Photo Gallery Forums

If the Mainmenu is set to show automatically when the gallery loads and if a photo is linked directly, f.ex http://dance-corner.net/iv2beta/?theme= ... _7152.JPG/ the menu will not close and is shown over the photo until the menu is touched. Tested with IE7 and FF3. I think it should hide automatically when any of the other controls is klicked.

Krgds,

Initially I think I don't agree with you. The point of having the "startopen" setting for the main menu, is to keep it open until the user actually rolls over and out of the menu itself. Only then is it certain that the main menu has been in the visitors focus before the menu disappears. Having the menu disappear on a range of other unrelated events goes against the reason, and would be hard to integrate.

When you use the startopen feature, you are telling the visitor "hello, look at me and roll over me please" before it closes. I don't see any other reason for having it set to startopen=true at all.

Why not consider removing the startopen setting, and instead making the "main menu" text bigger, bolder and stronger color? It would be hard for any visitor to ignore ...

Yes, maybe. I can see your point and agree this is not a bug.

The menu is ok while one enters at the frontpage but that is not allways wanted when there is a direct link. But I would like to suggest a setting that would allow to close the menu automatically either after a preset time or when the viewer klicks on some of the controls or the photo itself and triggers an event?

Can I ask why you feel it is required on frontpage but under direct links? Will direct links not also be for users who perhaps visit the gallery for the first time?

I have the following policy:
# The advantage of using the startshow=true for the main menu, is that it is clearly visible and intuitive to new users. The disadvantage is that for people who have used the gallery before, it is not required being visible at start, and may even be annoying.

I do see your point though. I'll see what I can do ...

Can I ask why you feel it is required on frontpage but under direct links? Will direct links not also be for users who perhaps visit the gallery for the first time?

This is certainly true in many cases, but it could be also the opposite. Photographing an event often means a lot of photograps. A viewer want to send a link of a particular photo to someone he knows has interest in it and maybe not so much in the other photograps in the same gallery and/or does not want to browse through the mass to find this one. And he is probable also quite used to to the gallery too and does not want to have the menu infront of the photos, atleast it should disappear in a moment. A new user is actually entering the site first time from the frontpage, he could benefit of a glue where to start. After that the menu should be as subtle as possible.

At the moment I'm not really sure what is the best setup for myself, just playing around and triyng the possibilities to evaluate. A lot of really great new features and I'm glad if you could see what is doable here. Thx