Implemented Integrate a more comprehensive Albums solution?

[Ludachris]

I do like the Images tab and the way it works currently. But I also have been putting a lot of thought into how I can make the showcases more inviting to users, and make the showcases a bigger focal point of the site.

One thing I thought of was allowing the user to create albums within their showcase. This way they can organize their photos better and upload more of them. I was thinking maybe there would be a way to integrate Showcase with the Xen Gallery plugin from sonnb, since that plugin is built around the user album structure.

Not sure how many others would want this.

 

[Bob]

Would like to hear more on how people THINK things like this should work. Saying "I'd like to see SC and XMG integrated) doesn't tell me anything. I want to know HOW (from a user experience point of view as well as Administrative). This is a rather LARGE and COMPLEX suggestion. It can not be explained in 4 sentences and I refuse to guess on something this large and complex.

 

[DaveM]

I would like to see this as well but I would also need an importer to import all the members galleries that we now have in our PhotoPost albums. I would be prepared to pay extra for the importer if needed.

 

[Ludachris]

Sorry for being so vague on a potentially major feature Bob. I'll put more thought into how it would work. I had basically looked at XMG and saw how it allowed users to create albums for their photos and thought it would be something that would add a lot of depth to showcases, especially for the types of showcases where images are a key component (like those of us with automotive sites).

 

[C.Birch]

The best way to do this is to add a XenMediaGallery Tab on the showcase item pages and much like with the Discussion Thread tab, it lets you link to a album id what then pulls the images from that album into the new showcase tab.

It would need a button on the tab page somewhere that users can press to be taken to the album to be able to upload more images to that album, as you want to keep the feeling of both systems being apart of each other.

A other way may be a setting to let you replace the Showcase gallery with a XenMediaGallery, so when your adding new Showcase items and images it then auto makes a XenMediaGallery album that users can upload to and as its replaced the Showcase gallery, it should pull all images from the album into the Showcase Gallery Tab.

This is the Showcase Gallery now:




It should be replaced when using XenMediaGallery and not Showcase to this:




Personally this is the way i would do it, because it would seem odd to have 2 Gallerys on the items page, so replacing systems would be the better way and help keep that feeling of the systems being one system.

 

[DaveM]

I like this idea very neat but I must admit I am not so keen on the way XenMediaGallery formats itself. It reminds me a lot of Win8 tiled view but the plus side it does have an importer fro Photo post Pro that I am trying to replace.

 

[Ludachris]

I like Xen Media Gallery, but I think the sonnb Xen Gallery would also be a good fit since it is structured around user-generated albums. As far as implementation, C.Birch pretty much nailed it on the head in terms of what I was visualizing. You click on the Images tab in the showcase item and you get a list of user-generated albums with thumbnails and a title for the album. You click on the album thumbnail and see a grid of photo thumbnails that you can click on to see larger versions of the photo and leave comments on each photo (and ratings, with share links and like links, etc for each photo). I do like the sonnb XenGallery way of using a Lightbox type overlay with comments on the right side, very FB-like, and something more users are becoming familiar with.

 

[DaveM]

I like the look of Xen Gallery better and I own a copy of it already

 

[Ludachris]

A few more thoughts on this - wonder if it's worth discussing the idea of a bridge for both XMG and sonnb XG so that we can "embed" those popular gallery plugins as part of showcase, essentially adding the option for the admin to replace the built-in Showcase image gallery. No sense in Bob writing a ton of code, duplicating efforts of sonnb and Chris Deeming for Showcase. Why not just find a way to hook them together? We've seen developers taking other developer plugins into consideration when creating their own plugins. This might be another one of those opportunities. Maybe the developers can share in the coding and the profits and sell the bridge as a separate option.

How it would work on the admin side:
The admin could be given a choice to use the built-in image gallery or integrate one of those two galleries. Then all of the configuration is essentially the same. The admin might have some additional settings to choose whether or not albums can be created outside of Showcase, so that some albums/photos/video can be tied to showcase items and some couldn't. Some admins might not want photos to be uploaded outside of showcase items.

Front end functionality:
When a user goes to create an album or upload a photo or video link, they would be able to choose which showcase item they want to associate it with and the new album/photo/video link gets added under a tab just like the built-in image gallery. It would look very similar to how C.Birch illustrated above.

For browsing, I see it working the same as Discussions in showcase. The user can get to the discussion by going through the forum that the admin specified for showcases (current functionality) or they could get there by browsing showcases directly. The Gallery would be the same way. Whenever a user browses the Gallery and stumbles across an album/photo/video link that belongs to a showcase item, they'd see the showcase tabs up top, very much like they do when they're browsing the discussion thread for the showcase item. Then can keep browsing the Gallery or get more information about that showcase item by clicking the tabs.

The tricky part (I think) would be some the the widgets. Making it so that when photos are added there's an update to the showcase item lists. I'm sure there are other complications that I'm not thinking of, but I'd love to keep this discussion going.

It's something I would pay additional money for if it was to be offered as an option (to both Bob B and sonnb or Chris Deeming). In fact, I will likely look in to having it custom coded if Bob chooses not to pursue it.

 

[Bob]

Showcase now has Xen Media Gallery Album integration. It is a basic integration, but an integration nontheless.