarded to the payment processor(I don't see how it can be done any other way).

Any comments are appreciated.
 
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kimlaine
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26 Dec 2008, 05:32

Hi,

Please, feel free to move this answer to the Features part of the forum if you think it would be better there.

Products

I would like to be able to define products, an ID, Description, Price and Currency. ID for obvious purpose, Description to define the product, fex: "Full Size JPG", "10x15cm Glossy" or "A3 Fine Art" etc. Not sure how the currency is passed to PayPal but PayPal could take care of the actual payment currency if you can define the currency for the price.

Cart

A simple cart to collect the products and check out.

Payment

Integration to PayPal. I would not like to enter any specific parameters to each and every photo, could the filename/filenames be passed to identify the photos, the Product ID for the particular product/products, then price and currency?

Other

What could be considered is VAT percentage and whether it should be included or not. Somebody might be interested in a coupon system to give dicounts. BUT, I would of cource like to keep the firts version as simple as possible, these might be ideas for a later version of the module.
Kimi
Dance-Corner.net
 
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mjau-mjau
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Joined: 30 Sep 2006, 03:37

28 Dec 2008, 00:41

Hmm... I never considered it like that - I always though the picture itself was the "product", but I see it could work your way also. Of course without ID's or specific data per image, it would not be possible to create an automated response(for example like we have when you purchase imagevue).

The data for the image would be forwarded simply as text, that would be handled by you, and viewed by your user(of course).

# As I see it, you would now need to fill in price for every product for every picture ... Eg. several product prices per picture. The only other option would be that ALL prices for all your pictures were identical across the line of "products".
 
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kimlaine
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Joined: 17 Jul 2008, 05:36

28 Dec 2008, 08:05

The new url for the X2 version is now:

Dance-Corner
mjau-mjau wrote:Hmm... I never considered it like that - I always though the picture itself was the "product", but I see it could work your way also. Of course without ID's or specific data per image, it would not be possible to create an automated response(for example like we have when you purchase imagevue).

The data for the image would be forwarded simply as text, that would be handled by you, and viewed by your user(of course).
Exactly. The idea of a particular picture of being a "product" is ok as long as you have a few photos to sell, actually the existing functionality would support that quite well already. But if you have more than a few photos to sell I believe you do not want to maintain this on a per photo basis but define a set of products once and connect these to the photos
mjau-mjau wrote:# As I see it, you would now need to fill in price for every product for every picture ... Eg. several product prices per picture. The only other option would be that ALL prices for all your pictures were identical across the line of "products".
Yes, the option where all prices would be similar acros the line of products. If this is not possible or good enough, then of cource it would be nice if one could create several product sets that could be aplied one at a time to each folder... a bit more complicated though.

What if you could either define the price per picture or if not defined on that level then use a default product based pricelist?

About PayPal. I think it would be a nice option if you could send in the contents of the shopping cart without a payment with PayPal. When larger printsizes are provided I would like to verify if the photo is really printable to that size with good quality before acepting and confirming the payment. In this option I would send a manual invoice (via PayPal or something else) and take care of the payment myself.

Edit: corrected the new url.
Kimi
Dance-Corner.net