January 2005 News
News From Ogden Point
Ron McLean
January 18 2005
Hello everyone;
The last few months since my last newsletter have been consumed with various things other than specific new web site tasks. I used
Cards From Ogden Point
to send my Christmas greetings to everyone in my e-mail address book as it seemed that if I owned a service, I should use it myself. That received a positive response in both feedback and site traffic.
I traveled to Manitoba to be with friends and family over the holiday season so not much was done on my internet sites during that period.
Once the holiday season was over, I returned to website things and did year end backups and archiving.
I also returned my focus to a "pet project". From the very start of my website operation, I had been trying to find a more user friendly way for visitors to view my pictures. The photosite and all of the links into it brought the thumbnail pictures onto the visitor's screen quite well. Then when they wanted to view a larger version of the picture, it was a "one at a time" process where they had to open and close a new window for every picture they wanted to see. I knew that as long as the system worked that way most viewers would check one or two pictures and then give up.
I wanted interfaces like the commercial photo hosting services had that allowed one at a time viewing and/or slide shows that were accessible by opening one window, not by a long series of opening and closing successive windows.
When I finally found the solution it was in a program -- ACDSee -- that I had experimented with and rejected earlier in my quest. When I had tried it using its default setup, it changed slides too quickly for use on slower internet connections. This time I "disassembled" some of the control functions in the albums and found that I could "retroactively" change the slide transition time after I created the show even though it was not adjustable while creating the show. To make things even better, I found that I only had do it once and then "copy and paste" my modifications into each of the slide show file folders.
I was pleased that my solution was from "very close to home" as it is a Canadian product. -- In fact ACDSee is not only a Canadian product, it is a Vancouver Island product.
It is produced by ACDSee Systems whose headquarters is in Victoria/Saanichton BC.
You can check it out at out:
http://www.acdsystems.com
I used ACDSee V6.0 software to create "albums" that display the pictures in "thumbnail" format when the pages load. The viewer then can view larger versions of the individual pictures one by one or as a slide show by clicking on any of the "thumbnails."
I spent a lot of time with experimentation that is best described as "trial and error" to determine the best settings to display the pictures so that they would load on most if not all computers regardless of age, speed or operating system. I also worked on finding settings that worked well on slower internet connections such as "dial-up" or "light speed cable".
I found a script that allowed me to open the new window for the slide show in a controlled size and modified ACDSee's standard layout so that the slide shows ran in that window without the need to scroll the page up or down during the show. The window will open on computers with small screen resolutions and it can be resized for viewers with larger screen resolutions.
I chose options that limited the page size to 20 thumbnails. I set the slide transition times to provide ten second delays between slide changes.
I wanted to create displays that worked satisfactorily on slow connections without appearing to "drag" with long delays on faster connections.
I think I have achieved a good balance. Please use the feedback links on this page to let me know whether or not you think I succeeded.
Here are my results:
1: This page is one I will update regularly with my newer pictures. It shows directly how the new browser window opens with the Album:
Click here for an album of my most recent pictures.
2: This page is what I think is the best way to view my better pictures:
Small Picture Albums
The pictures are reduced in size and quality to allow them to run and display in the slide show process.
For those of you using Firefox and Netscape browsers, the albums work there as well. The Photosite and some of the other attempts at displaying my pictures did not work well (or sometimes even at all) in those browsers.
That was a side effect I hadn't considered when I first decide to go with ACDSee. I had created and uploaded all the albums without even thinking of trying those browsers. I was pleasantly surprised when I opened the albums in each of the browsers with full operation
Ron McLean
January 18 2005
Hello everyone;
The last few months since my last newsletter have been consumed with various things other than specific new web site tasks. I used
Cards From Ogden Point
to send my Christmas greetings to everyone in my e-mail address book as it seemed that if I owned a service, I should use it myself. That received a positive response in both feedback and site traffic.
I traveled to Manitoba to be with friends and family over the holiday season so not much was done on my internet sites during that period.
Once the holiday season was over, I returned to website things and did year end backups and archiving.
I also returned my focus to a "pet project". From the very start of my website operation, I had been trying to find a more user friendly way for visitors to view my pictures. The photosite and all of the links into it brought the thumbnail pictures onto the visitor's screen quite well. Then when they wanted to view a larger version of the picture, it was a "one at a time" process where they had to open and close a new window for every picture they wanted to see. I knew that as long as the system worked that way most viewers would check one or two pictures and then give up.
I wanted interfaces like the commercial photo hosting services had that allowed one at a time viewing and/or slide shows that were accessible by opening one window, not by a long series of opening and closing successive windows.
When I finally found the solution it was in a program -- ACDSee -- that I had experimented with and rejected earlier in my quest. When I had tried it using its default setup, it changed slides too quickly for use on slower internet connections. This time I "disassembled" some of the control functions in the albums and found that I could "retroactively" change the slide transition time after I created the show even though it was not adjustable while creating the show. To make things even better, I found that I only had do it once and then "copy and paste" my modifications into each of the slide show file folders.
I was pleased that my solution was from "very close to home" as it is a Canadian product. -- In fact ACDSee is not only a Canadian product, it is a Vancouver Island product.
It is produced by ACDSee Systems whose headquarters is in Victoria/Saanichton BC.
You can check it out at out:
http://www.acdsystems.com
I used ACDSee V6.0 software to create "albums" that display the pictures in "thumbnail" format when the pages load. The viewer then can view larger versions of the individual pictures one by one or as a slide show by clicking on any of the "thumbnails."
I spent a lot of time with experimentation that is best described as "trial and error" to determine the best settings to display the pictures so that they would load on most if not all computers regardless of age, speed or operating system. I also worked on finding settings that worked well on slower internet connections such as "dial-up" or "light speed cable".
I found a script that allowed me to open the new window for the slide show in a controlled size and modified ACDSee's standard layout so that the slide shows ran in that window without the need to scroll the page up or down during the show. The window will open on computers with small screen resolutions and it can be resized for viewers with larger screen resolutions.
I chose options that limited the page size to 20 thumbnails. I set the slide transition times to provide ten second delays between slide changes.
I wanted to create displays that worked satisfactorily on slow connections without appearing to "drag" with long delays on faster connections.
I think I have achieved a good balance. Please use the feedback links on this page to let me know whether or not you think I succeeded.
Here are my results:
1: This page is one I will update regularly with my newer pictures. It shows directly how the new browser window opens with the Album:
Click here for an album of my most recent pictures.
2: This page is what I think is the best way to view my better pictures:
Small Picture Albums
The pictures are reduced in size and quality to allow them to run and display in the slide show process.
For those of you using Firefox and Netscape browsers, the albums work there as well. The Photosite and some of the other attempts at displaying my pictures did not work well (or sometimes even at all) in those browsers.
That was a side effect I hadn't considered when I first decide to go with ACDSee. I had created and uploaded all the albums without even thinking of trying those browsers. I was pleasantly surprised when I opened the albums in each of the browsers with full operation
posted by ...ron... | 3:43 PM
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