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bfarber

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  1. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from Ehsan1111 for a blog entry, 4.3: Modernizing our Gallery   
    A picture says a thousand words, they say. If getting those pictures online is troublesome, some of those words might be a little choice.
    Gallery has been an integral part of our community suite for just about as long as T1 Tech Mark Higgins can remember (and he has many years of memories). It has seen many interfaces changes as the years have rolled by. The most recent version received a fair amount to feedback on usability.
    We've listened. We've re-engineered most of Gallery's key interfaces to make uploading new images to your community frictionless.
    Lets take a look through the major changes.
    Improved submission process
    Submitting images has to be simple or else users will give up and your gallery will be underutilized. We have spent a lot of time simplifying and speeding up the submissions process for your users. The first thing that will be noticed is that the submission process is not presented as a wizard anymore, and the choice to submit to a category or album has been significantly cleaned up and simplified.

     
    Choosing a container
    Here, I have chosen the category I wish to submit to, so now I am asked if I want to submit directly to the category, if I want to create a new album, or if I want to submit to an existing album.  Choosing one of those last two options will load the appropriate forms to create an album or select an existing album, respectively.
    Afterwards, the modal expands to full screen and you will naturally select your images next, and there's a lot to talk about here.
     

    Overhauled submission interface
    First and foremost, the interface has changed significantly to both simplify the UI and to make actually using the interface easier. When you click on an image, the form is loaded to the right immediately without an AJAX request needed to fetch the form.
    In addition to quickly setting the credit and copyright information for all images at once, you can now set the tags for all images quickly and easily without having to edit each image individually.
    Images support drag n drop reordering in the uploader here, which means that you can drag n drop images to different positions to control their order. Many users previously would name images "Image 1", "Image 2", and so on, and then set their albums to order images by name in order to control the order the images were displayed in. This is no longer necessary now that you can manually reposition the images.
    The default description editor is a pared down textarea box, but you can still use the rich text editor if you wish. The ability to enable maps for geo-encoded images and to upload thumbnails for videos is still supported as well, and those options will show up when appropriate in the right hand panel.
    The 100 image per submission limit has also been lifted. You can now upload many more images in one go with no hard limit imposed.
    Upon clicking submit images, you will see the typical multiredirector to store all of your images, however you will notice that it processes much faster than it did in 4.2 and below.
    Better submission control
    Administrators can now configure categories such that can accept only images, only albums, or both. This means you can now create categories that cannot be submitted to directly, and you can create categories that albums cannot be used with. This is a feature that has been oft-requested since the release of 4.0, and we are happy to report that it will be available in our next release.
    Additionally, album creators (if permitted) can also now create shared albums.  When you create a new album, you can now specify (under the Privacy menu) who can submit to the album, with your available options being:
    Only me Anyone Only the users I specify Only the groups I specify Prior to 4.3, albums have always been owned by one user and only that user could submit to them. Invision Community 4.3 will open up albums so that anyone can submit to them, dependent upon the album creator's preferences and needs.

    The choice is yours as to who can submit to your albums
    New image navigation
    Another major change with Gallery 4.3 is that clicking an image now launches that image in a lightbox to view it and interact with it. This lightbox is context-aware, allowing you to visit the next and previous images in the listing, whether that is a category or album listing, or the featured images or new images listings on the Gallery homepage, for example.
     

    The new image lightbox
    Firstly, I will note that you are seeing the image here with my mouse cursor over the image area, exposing the title, tags, and some various buttons. When you mouse away from the image those overlays fade away to highlight the image itself better.
    As you can see, you can navigate left and right here to view the next and previous image in this context, and you can otherwise interact with the image as you would have if you had visited the older-style image view page (including the ability to rate, review and comment).
    The new Gallery release will introduce a new advertisement location in the right hand column to allow you to show advertisements, even in the lightbox.
    If you follow a link to a full image view page, the lightbox will automatically launch when the page loads, still allowing you to interact in a familiar manner. Additionally, if you move through enough images in the lightbox to reach a new page (for example, if you click on the last image in the album listing and then click on the next image button), the listing itself behind the lightbox will update for easier usability if the user closes the lightbox.
    One final thing to note is that the interface has been made more mobile friendly, particularly through the introduction of swiping support. You can swipe left and right in the lightbox, and in image carousels, to see the next and previous images.
    Notable performance improvements
    As we mentioned at the beginning, we recognize there is a balance between performance, usability, and attractiveness, particularly with regards to an image Gallery. For that reason, we have made Gallery's performance a major focus in 4.3, and have implemented some changes that bring with them a noticeable performance improvement.
    Firstly, we have adjusted the software to only store two copies of an image (in addition to the original), instead of four. In previous versions, we stored a thumbnail, a small copy, a medium copy and a large copy of an image, all of which arbitrarily sized and designed to best meet our layout needs without showing an image too large or too small in a given space. We have simplified this vastly by storing a slightly larger "small" image, and storing a large copy. Diskspace usage is reduced dramatically as a result, and bandwidth usage is actually lowered as well since only two copies of an image need to be delivered to the browser instead of four.
    Next, we have implemented prefetching of the 'next' and 'previous' pages when you launch the lightbox image view. This means that when a user navigates to the next image in the lightbox, it loads immediately instead of waiting for the content to be fetched from the server. From a UX perspective, this provides a much snappier and responsive interface, making users more apt to interact with the site.
    We have additionally sped up the submission process as previously mentioned. The order of execution for certain events that must happen during submission has been moved around a bit, resulting in a faster experience for the end user actually submitting the images.
    Because we know the details matter, we have implemented other smaller improvements as well. For example, the link to rebuild images in the AdminCP previously resulted in a redirect process that rebuilt the images while you waited, but now a background task is launched so that you can continue with what you were doing while the images get rebuilt in the background.
    From start to finish, the Gallery UI and UX has been touched on and improved, and we hope you enjoy these improvements when you start using the new version.
  2. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from iacas for a blog entry, 4.3: Modernizing our Gallery   
    A picture says a thousand words, they say. If getting those pictures online is troublesome, some of those words might be a little choice.
    Gallery has been an integral part of our community suite for just about as long as T1 Tech Mark Higgins can remember (and he has many years of memories). It has seen many interfaces changes as the years have rolled by. The most recent version received a fair amount to feedback on usability.
    We've listened. We've re-engineered most of Gallery's key interfaces to make uploading new images to your community frictionless.
    Lets take a look through the major changes.
    Improved submission process
    Submitting images has to be simple or else users will give up and your gallery will be underutilized. We have spent a lot of time simplifying and speeding up the submissions process for your users. The first thing that will be noticed is that the submission process is not presented as a wizard anymore, and the choice to submit to a category or album has been significantly cleaned up and simplified.

     
    Choosing a container
    Here, I have chosen the category I wish to submit to, so now I am asked if I want to submit directly to the category, if I want to create a new album, or if I want to submit to an existing album.  Choosing one of those last two options will load the appropriate forms to create an album or select an existing album, respectively.
    Afterwards, the modal expands to full screen and you will naturally select your images next, and there's a lot to talk about here.
     

    Overhauled submission interface
    First and foremost, the interface has changed significantly to both simplify the UI and to make actually using the interface easier. When you click on an image, the form is loaded to the right immediately without an AJAX request needed to fetch the form.
    In addition to quickly setting the credit and copyright information for all images at once, you can now set the tags for all images quickly and easily without having to edit each image individually.
    Images support drag n drop reordering in the uploader here, which means that you can drag n drop images to different positions to control their order. Many users previously would name images "Image 1", "Image 2", and so on, and then set their albums to order images by name in order to control the order the images were displayed in. This is no longer necessary now that you can manually reposition the images.
    The default description editor is a pared down textarea box, but you can still use the rich text editor if you wish. The ability to enable maps for geo-encoded images and to upload thumbnails for videos is still supported as well, and those options will show up when appropriate in the right hand panel.
    The 100 image per submission limit has also been lifted. You can now upload many more images in one go with no hard limit imposed.
    Upon clicking submit images, you will see the typical multiredirector to store all of your images, however you will notice that it processes much faster than it did in 4.2 and below.
    Better submission control
    Administrators can now configure categories such that can accept only images, only albums, or both. This means you can now create categories that cannot be submitted to directly, and you can create categories that albums cannot be used with. This is a feature that has been oft-requested since the release of 4.0, and we are happy to report that it will be available in our next release.
    Additionally, album creators (if permitted) can also now create shared albums.  When you create a new album, you can now specify (under the Privacy menu) who can submit to the album, with your available options being:
    Only me Anyone Only the users I specify Only the groups I specify Prior to 4.3, albums have always been owned by one user and only that user could submit to them. Invision Community 4.3 will open up albums so that anyone can submit to them, dependent upon the album creator's preferences and needs.

    The choice is yours as to who can submit to your albums
    New image navigation
    Another major change with Gallery 4.3 is that clicking an image now launches that image in a lightbox to view it and interact with it. This lightbox is context-aware, allowing you to visit the next and previous images in the listing, whether that is a category or album listing, or the featured images or new images listings on the Gallery homepage, for example.
     

    The new image lightbox
    Firstly, I will note that you are seeing the image here with my mouse cursor over the image area, exposing the title, tags, and some various buttons. When you mouse away from the image those overlays fade away to highlight the image itself better.
    As you can see, you can navigate left and right here to view the next and previous image in this context, and you can otherwise interact with the image as you would have if you had visited the older-style image view page (including the ability to rate, review and comment).
    The new Gallery release will introduce a new advertisement location in the right hand column to allow you to show advertisements, even in the lightbox.
    If you follow a link to a full image view page, the lightbox will automatically launch when the page loads, still allowing you to interact in a familiar manner. Additionally, if you move through enough images in the lightbox to reach a new page (for example, if you click on the last image in the album listing and then click on the next image button), the listing itself behind the lightbox will update for easier usability if the user closes the lightbox.
    One final thing to note is that the interface has been made more mobile friendly, particularly through the introduction of swiping support. You can swipe left and right in the lightbox, and in image carousels, to see the next and previous images.
    Notable performance improvements
    As we mentioned at the beginning, we recognize there is a balance between performance, usability, and attractiveness, particularly with regards to an image Gallery. For that reason, we have made Gallery's performance a major focus in 4.3, and have implemented some changes that bring with them a noticeable performance improvement.
    Firstly, we have adjusted the software to only store two copies of an image (in addition to the original), instead of four. In previous versions, we stored a thumbnail, a small copy, a medium copy and a large copy of an image, all of which arbitrarily sized and designed to best meet our layout needs without showing an image too large or too small in a given space. We have simplified this vastly by storing a slightly larger "small" image, and storing a large copy. Diskspace usage is reduced dramatically as a result, and bandwidth usage is actually lowered as well since only two copies of an image need to be delivered to the browser instead of four.
    Next, we have implemented prefetching of the 'next' and 'previous' pages when you launch the lightbox image view. This means that when a user navigates to the next image in the lightbox, it loads immediately instead of waiting for the content to be fetched from the server. From a UX perspective, this provides a much snappier and responsive interface, making users more apt to interact with the site.
    We have additionally sped up the submission process as previously mentioned. The order of execution for certain events that must happen during submission has been moved around a bit, resulting in a faster experience for the end user actually submitting the images.
    Because we know the details matter, we have implemented other smaller improvements as well. For example, the link to rebuild images in the AdminCP previously resulted in a redirect process that rebuilt the images while you waited, but now a background task is launched so that you can continue with what you were doing while the images get rebuilt in the background.
    From start to finish, the Gallery UI and UX has been touched on and improved, and we hope you enjoy these improvements when you start using the new version.
  3. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from motomac for a blog entry, 4.3: Modernizing our Gallery   
    A picture says a thousand words, they say. If getting those pictures online is troublesome, some of those words might be a little choice.
    Gallery has been an integral part of our community suite for just about as long as T1 Tech Mark Higgins can remember (and he has many years of memories). It has seen many interfaces changes as the years have rolled by. The most recent version received a fair amount to feedback on usability.
    We've listened. We've re-engineered most of Gallery's key interfaces to make uploading new images to your community frictionless.
    Lets take a look through the major changes.
    Improved submission process
    Submitting images has to be simple or else users will give up and your gallery will be underutilized. We have spent a lot of time simplifying and speeding up the submissions process for your users. The first thing that will be noticed is that the submission process is not presented as a wizard anymore, and the choice to submit to a category or album has been significantly cleaned up and simplified.

     
    Choosing a container
    Here, I have chosen the category I wish to submit to, so now I am asked if I want to submit directly to the category, if I want to create a new album, or if I want to submit to an existing album.  Choosing one of those last two options will load the appropriate forms to create an album or select an existing album, respectively.
    Afterwards, the modal expands to full screen and you will naturally select your images next, and there's a lot to talk about here.
     

    Overhauled submission interface
    First and foremost, the interface has changed significantly to both simplify the UI and to make actually using the interface easier. When you click on an image, the form is loaded to the right immediately without an AJAX request needed to fetch the form.
    In addition to quickly setting the credit and copyright information for all images at once, you can now set the tags for all images quickly and easily without having to edit each image individually.
    Images support drag n drop reordering in the uploader here, which means that you can drag n drop images to different positions to control their order. Many users previously would name images "Image 1", "Image 2", and so on, and then set their albums to order images by name in order to control the order the images were displayed in. This is no longer necessary now that you can manually reposition the images.
    The default description editor is a pared down textarea box, but you can still use the rich text editor if you wish. The ability to enable maps for geo-encoded images and to upload thumbnails for videos is still supported as well, and those options will show up when appropriate in the right hand panel.
    The 100 image per submission limit has also been lifted. You can now upload many more images in one go with no hard limit imposed.
    Upon clicking submit images, you will see the typical multiredirector to store all of your images, however you will notice that it processes much faster than it did in 4.2 and below.
    Better submission control
    Administrators can now configure categories such that can accept only images, only albums, or both. This means you can now create categories that cannot be submitted to directly, and you can create categories that albums cannot be used with. This is a feature that has been oft-requested since the release of 4.0, and we are happy to report that it will be available in our next release.
    Additionally, album creators (if permitted) can also now create shared albums.  When you create a new album, you can now specify (under the Privacy menu) who can submit to the album, with your available options being:
    Only me Anyone Only the users I specify Only the groups I specify Prior to 4.3, albums have always been owned by one user and only that user could submit to them. Invision Community 4.3 will open up albums so that anyone can submit to them, dependent upon the album creator's preferences and needs.

    The choice is yours as to who can submit to your albums
    New image navigation
    Another major change with Gallery 4.3 is that clicking an image now launches that image in a lightbox to view it and interact with it. This lightbox is context-aware, allowing you to visit the next and previous images in the listing, whether that is a category or album listing, or the featured images or new images listings on the Gallery homepage, for example.
     

    The new image lightbox
    Firstly, I will note that you are seeing the image here with my mouse cursor over the image area, exposing the title, tags, and some various buttons. When you mouse away from the image those overlays fade away to highlight the image itself better.
    As you can see, you can navigate left and right here to view the next and previous image in this context, and you can otherwise interact with the image as you would have if you had visited the older-style image view page (including the ability to rate, review and comment).
    The new Gallery release will introduce a new advertisement location in the right hand column to allow you to show advertisements, even in the lightbox.
    If you follow a link to a full image view page, the lightbox will automatically launch when the page loads, still allowing you to interact in a familiar manner. Additionally, if you move through enough images in the lightbox to reach a new page (for example, if you click on the last image in the album listing and then click on the next image button), the listing itself behind the lightbox will update for easier usability if the user closes the lightbox.
    One final thing to note is that the interface has been made more mobile friendly, particularly through the introduction of swiping support. You can swipe left and right in the lightbox, and in image carousels, to see the next and previous images.
    Notable performance improvements
    As we mentioned at the beginning, we recognize there is a balance between performance, usability, and attractiveness, particularly with regards to an image Gallery. For that reason, we have made Gallery's performance a major focus in 4.3, and have implemented some changes that bring with them a noticeable performance improvement.
    Firstly, we have adjusted the software to only store two copies of an image (in addition to the original), instead of four. In previous versions, we stored a thumbnail, a small copy, a medium copy and a large copy of an image, all of which arbitrarily sized and designed to best meet our layout needs without showing an image too large or too small in a given space. We have simplified this vastly by storing a slightly larger "small" image, and storing a large copy. Diskspace usage is reduced dramatically as a result, and bandwidth usage is actually lowered as well since only two copies of an image need to be delivered to the browser instead of four.
    Next, we have implemented prefetching of the 'next' and 'previous' pages when you launch the lightbox image view. This means that when a user navigates to the next image in the lightbox, it loads immediately instead of waiting for the content to be fetched from the server. From a UX perspective, this provides a much snappier and responsive interface, making users more apt to interact with the site.
    We have additionally sped up the submission process as previously mentioned. The order of execution for certain events that must happen during submission has been moved around a bit, resulting in a faster experience for the end user actually submitting the images.
    Because we know the details matter, we have implemented other smaller improvements as well. For example, the link to rebuild images in the AdminCP previously resulted in a redirect process that rebuilt the images while you waited, but now a background task is launched so that you can continue with what you were doing while the images get rebuilt in the background.
    From start to finish, the Gallery UI and UX has been touched on and improved, and we hope you enjoy these improvements when you start using the new version.
  4. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from Bliss99 for a blog entry, 4.3: Modernizing our Gallery   
    A picture says a thousand words, they say. If getting those pictures online is troublesome, some of those words might be a little choice.
    Gallery has been an integral part of our community suite for just about as long as T1 Tech Mark Higgins can remember (and he has many years of memories). It has seen many interfaces changes as the years have rolled by. The most recent version received a fair amount to feedback on usability.
    We've listened. We've re-engineered most of Gallery's key interfaces to make uploading new images to your community frictionless.
    Lets take a look through the major changes.
    Improved submission process
    Submitting images has to be simple or else users will give up and your gallery will be underutilized. We have spent a lot of time simplifying and speeding up the submissions process for your users. The first thing that will be noticed is that the submission process is not presented as a wizard anymore, and the choice to submit to a category or album has been significantly cleaned up and simplified.

     
    Choosing a container
    Here, I have chosen the category I wish to submit to, so now I am asked if I want to submit directly to the category, if I want to create a new album, or if I want to submit to an existing album.  Choosing one of those last two options will load the appropriate forms to create an album or select an existing album, respectively.
    Afterwards, the modal expands to full screen and you will naturally select your images next, and there's a lot to talk about here.
     

    Overhauled submission interface
    First and foremost, the interface has changed significantly to both simplify the UI and to make actually using the interface easier. When you click on an image, the form is loaded to the right immediately without an AJAX request needed to fetch the form.
    In addition to quickly setting the credit and copyright information for all images at once, you can now set the tags for all images quickly and easily without having to edit each image individually.
    Images support drag n drop reordering in the uploader here, which means that you can drag n drop images to different positions to control their order. Many users previously would name images "Image 1", "Image 2", and so on, and then set their albums to order images by name in order to control the order the images were displayed in. This is no longer necessary now that you can manually reposition the images.
    The default description editor is a pared down textarea box, but you can still use the rich text editor if you wish. The ability to enable maps for geo-encoded images and to upload thumbnails for videos is still supported as well, and those options will show up when appropriate in the right hand panel.
    The 100 image per submission limit has also been lifted. You can now upload many more images in one go with no hard limit imposed.
    Upon clicking submit images, you will see the typical multiredirector to store all of your images, however you will notice that it processes much faster than it did in 4.2 and below.
    Better submission control
    Administrators can now configure categories such that can accept only images, only albums, or both. This means you can now create categories that cannot be submitted to directly, and you can create categories that albums cannot be used with. This is a feature that has been oft-requested since the release of 4.0, and we are happy to report that it will be available in our next release.
    Additionally, album creators (if permitted) can also now create shared albums.  When you create a new album, you can now specify (under the Privacy menu) who can submit to the album, with your available options being:
    Only me Anyone Only the users I specify Only the groups I specify Prior to 4.3, albums have always been owned by one user and only that user could submit to them. Invision Community 4.3 will open up albums so that anyone can submit to them, dependent upon the album creator's preferences and needs.

    The choice is yours as to who can submit to your albums
    New image navigation
    Another major change with Gallery 4.3 is that clicking an image now launches that image in a lightbox to view it and interact with it. This lightbox is context-aware, allowing you to visit the next and previous images in the listing, whether that is a category or album listing, or the featured images or new images listings on the Gallery homepage, for example.
     

    The new image lightbox
    Firstly, I will note that you are seeing the image here with my mouse cursor over the image area, exposing the title, tags, and some various buttons. When you mouse away from the image those overlays fade away to highlight the image itself better.
    As you can see, you can navigate left and right here to view the next and previous image in this context, and you can otherwise interact with the image as you would have if you had visited the older-style image view page (including the ability to rate, review and comment).
    The new Gallery release will introduce a new advertisement location in the right hand column to allow you to show advertisements, even in the lightbox.
    If you follow a link to a full image view page, the lightbox will automatically launch when the page loads, still allowing you to interact in a familiar manner. Additionally, if you move through enough images in the lightbox to reach a new page (for example, if you click on the last image in the album listing and then click on the next image button), the listing itself behind the lightbox will update for easier usability if the user closes the lightbox.
    One final thing to note is that the interface has been made more mobile friendly, particularly through the introduction of swiping support. You can swipe left and right in the lightbox, and in image carousels, to see the next and previous images.
    Notable performance improvements
    As we mentioned at the beginning, we recognize there is a balance between performance, usability, and attractiveness, particularly with regards to an image Gallery. For that reason, we have made Gallery's performance a major focus in 4.3, and have implemented some changes that bring with them a noticeable performance improvement.
    Firstly, we have adjusted the software to only store two copies of an image (in addition to the original), instead of four. In previous versions, we stored a thumbnail, a small copy, a medium copy and a large copy of an image, all of which arbitrarily sized and designed to best meet our layout needs without showing an image too large or too small in a given space. We have simplified this vastly by storing a slightly larger "small" image, and storing a large copy. Diskspace usage is reduced dramatically as a result, and bandwidth usage is actually lowered as well since only two copies of an image need to be delivered to the browser instead of four.
    Next, we have implemented prefetching of the 'next' and 'previous' pages when you launch the lightbox image view. This means that when a user navigates to the next image in the lightbox, it loads immediately instead of waiting for the content to be fetched from the server. From a UX perspective, this provides a much snappier and responsive interface, making users more apt to interact with the site.
    We have additionally sped up the submission process as previously mentioned. The order of execution for certain events that must happen during submission has been moved around a bit, resulting in a faster experience for the end user actually submitting the images.
    Because we know the details matter, we have implemented other smaller improvements as well. For example, the link to rebuild images in the AdminCP previously resulted in a redirect process that rebuilt the images while you waited, but now a background task is launched so that you can continue with what you were doing while the images get rebuilt in the background.
    From start to finish, the Gallery UI and UX has been touched on and improved, and we hope you enjoy these improvements when you start using the new version.
  5. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from Thomas. for a blog entry, 4.3: Modernizing our Gallery   
    A picture says a thousand words, they say. If getting those pictures online is troublesome, some of those words might be a little choice.
    Gallery has been an integral part of our community suite for just about as long as T1 Tech Mark Higgins can remember (and he has many years of memories). It has seen many interfaces changes as the years have rolled by. The most recent version received a fair amount to feedback on usability.
    We've listened. We've re-engineered most of Gallery's key interfaces to make uploading new images to your community frictionless.
    Lets take a look through the major changes.
    Improved submission process
    Submitting images has to be simple or else users will give up and your gallery will be underutilized. We have spent a lot of time simplifying and speeding up the submissions process for your users. The first thing that will be noticed is that the submission process is not presented as a wizard anymore, and the choice to submit to a category or album has been significantly cleaned up and simplified.

     
    Choosing a container
    Here, I have chosen the category I wish to submit to, so now I am asked if I want to submit directly to the category, if I want to create a new album, or if I want to submit to an existing album.  Choosing one of those last two options will load the appropriate forms to create an album or select an existing album, respectively.
    Afterwards, the modal expands to full screen and you will naturally select your images next, and there's a lot to talk about here.
     

    Overhauled submission interface
    First and foremost, the interface has changed significantly to both simplify the UI and to make actually using the interface easier. When you click on an image, the form is loaded to the right immediately without an AJAX request needed to fetch the form.
    In addition to quickly setting the credit and copyright information for all images at once, you can now set the tags for all images quickly and easily without having to edit each image individually.
    Images support drag n drop reordering in the uploader here, which means that you can drag n drop images to different positions to control their order. Many users previously would name images "Image 1", "Image 2", and so on, and then set their albums to order images by name in order to control the order the images were displayed in. This is no longer necessary now that you can manually reposition the images.
    The default description editor is a pared down textarea box, but you can still use the rich text editor if you wish. The ability to enable maps for geo-encoded images and to upload thumbnails for videos is still supported as well, and those options will show up when appropriate in the right hand panel.
    The 100 image per submission limit has also been lifted. You can now upload many more images in one go with no hard limit imposed.
    Upon clicking submit images, you will see the typical multiredirector to store all of your images, however you will notice that it processes much faster than it did in 4.2 and below.
    Better submission control
    Administrators can now configure categories such that can accept only images, only albums, or both. This means you can now create categories that cannot be submitted to directly, and you can create categories that albums cannot be used with. This is a feature that has been oft-requested since the release of 4.0, and we are happy to report that it will be available in our next release.
    Additionally, album creators (if permitted) can also now create shared albums.  When you create a new album, you can now specify (under the Privacy menu) who can submit to the album, with your available options being:
    Only me Anyone Only the users I specify Only the groups I specify Prior to 4.3, albums have always been owned by one user and only that user could submit to them. Invision Community 4.3 will open up albums so that anyone can submit to them, dependent upon the album creator's preferences and needs.

    The choice is yours as to who can submit to your albums
    New image navigation
    Another major change with Gallery 4.3 is that clicking an image now launches that image in a lightbox to view it and interact with it. This lightbox is context-aware, allowing you to visit the next and previous images in the listing, whether that is a category or album listing, or the featured images or new images listings on the Gallery homepage, for example.
     

    The new image lightbox
    Firstly, I will note that you are seeing the image here with my mouse cursor over the image area, exposing the title, tags, and some various buttons. When you mouse away from the image those overlays fade away to highlight the image itself better.
    As you can see, you can navigate left and right here to view the next and previous image in this context, and you can otherwise interact with the image as you would have if you had visited the older-style image view page (including the ability to rate, review and comment).
    The new Gallery release will introduce a new advertisement location in the right hand column to allow you to show advertisements, even in the lightbox.
    If you follow a link to a full image view page, the lightbox will automatically launch when the page loads, still allowing you to interact in a familiar manner. Additionally, if you move through enough images in the lightbox to reach a new page (for example, if you click on the last image in the album listing and then click on the next image button), the listing itself behind the lightbox will update for easier usability if the user closes the lightbox.
    One final thing to note is that the interface has been made more mobile friendly, particularly through the introduction of swiping support. You can swipe left and right in the lightbox, and in image carousels, to see the next and previous images.
    Notable performance improvements
    As we mentioned at the beginning, we recognize there is a balance between performance, usability, and attractiveness, particularly with regards to an image Gallery. For that reason, we have made Gallery's performance a major focus in 4.3, and have implemented some changes that bring with them a noticeable performance improvement.
    Firstly, we have adjusted the software to only store two copies of an image (in addition to the original), instead of four. In previous versions, we stored a thumbnail, a small copy, a medium copy and a large copy of an image, all of which arbitrarily sized and designed to best meet our layout needs without showing an image too large or too small in a given space. We have simplified this vastly by storing a slightly larger "small" image, and storing a large copy. Diskspace usage is reduced dramatically as a result, and bandwidth usage is actually lowered as well since only two copies of an image need to be delivered to the browser instead of four.
    Next, we have implemented prefetching of the 'next' and 'previous' pages when you launch the lightbox image view. This means that when a user navigates to the next image in the lightbox, it loads immediately instead of waiting for the content to be fetched from the server. From a UX perspective, this provides a much snappier and responsive interface, making users more apt to interact with the site.
    We have additionally sped up the submission process as previously mentioned. The order of execution for certain events that must happen during submission has been moved around a bit, resulting in a faster experience for the end user actually submitting the images.
    Because we know the details matter, we have implemented other smaller improvements as well. For example, the link to rebuild images in the AdminCP previously resulted in a redirect process that rebuilt the images while you waited, but now a background task is launched so that you can continue with what you were doing while the images get rebuilt in the background.
    From start to finish, the Gallery UI and UX has been touched on and improved, and we hope you enjoy these improvements when you start using the new version.
  6. Thanks
    bfarber got a reaction from The Old Man for a blog entry, 4.3: Modernizing our Gallery   
    A picture says a thousand words, they say. If getting those pictures online is troublesome, some of those words might be a little choice.
    Gallery has been an integral part of our community suite for just about as long as T1 Tech Mark Higgins can remember (and he has many years of memories). It has seen many interfaces changes as the years have rolled by. The most recent version received a fair amount to feedback on usability.
    We've listened. We've re-engineered most of Gallery's key interfaces to make uploading new images to your community frictionless.
    Lets take a look through the major changes.
    Improved submission process
    Submitting images has to be simple or else users will give up and your gallery will be underutilized. We have spent a lot of time simplifying and speeding up the submissions process for your users. The first thing that will be noticed is that the submission process is not presented as a wizard anymore, and the choice to submit to a category or album has been significantly cleaned up and simplified.

     
    Choosing a container
    Here, I have chosen the category I wish to submit to, so now I am asked if I want to submit directly to the category, if I want to create a new album, or if I want to submit to an existing album.  Choosing one of those last two options will load the appropriate forms to create an album or select an existing album, respectively.
    Afterwards, the modal expands to full screen and you will naturally select your images next, and there's a lot to talk about here.
     

    Overhauled submission interface
    First and foremost, the interface has changed significantly to both simplify the UI and to make actually using the interface easier. When you click on an image, the form is loaded to the right immediately without an AJAX request needed to fetch the form.
    In addition to quickly setting the credit and copyright information for all images at once, you can now set the tags for all images quickly and easily without having to edit each image individually.
    Images support drag n drop reordering in the uploader here, which means that you can drag n drop images to different positions to control their order. Many users previously would name images "Image 1", "Image 2", and so on, and then set their albums to order images by name in order to control the order the images were displayed in. This is no longer necessary now that you can manually reposition the images.
    The default description editor is a pared down textarea box, but you can still use the rich text editor if you wish. The ability to enable maps for geo-encoded images and to upload thumbnails for videos is still supported as well, and those options will show up when appropriate in the right hand panel.
    The 100 image per submission limit has also been lifted. You can now upload many more images in one go with no hard limit imposed.
    Upon clicking submit images, you will see the typical multiredirector to store all of your images, however you will notice that it processes much faster than it did in 4.2 and below.
    Better submission control
    Administrators can now configure categories such that can accept only images, only albums, or both. This means you can now create categories that cannot be submitted to directly, and you can create categories that albums cannot be used with. This is a feature that has been oft-requested since the release of 4.0, and we are happy to report that it will be available in our next release.
    Additionally, album creators (if permitted) can also now create shared albums.  When you create a new album, you can now specify (under the Privacy menu) who can submit to the album, with your available options being:
    Only me Anyone Only the users I specify Only the groups I specify Prior to 4.3, albums have always been owned by one user and only that user could submit to them. Invision Community 4.3 will open up albums so that anyone can submit to them, dependent upon the album creator's preferences and needs.

    The choice is yours as to who can submit to your albums
    New image navigation
    Another major change with Gallery 4.3 is that clicking an image now launches that image in a lightbox to view it and interact with it. This lightbox is context-aware, allowing you to visit the next and previous images in the listing, whether that is a category or album listing, or the featured images or new images listings on the Gallery homepage, for example.
     

    The new image lightbox
    Firstly, I will note that you are seeing the image here with my mouse cursor over the image area, exposing the title, tags, and some various buttons. When you mouse away from the image those overlays fade away to highlight the image itself better.
    As you can see, you can navigate left and right here to view the next and previous image in this context, and you can otherwise interact with the image as you would have if you had visited the older-style image view page (including the ability to rate, review and comment).
    The new Gallery release will introduce a new advertisement location in the right hand column to allow you to show advertisements, even in the lightbox.
    If you follow a link to a full image view page, the lightbox will automatically launch when the page loads, still allowing you to interact in a familiar manner. Additionally, if you move through enough images in the lightbox to reach a new page (for example, if you click on the last image in the album listing and then click on the next image button), the listing itself behind the lightbox will update for easier usability if the user closes the lightbox.
    One final thing to note is that the interface has been made more mobile friendly, particularly through the introduction of swiping support. You can swipe left and right in the lightbox, and in image carousels, to see the next and previous images.
    Notable performance improvements
    As we mentioned at the beginning, we recognize there is a balance between performance, usability, and attractiveness, particularly with regards to an image Gallery. For that reason, we have made Gallery's performance a major focus in 4.3, and have implemented some changes that bring with them a noticeable performance improvement.
    Firstly, we have adjusted the software to only store two copies of an image (in addition to the original), instead of four. In previous versions, we stored a thumbnail, a small copy, a medium copy and a large copy of an image, all of which arbitrarily sized and designed to best meet our layout needs without showing an image too large or too small in a given space. We have simplified this vastly by storing a slightly larger "small" image, and storing a large copy. Diskspace usage is reduced dramatically as a result, and bandwidth usage is actually lowered as well since only two copies of an image need to be delivered to the browser instead of four.
    Next, we have implemented prefetching of the 'next' and 'previous' pages when you launch the lightbox image view. This means that when a user navigates to the next image in the lightbox, it loads immediately instead of waiting for the content to be fetched from the server. From a UX perspective, this provides a much snappier and responsive interface, making users more apt to interact with the site.
    We have additionally sped up the submission process as previously mentioned. The order of execution for certain events that must happen during submission has been moved around a bit, resulting in a faster experience for the end user actually submitting the images.
    Because we know the details matter, we have implemented other smaller improvements as well. For example, the link to rebuild images in the AdminCP previously resulted in a redirect process that rebuilt the images while you waited, but now a background task is launched so that you can continue with what you were doing while the images get rebuilt in the background.
    From start to finish, the Gallery UI and UX has been touched on and improved, and we hope you enjoy these improvements when you start using the new version.
  7. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from TLeM4 for a blog entry, 4.3: Modernizing our Gallery   
    A picture says a thousand words, they say. If getting those pictures online is troublesome, some of those words might be a little choice.
    Gallery has been an integral part of our community suite for just about as long as T1 Tech Mark Higgins can remember (and he has many years of memories). It has seen many interfaces changes as the years have rolled by. The most recent version received a fair amount to feedback on usability.
    We've listened. We've re-engineered most of Gallery's key interfaces to make uploading new images to your community frictionless.
    Lets take a look through the major changes.
    Improved submission process
    Submitting images has to be simple or else users will give up and your gallery will be underutilized. We have spent a lot of time simplifying and speeding up the submissions process for your users. The first thing that will be noticed is that the submission process is not presented as a wizard anymore, and the choice to submit to a category or album has been significantly cleaned up and simplified.

     
    Choosing a container
    Here, I have chosen the category I wish to submit to, so now I am asked if I want to submit directly to the category, if I want to create a new album, or if I want to submit to an existing album.  Choosing one of those last two options will load the appropriate forms to create an album or select an existing album, respectively.
    Afterwards, the modal expands to full screen and you will naturally select your images next, and there's a lot to talk about here.
     

    Overhauled submission interface
    First and foremost, the interface has changed significantly to both simplify the UI and to make actually using the interface easier. When you click on an image, the form is loaded to the right immediately without an AJAX request needed to fetch the form.
    In addition to quickly setting the credit and copyright information for all images at once, you can now set the tags for all images quickly and easily without having to edit each image individually.
    Images support drag n drop reordering in the uploader here, which means that you can drag n drop images to different positions to control their order. Many users previously would name images "Image 1", "Image 2", and so on, and then set their albums to order images by name in order to control the order the images were displayed in. This is no longer necessary now that you can manually reposition the images.
    The default description editor is a pared down textarea box, but you can still use the rich text editor if you wish. The ability to enable maps for geo-encoded images and to upload thumbnails for videos is still supported as well, and those options will show up when appropriate in the right hand panel.
    The 100 image per submission limit has also been lifted. You can now upload many more images in one go with no hard limit imposed.
    Upon clicking submit images, you will see the typical multiredirector to store all of your images, however you will notice that it processes much faster than it did in 4.2 and below.
    Better submission control
    Administrators can now configure categories such that can accept only images, only albums, or both. This means you can now create categories that cannot be submitted to directly, and you can create categories that albums cannot be used with. This is a feature that has been oft-requested since the release of 4.0, and we are happy to report that it will be available in our next release.
    Additionally, album creators (if permitted) can also now create shared albums.  When you create a new album, you can now specify (under the Privacy menu) who can submit to the album, with your available options being:
    Only me Anyone Only the users I specify Only the groups I specify Prior to 4.3, albums have always been owned by one user and only that user could submit to them. Invision Community 4.3 will open up albums so that anyone can submit to them, dependent upon the album creator's preferences and needs.

    The choice is yours as to who can submit to your albums
    New image navigation
    Another major change with Gallery 4.3 is that clicking an image now launches that image in a lightbox to view it and interact with it. This lightbox is context-aware, allowing you to visit the next and previous images in the listing, whether that is a category or album listing, or the featured images or new images listings on the Gallery homepage, for example.
     

    The new image lightbox
    Firstly, I will note that you are seeing the image here with my mouse cursor over the image area, exposing the title, tags, and some various buttons. When you mouse away from the image those overlays fade away to highlight the image itself better.
    As you can see, you can navigate left and right here to view the next and previous image in this context, and you can otherwise interact with the image as you would have if you had visited the older-style image view page (including the ability to rate, review and comment).
    The new Gallery release will introduce a new advertisement location in the right hand column to allow you to show advertisements, even in the lightbox.
    If you follow a link to a full image view page, the lightbox will automatically launch when the page loads, still allowing you to interact in a familiar manner. Additionally, if you move through enough images in the lightbox to reach a new page (for example, if you click on the last image in the album listing and then click on the next image button), the listing itself behind the lightbox will update for easier usability if the user closes the lightbox.
    One final thing to note is that the interface has been made more mobile friendly, particularly through the introduction of swiping support. You can swipe left and right in the lightbox, and in image carousels, to see the next and previous images.
    Notable performance improvements
    As we mentioned at the beginning, we recognize there is a balance between performance, usability, and attractiveness, particularly with regards to an image Gallery. For that reason, we have made Gallery's performance a major focus in 4.3, and have implemented some changes that bring with them a noticeable performance improvement.
    Firstly, we have adjusted the software to only store two copies of an image (in addition to the original), instead of four. In previous versions, we stored a thumbnail, a small copy, a medium copy and a large copy of an image, all of which arbitrarily sized and designed to best meet our layout needs without showing an image too large or too small in a given space. We have simplified this vastly by storing a slightly larger "small" image, and storing a large copy. Diskspace usage is reduced dramatically as a result, and bandwidth usage is actually lowered as well since only two copies of an image need to be delivered to the browser instead of four.
    Next, we have implemented prefetching of the 'next' and 'previous' pages when you launch the lightbox image view. This means that when a user navigates to the next image in the lightbox, it loads immediately instead of waiting for the content to be fetched from the server. From a UX perspective, this provides a much snappier and responsive interface, making users more apt to interact with the site.
    We have additionally sped up the submission process as previously mentioned. The order of execution for certain events that must happen during submission has been moved around a bit, resulting in a faster experience for the end user actually submitting the images.
    Because we know the details matter, we have implemented other smaller improvements as well. For example, the link to rebuild images in the AdminCP previously resulted in a redirect process that rebuilt the images while you waited, but now a background task is launched so that you can continue with what you were doing while the images get rebuilt in the background.
    From start to finish, the Gallery UI and UX has been touched on and improved, and we hope you enjoy these improvements when you start using the new version.
  8. Thanks
    bfarber got a reaction from Mi}{a for a blog entry, 4.3: Modernizing our Gallery   
    A picture says a thousand words, they say. If getting those pictures online is troublesome, some of those words might be a little choice.
    Gallery has been an integral part of our community suite for just about as long as T1 Tech Mark Higgins can remember (and he has many years of memories). It has seen many interfaces changes as the years have rolled by. The most recent version received a fair amount to feedback on usability.
    We've listened. We've re-engineered most of Gallery's key interfaces to make uploading new images to your community frictionless.
    Lets take a look through the major changes.
    Improved submission process
    Submitting images has to be simple or else users will give up and your gallery will be underutilized. We have spent a lot of time simplifying and speeding up the submissions process for your users. The first thing that will be noticed is that the submission process is not presented as a wizard anymore, and the choice to submit to a category or album has been significantly cleaned up and simplified.

     
    Choosing a container
    Here, I have chosen the category I wish to submit to, so now I am asked if I want to submit directly to the category, if I want to create a new album, or if I want to submit to an existing album.  Choosing one of those last two options will load the appropriate forms to create an album or select an existing album, respectively.
    Afterwards, the modal expands to full screen and you will naturally select your images next, and there's a lot to talk about here.
     

    Overhauled submission interface
    First and foremost, the interface has changed significantly to both simplify the UI and to make actually using the interface easier. When you click on an image, the form is loaded to the right immediately without an AJAX request needed to fetch the form.
    In addition to quickly setting the credit and copyright information for all images at once, you can now set the tags for all images quickly and easily without having to edit each image individually.
    Images support drag n drop reordering in the uploader here, which means that you can drag n drop images to different positions to control their order. Many users previously would name images "Image 1", "Image 2", and so on, and then set their albums to order images by name in order to control the order the images were displayed in. This is no longer necessary now that you can manually reposition the images.
    The default description editor is a pared down textarea box, but you can still use the rich text editor if you wish. The ability to enable maps for geo-encoded images and to upload thumbnails for videos is still supported as well, and those options will show up when appropriate in the right hand panel.
    The 100 image per submission limit has also been lifted. You can now upload many more images in one go with no hard limit imposed.
    Upon clicking submit images, you will see the typical multiredirector to store all of your images, however you will notice that it processes much faster than it did in 4.2 and below.
    Better submission control
    Administrators can now configure categories such that can accept only images, only albums, or both. This means you can now create categories that cannot be submitted to directly, and you can create categories that albums cannot be used with. This is a feature that has been oft-requested since the release of 4.0, and we are happy to report that it will be available in our next release.
    Additionally, album creators (if permitted) can also now create shared albums.  When you create a new album, you can now specify (under the Privacy menu) who can submit to the album, with your available options being:
    Only me Anyone Only the users I specify Only the groups I specify Prior to 4.3, albums have always been owned by one user and only that user could submit to them. Invision Community 4.3 will open up albums so that anyone can submit to them, dependent upon the album creator's preferences and needs.

    The choice is yours as to who can submit to your albums
    New image navigation
    Another major change with Gallery 4.3 is that clicking an image now launches that image in a lightbox to view it and interact with it. This lightbox is context-aware, allowing you to visit the next and previous images in the listing, whether that is a category or album listing, or the featured images or new images listings on the Gallery homepage, for example.
     

    The new image lightbox
    Firstly, I will note that you are seeing the image here with my mouse cursor over the image area, exposing the title, tags, and some various buttons. When you mouse away from the image those overlays fade away to highlight the image itself better.
    As you can see, you can navigate left and right here to view the next and previous image in this context, and you can otherwise interact with the image as you would have if you had visited the older-style image view page (including the ability to rate, review and comment).
    The new Gallery release will introduce a new advertisement location in the right hand column to allow you to show advertisements, even in the lightbox.
    If you follow a link to a full image view page, the lightbox will automatically launch when the page loads, still allowing you to interact in a familiar manner. Additionally, if you move through enough images in the lightbox to reach a new page (for example, if you click on the last image in the album listing and then click on the next image button), the listing itself behind the lightbox will update for easier usability if the user closes the lightbox.
    One final thing to note is that the interface has been made more mobile friendly, particularly through the introduction of swiping support. You can swipe left and right in the lightbox, and in image carousels, to see the next and previous images.
    Notable performance improvements
    As we mentioned at the beginning, we recognize there is a balance between performance, usability, and attractiveness, particularly with regards to an image Gallery. For that reason, we have made Gallery's performance a major focus in 4.3, and have implemented some changes that bring with them a noticeable performance improvement.
    Firstly, we have adjusted the software to only store two copies of an image (in addition to the original), instead of four. In previous versions, we stored a thumbnail, a small copy, a medium copy and a large copy of an image, all of which arbitrarily sized and designed to best meet our layout needs without showing an image too large or too small in a given space. We have simplified this vastly by storing a slightly larger "small" image, and storing a large copy. Diskspace usage is reduced dramatically as a result, and bandwidth usage is actually lowered as well since only two copies of an image need to be delivered to the browser instead of four.
    Next, we have implemented prefetching of the 'next' and 'previous' pages when you launch the lightbox image view. This means that when a user navigates to the next image in the lightbox, it loads immediately instead of waiting for the content to be fetched from the server. From a UX perspective, this provides a much snappier and responsive interface, making users more apt to interact with the site.
    We have additionally sped up the submission process as previously mentioned. The order of execution for certain events that must happen during submission has been moved around a bit, resulting in a faster experience for the end user actually submitting the images.
    Because we know the details matter, we have implemented other smaller improvements as well. For example, the link to rebuild images in the AdminCP previously resulted in a redirect process that rebuilt the images while you waited, but now a background task is launched so that you can continue with what you were doing while the images get rebuilt in the background.
    From start to finish, the Gallery UI and UX has been touched on and improved, and we hope you enjoy these improvements when you start using the new version.
  9. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from Maxxius for a blog entry, 4.3: Modernizing our Gallery   
    A picture says a thousand words, they say. If getting those pictures online is troublesome, some of those words might be a little choice.
    Gallery has been an integral part of our community suite for just about as long as T1 Tech Mark Higgins can remember (and he has many years of memories). It has seen many interfaces changes as the years have rolled by. The most recent version received a fair amount to feedback on usability.
    We've listened. We've re-engineered most of Gallery's key interfaces to make uploading new images to your community frictionless.
    Lets take a look through the major changes.
    Improved submission process
    Submitting images has to be simple or else users will give up and your gallery will be underutilized. We have spent a lot of time simplifying and speeding up the submissions process for your users. The first thing that will be noticed is that the submission process is not presented as a wizard anymore, and the choice to submit to a category or album has been significantly cleaned up and simplified.

     
    Choosing a container
    Here, I have chosen the category I wish to submit to, so now I am asked if I want to submit directly to the category, if I want to create a new album, or if I want to submit to an existing album.  Choosing one of those last two options will load the appropriate forms to create an album or select an existing album, respectively.
    Afterwards, the modal expands to full screen and you will naturally select your images next, and there's a lot to talk about here.
     

    Overhauled submission interface
    First and foremost, the interface has changed significantly to both simplify the UI and to make actually using the interface easier. When you click on an image, the form is loaded to the right immediately without an AJAX request needed to fetch the form.
    In addition to quickly setting the credit and copyright information for all images at once, you can now set the tags for all images quickly and easily without having to edit each image individually.
    Images support drag n drop reordering in the uploader here, which means that you can drag n drop images to different positions to control their order. Many users previously would name images "Image 1", "Image 2", and so on, and then set their albums to order images by name in order to control the order the images were displayed in. This is no longer necessary now that you can manually reposition the images.
    The default description editor is a pared down textarea box, but you can still use the rich text editor if you wish. The ability to enable maps for geo-encoded images and to upload thumbnails for videos is still supported as well, and those options will show up when appropriate in the right hand panel.
    The 100 image per submission limit has also been lifted. You can now upload many more images in one go with no hard limit imposed.
    Upon clicking submit images, you will see the typical multiredirector to store all of your images, however you will notice that it processes much faster than it did in 4.2 and below.
    Better submission control
    Administrators can now configure categories such that can accept only images, only albums, or both. This means you can now create categories that cannot be submitted to directly, and you can create categories that albums cannot be used with. This is a feature that has been oft-requested since the release of 4.0, and we are happy to report that it will be available in our next release.
    Additionally, album creators (if permitted) can also now create shared albums.  When you create a new album, you can now specify (under the Privacy menu) who can submit to the album, with your available options being:
    Only me Anyone Only the users I specify Only the groups I specify Prior to 4.3, albums have always been owned by one user and only that user could submit to them. Invision Community 4.3 will open up albums so that anyone can submit to them, dependent upon the album creator's preferences and needs.

    The choice is yours as to who can submit to your albums
    New image navigation
    Another major change with Gallery 4.3 is that clicking an image now launches that image in a lightbox to view it and interact with it. This lightbox is context-aware, allowing you to visit the next and previous images in the listing, whether that is a category or album listing, or the featured images or new images listings on the Gallery homepage, for example.
     

    The new image lightbox
    Firstly, I will note that you are seeing the image here with my mouse cursor over the image area, exposing the title, tags, and some various buttons. When you mouse away from the image those overlays fade away to highlight the image itself better.
    As you can see, you can navigate left and right here to view the next and previous image in this context, and you can otherwise interact with the image as you would have if you had visited the older-style image view page (including the ability to rate, review and comment).
    The new Gallery release will introduce a new advertisement location in the right hand column to allow you to show advertisements, even in the lightbox.
    If you follow a link to a full image view page, the lightbox will automatically launch when the page loads, still allowing you to interact in a familiar manner. Additionally, if you move through enough images in the lightbox to reach a new page (for example, if you click on the last image in the album listing and then click on the next image button), the listing itself behind the lightbox will update for easier usability if the user closes the lightbox.
    One final thing to note is that the interface has been made more mobile friendly, particularly through the introduction of swiping support. You can swipe left and right in the lightbox, and in image carousels, to see the next and previous images.
    Notable performance improvements
    As we mentioned at the beginning, we recognize there is a balance between performance, usability, and attractiveness, particularly with regards to an image Gallery. For that reason, we have made Gallery's performance a major focus in 4.3, and have implemented some changes that bring with them a noticeable performance improvement.
    Firstly, we have adjusted the software to only store two copies of an image (in addition to the original), instead of four. In previous versions, we stored a thumbnail, a small copy, a medium copy and a large copy of an image, all of which arbitrarily sized and designed to best meet our layout needs without showing an image too large or too small in a given space. We have simplified this vastly by storing a slightly larger "small" image, and storing a large copy. Diskspace usage is reduced dramatically as a result, and bandwidth usage is actually lowered as well since only two copies of an image need to be delivered to the browser instead of four.
    Next, we have implemented prefetching of the 'next' and 'previous' pages when you launch the lightbox image view. This means that when a user navigates to the next image in the lightbox, it loads immediately instead of waiting for the content to be fetched from the server. From a UX perspective, this provides a much snappier and responsive interface, making users more apt to interact with the site.
    We have additionally sped up the submission process as previously mentioned. The order of execution for certain events that must happen during submission has been moved around a bit, resulting in a faster experience for the end user actually submitting the images.
    Because we know the details matter, we have implemented other smaller improvements as well. For example, the link to rebuild images in the AdminCP previously resulted in a redirect process that rebuilt the images while you waited, but now a background task is launched so that you can continue with what you were doing while the images get rebuilt in the background.
    From start to finish, the Gallery UI and UX has been touched on and improved, and we hope you enjoy these improvements when you start using the new version.
  10. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from Qubabos for a blog entry, 4.3: Modernizing our Gallery   
    A picture says a thousand words, they say. If getting those pictures online is troublesome, some of those words might be a little choice.
    Gallery has been an integral part of our community suite for just about as long as T1 Tech Mark Higgins can remember (and he has many years of memories). It has seen many interfaces changes as the years have rolled by. The most recent version received a fair amount to feedback on usability.
    We've listened. We've re-engineered most of Gallery's key interfaces to make uploading new images to your community frictionless.
    Lets take a look through the major changes.
    Improved submission process
    Submitting images has to be simple or else users will give up and your gallery will be underutilized. We have spent a lot of time simplifying and speeding up the submissions process for your users. The first thing that will be noticed is that the submission process is not presented as a wizard anymore, and the choice to submit to a category or album has been significantly cleaned up and simplified.

     
    Choosing a container
    Here, I have chosen the category I wish to submit to, so now I am asked if I want to submit directly to the category, if I want to create a new album, or if I want to submit to an existing album.  Choosing one of those last two options will load the appropriate forms to create an album or select an existing album, respectively.
    Afterwards, the modal expands to full screen and you will naturally select your images next, and there's a lot to talk about here.
     

    Overhauled submission interface
    First and foremost, the interface has changed significantly to both simplify the UI and to make actually using the interface easier. When you click on an image, the form is loaded to the right immediately without an AJAX request needed to fetch the form.
    In addition to quickly setting the credit and copyright information for all images at once, you can now set the tags for all images quickly and easily without having to edit each image individually.
    Images support drag n drop reordering in the uploader here, which means that you can drag n drop images to different positions to control their order. Many users previously would name images "Image 1", "Image 2", and so on, and then set their albums to order images by name in order to control the order the images were displayed in. This is no longer necessary now that you can manually reposition the images.
    The default description editor is a pared down textarea box, but you can still use the rich text editor if you wish. The ability to enable maps for geo-encoded images and to upload thumbnails for videos is still supported as well, and those options will show up when appropriate in the right hand panel.
    The 100 image per submission limit has also been lifted. You can now upload many more images in one go with no hard limit imposed.
    Upon clicking submit images, you will see the typical multiredirector to store all of your images, however you will notice that it processes much faster than it did in 4.2 and below.
    Better submission control
    Administrators can now configure categories such that can accept only images, only albums, or both. This means you can now create categories that cannot be submitted to directly, and you can create categories that albums cannot be used with. This is a feature that has been oft-requested since the release of 4.0, and we are happy to report that it will be available in our next release.
    Additionally, album creators (if permitted) can also now create shared albums.  When you create a new album, you can now specify (under the Privacy menu) who can submit to the album, with your available options being:
    Only me Anyone Only the users I specify Only the groups I specify Prior to 4.3, albums have always been owned by one user and only that user could submit to them. Invision Community 4.3 will open up albums so that anyone can submit to them, dependent upon the album creator's preferences and needs.

    The choice is yours as to who can submit to your albums
    New image navigation
    Another major change with Gallery 4.3 is that clicking an image now launches that image in a lightbox to view it and interact with it. This lightbox is context-aware, allowing you to visit the next and previous images in the listing, whether that is a category or album listing, or the featured images or new images listings on the Gallery homepage, for example.
     

    The new image lightbox
    Firstly, I will note that you are seeing the image here with my mouse cursor over the image area, exposing the title, tags, and some various buttons. When you mouse away from the image those overlays fade away to highlight the image itself better.
    As you can see, you can navigate left and right here to view the next and previous image in this context, and you can otherwise interact with the image as you would have if you had visited the older-style image view page (including the ability to rate, review and comment).
    The new Gallery release will introduce a new advertisement location in the right hand column to allow you to show advertisements, even in the lightbox.
    If you follow a link to a full image view page, the lightbox will automatically launch when the page loads, still allowing you to interact in a familiar manner. Additionally, if you move through enough images in the lightbox to reach a new page (for example, if you click on the last image in the album listing and then click on the next image button), the listing itself behind the lightbox will update for easier usability if the user closes the lightbox.
    One final thing to note is that the interface has been made more mobile friendly, particularly through the introduction of swiping support. You can swipe left and right in the lightbox, and in image carousels, to see the next and previous images.
    Notable performance improvements
    As we mentioned at the beginning, we recognize there is a balance between performance, usability, and attractiveness, particularly with regards to an image Gallery. For that reason, we have made Gallery's performance a major focus in 4.3, and have implemented some changes that bring with them a noticeable performance improvement.
    Firstly, we have adjusted the software to only store two copies of an image (in addition to the original), instead of four. In previous versions, we stored a thumbnail, a small copy, a medium copy and a large copy of an image, all of which arbitrarily sized and designed to best meet our layout needs without showing an image too large or too small in a given space. We have simplified this vastly by storing a slightly larger "small" image, and storing a large copy. Diskspace usage is reduced dramatically as a result, and bandwidth usage is actually lowered as well since only two copies of an image need to be delivered to the browser instead of four.
    Next, we have implemented prefetching of the 'next' and 'previous' pages when you launch the lightbox image view. This means that when a user navigates to the next image in the lightbox, it loads immediately instead of waiting for the content to be fetched from the server. From a UX perspective, this provides a much snappier and responsive interface, making users more apt to interact with the site.
    We have additionally sped up the submission process as previously mentioned. The order of execution for certain events that must happen during submission has been moved around a bit, resulting in a faster experience for the end user actually submitting the images.
    Because we know the details matter, we have implemented other smaller improvements as well. For example, the link to rebuild images in the AdminCP previously resulted in a redirect process that rebuilt the images while you waited, but now a background task is launched so that you can continue with what you were doing while the images get rebuilt in the background.
    From start to finish, the Gallery UI and UX has been touched on and improved, and we hope you enjoy these improvements when you start using the new version.
  11. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from svit for a blog entry, 4.3: Modernizing our Gallery   
    A picture says a thousand words, they say. If getting those pictures online is troublesome, some of those words might be a little choice.
    Gallery has been an integral part of our community suite for just about as long as T1 Tech Mark Higgins can remember (and he has many years of memories). It has seen many interfaces changes as the years have rolled by. The most recent version received a fair amount to feedback on usability.
    We've listened. We've re-engineered most of Gallery's key interfaces to make uploading new images to your community frictionless.
    Lets take a look through the major changes.
    Improved submission process
    Submitting images has to be simple or else users will give up and your gallery will be underutilized. We have spent a lot of time simplifying and speeding up the submissions process for your users. The first thing that will be noticed is that the submission process is not presented as a wizard anymore, and the choice to submit to a category or album has been significantly cleaned up and simplified.

     
    Choosing a container
    Here, I have chosen the category I wish to submit to, so now I am asked if I want to submit directly to the category, if I want to create a new album, or if I want to submit to an existing album.  Choosing one of those last two options will load the appropriate forms to create an album or select an existing album, respectively.
    Afterwards, the modal expands to full screen and you will naturally select your images next, and there's a lot to talk about here.
     

    Overhauled submission interface
    First and foremost, the interface has changed significantly to both simplify the UI and to make actually using the interface easier. When you click on an image, the form is loaded to the right immediately without an AJAX request needed to fetch the form.
    In addition to quickly setting the credit and copyright information for all images at once, you can now set the tags for all images quickly and easily without having to edit each image individually.
    Images support drag n drop reordering in the uploader here, which means that you can drag n drop images to different positions to control their order. Many users previously would name images "Image 1", "Image 2", and so on, and then set their albums to order images by name in order to control the order the images were displayed in. This is no longer necessary now that you can manually reposition the images.
    The default description editor is a pared down textarea box, but you can still use the rich text editor if you wish. The ability to enable maps for geo-encoded images and to upload thumbnails for videos is still supported as well, and those options will show up when appropriate in the right hand panel.
    The 100 image per submission limit has also been lifted. You can now upload many more images in one go with no hard limit imposed.
    Upon clicking submit images, you will see the typical multiredirector to store all of your images, however you will notice that it processes much faster than it did in 4.2 and below.
    Better submission control
    Administrators can now configure categories such that can accept only images, only albums, or both. This means you can now create categories that cannot be submitted to directly, and you can create categories that albums cannot be used with. This is a feature that has been oft-requested since the release of 4.0, and we are happy to report that it will be available in our next release.
    Additionally, album creators (if permitted) can also now create shared albums.  When you create a new album, you can now specify (under the Privacy menu) who can submit to the album, with your available options being:
    Only me Anyone Only the users I specify Only the groups I specify Prior to 4.3, albums have always been owned by one user and only that user could submit to them. Invision Community 4.3 will open up albums so that anyone can submit to them, dependent upon the album creator's preferences and needs.

    The choice is yours as to who can submit to your albums
    New image navigation
    Another major change with Gallery 4.3 is that clicking an image now launches that image in a lightbox to view it and interact with it. This lightbox is context-aware, allowing you to visit the next and previous images in the listing, whether that is a category or album listing, or the featured images or new images listings on the Gallery homepage, for example.
     

    The new image lightbox
    Firstly, I will note that you are seeing the image here with my mouse cursor over the image area, exposing the title, tags, and some various buttons. When you mouse away from the image those overlays fade away to highlight the image itself better.
    As you can see, you can navigate left and right here to view the next and previous image in this context, and you can otherwise interact with the image as you would have if you had visited the older-style image view page (including the ability to rate, review and comment).
    The new Gallery release will introduce a new advertisement location in the right hand column to allow you to show advertisements, even in the lightbox.
    If you follow a link to a full image view page, the lightbox will automatically launch when the page loads, still allowing you to interact in a familiar manner. Additionally, if you move through enough images in the lightbox to reach a new page (for example, if you click on the last image in the album listing and then click on the next image button), the listing itself behind the lightbox will update for easier usability if the user closes the lightbox.
    One final thing to note is that the interface has been made more mobile friendly, particularly through the introduction of swiping support. You can swipe left and right in the lightbox, and in image carousels, to see the next and previous images.
    Notable performance improvements
    As we mentioned at the beginning, we recognize there is a balance between performance, usability, and attractiveness, particularly with regards to an image Gallery. For that reason, we have made Gallery's performance a major focus in 4.3, and have implemented some changes that bring with them a noticeable performance improvement.
    Firstly, we have adjusted the software to only store two copies of an image (in addition to the original), instead of four. In previous versions, we stored a thumbnail, a small copy, a medium copy and a large copy of an image, all of which arbitrarily sized and designed to best meet our layout needs without showing an image too large or too small in a given space. We have simplified this vastly by storing a slightly larger "small" image, and storing a large copy. Diskspace usage is reduced dramatically as a result, and bandwidth usage is actually lowered as well since only two copies of an image need to be delivered to the browser instead of four.
    Next, we have implemented prefetching of the 'next' and 'previous' pages when you launch the lightbox image view. This means that when a user navigates to the next image in the lightbox, it loads immediately instead of waiting for the content to be fetched from the server. From a UX perspective, this provides a much snappier and responsive interface, making users more apt to interact with the site.
    We have additionally sped up the submission process as previously mentioned. The order of execution for certain events that must happen during submission has been moved around a bit, resulting in a faster experience for the end user actually submitting the images.
    Because we know the details matter, we have implemented other smaller improvements as well. For example, the link to rebuild images in the AdminCP previously resulted in a redirect process that rebuilt the images while you waited, but now a background task is launched so that you can continue with what you were doing while the images get rebuilt in the background.
    From start to finish, the Gallery UI and UX has been touched on and improved, and we hope you enjoy these improvements when you start using the new version.
  12. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from shahed for a blog entry, 4.3: Modernizing our Gallery   
    A picture says a thousand words, they say. If getting those pictures online is troublesome, some of those words might be a little choice.
    Gallery has been an integral part of our community suite for just about as long as T1 Tech Mark Higgins can remember (and he has many years of memories). It has seen many interfaces changes as the years have rolled by. The most recent version received a fair amount to feedback on usability.
    We've listened. We've re-engineered most of Gallery's key interfaces to make uploading new images to your community frictionless.
    Lets take a look through the major changes.
    Improved submission process
    Submitting images has to be simple or else users will give up and your gallery will be underutilized. We have spent a lot of time simplifying and speeding up the submissions process for your users. The first thing that will be noticed is that the submission process is not presented as a wizard anymore, and the choice to submit to a category or album has been significantly cleaned up and simplified.

     
    Choosing a container
    Here, I have chosen the category I wish to submit to, so now I am asked if I want to submit directly to the category, if I want to create a new album, or if I want to submit to an existing album.  Choosing one of those last two options will load the appropriate forms to create an album or select an existing album, respectively.
    Afterwards, the modal expands to full screen and you will naturally select your images next, and there's a lot to talk about here.
     

    Overhauled submission interface
    First and foremost, the interface has changed significantly to both simplify the UI and to make actually using the interface easier. When you click on an image, the form is loaded to the right immediately without an AJAX request needed to fetch the form.
    In addition to quickly setting the credit and copyright information for all images at once, you can now set the tags for all images quickly and easily without having to edit each image individually.
    Images support drag n drop reordering in the uploader here, which means that you can drag n drop images to different positions to control their order. Many users previously would name images "Image 1", "Image 2", and so on, and then set their albums to order images by name in order to control the order the images were displayed in. This is no longer necessary now that you can manually reposition the images.
    The default description editor is a pared down textarea box, but you can still use the rich text editor if you wish. The ability to enable maps for geo-encoded images and to upload thumbnails for videos is still supported as well, and those options will show up when appropriate in the right hand panel.
    The 100 image per submission limit has also been lifted. You can now upload many more images in one go with no hard limit imposed.
    Upon clicking submit images, you will see the typical multiredirector to store all of your images, however you will notice that it processes much faster than it did in 4.2 and below.
    Better submission control
    Administrators can now configure categories such that can accept only images, only albums, or both. This means you can now create categories that cannot be submitted to directly, and you can create categories that albums cannot be used with. This is a feature that has been oft-requested since the release of 4.0, and we are happy to report that it will be available in our next release.
    Additionally, album creators (if permitted) can also now create shared albums.  When you create a new album, you can now specify (under the Privacy menu) who can submit to the album, with your available options being:
    Only me Anyone Only the users I specify Only the groups I specify Prior to 4.3, albums have always been owned by one user and only that user could submit to them. Invision Community 4.3 will open up albums so that anyone can submit to them, dependent upon the album creator's preferences and needs.

    The choice is yours as to who can submit to your albums
    New image navigation
    Another major change with Gallery 4.3 is that clicking an image now launches that image in a lightbox to view it and interact with it. This lightbox is context-aware, allowing you to visit the next and previous images in the listing, whether that is a category or album listing, or the featured images or new images listings on the Gallery homepage, for example.
     

    The new image lightbox
    Firstly, I will note that you are seeing the image here with my mouse cursor over the image area, exposing the title, tags, and some various buttons. When you mouse away from the image those overlays fade away to highlight the image itself better.
    As you can see, you can navigate left and right here to view the next and previous image in this context, and you can otherwise interact with the image as you would have if you had visited the older-style image view page (including the ability to rate, review and comment).
    The new Gallery release will introduce a new advertisement location in the right hand column to allow you to show advertisements, even in the lightbox.
    If you follow a link to a full image view page, the lightbox will automatically launch when the page loads, still allowing you to interact in a familiar manner. Additionally, if you move through enough images in the lightbox to reach a new page (for example, if you click on the last image in the album listing and then click on the next image button), the listing itself behind the lightbox will update for easier usability if the user closes the lightbox.
    One final thing to note is that the interface has been made more mobile friendly, particularly through the introduction of swiping support. You can swipe left and right in the lightbox, and in image carousels, to see the next and previous images.
    Notable performance improvements
    As we mentioned at the beginning, we recognize there is a balance between performance, usability, and attractiveness, particularly with regards to an image Gallery. For that reason, we have made Gallery's performance a major focus in 4.3, and have implemented some changes that bring with them a noticeable performance improvement.
    Firstly, we have adjusted the software to only store two copies of an image (in addition to the original), instead of four. In previous versions, we stored a thumbnail, a small copy, a medium copy and a large copy of an image, all of which arbitrarily sized and designed to best meet our layout needs without showing an image too large or too small in a given space. We have simplified this vastly by storing a slightly larger "small" image, and storing a large copy. Diskspace usage is reduced dramatically as a result, and bandwidth usage is actually lowered as well since only two copies of an image need to be delivered to the browser instead of four.
    Next, we have implemented prefetching of the 'next' and 'previous' pages when you launch the lightbox image view. This means that when a user navigates to the next image in the lightbox, it loads immediately instead of waiting for the content to be fetched from the server. From a UX perspective, this provides a much snappier and responsive interface, making users more apt to interact with the site.
    We have additionally sped up the submission process as previously mentioned. The order of execution for certain events that must happen during submission has been moved around a bit, resulting in a faster experience for the end user actually submitting the images.
    Because we know the details matter, we have implemented other smaller improvements as well. For example, the link to rebuild images in the AdminCP previously resulted in a redirect process that rebuilt the images while you waited, but now a background task is launched so that you can continue with what you were doing while the images get rebuilt in the background.
    From start to finish, the Gallery UI and UX has been touched on and improved, and we hope you enjoy these improvements when you start using the new version.
  13. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from Optic14 for a blog entry, 4.3: Modernizing our Gallery   
    A picture says a thousand words, they say. If getting those pictures online is troublesome, some of those words might be a little choice.
    Gallery has been an integral part of our community suite for just about as long as T1 Tech Mark Higgins can remember (and he has many years of memories). It has seen many interfaces changes as the years have rolled by. The most recent version received a fair amount to feedback on usability.
    We've listened. We've re-engineered most of Gallery's key interfaces to make uploading new images to your community frictionless.
    Lets take a look through the major changes.
    Improved submission process
    Submitting images has to be simple or else users will give up and your gallery will be underutilized. We have spent a lot of time simplifying and speeding up the submissions process for your users. The first thing that will be noticed is that the submission process is not presented as a wizard anymore, and the choice to submit to a category or album has been significantly cleaned up and simplified.

     
    Choosing a container
    Here, I have chosen the category I wish to submit to, so now I am asked if I want to submit directly to the category, if I want to create a new album, or if I want to submit to an existing album.  Choosing one of those last two options will load the appropriate forms to create an album or select an existing album, respectively.
    Afterwards, the modal expands to full screen and you will naturally select your images next, and there's a lot to talk about here.
     

    Overhauled submission interface
    First and foremost, the interface has changed significantly to both simplify the UI and to make actually using the interface easier. When you click on an image, the form is loaded to the right immediately without an AJAX request needed to fetch the form.
    In addition to quickly setting the credit and copyright information for all images at once, you can now set the tags for all images quickly and easily without having to edit each image individually.
    Images support drag n drop reordering in the uploader here, which means that you can drag n drop images to different positions to control their order. Many users previously would name images "Image 1", "Image 2", and so on, and then set their albums to order images by name in order to control the order the images were displayed in. This is no longer necessary now that you can manually reposition the images.
    The default description editor is a pared down textarea box, but you can still use the rich text editor if you wish. The ability to enable maps for geo-encoded images and to upload thumbnails for videos is still supported as well, and those options will show up when appropriate in the right hand panel.
    The 100 image per submission limit has also been lifted. You can now upload many more images in one go with no hard limit imposed.
    Upon clicking submit images, you will see the typical multiredirector to store all of your images, however you will notice that it processes much faster than it did in 4.2 and below.
    Better submission control
    Administrators can now configure categories such that can accept only images, only albums, or both. This means you can now create categories that cannot be submitted to directly, and you can create categories that albums cannot be used with. This is a feature that has been oft-requested since the release of 4.0, and we are happy to report that it will be available in our next release.
    Additionally, album creators (if permitted) can also now create shared albums.  When you create a new album, you can now specify (under the Privacy menu) who can submit to the album, with your available options being:
    Only me Anyone Only the users I specify Only the groups I specify Prior to 4.3, albums have always been owned by one user and only that user could submit to them. Invision Community 4.3 will open up albums so that anyone can submit to them, dependent upon the album creator's preferences and needs.

    The choice is yours as to who can submit to your albums
    New image navigation
    Another major change with Gallery 4.3 is that clicking an image now launches that image in a lightbox to view it and interact with it. This lightbox is context-aware, allowing you to visit the next and previous images in the listing, whether that is a category or album listing, or the featured images or new images listings on the Gallery homepage, for example.
     

    The new image lightbox
    Firstly, I will note that you are seeing the image here with my mouse cursor over the image area, exposing the title, tags, and some various buttons. When you mouse away from the image those overlays fade away to highlight the image itself better.
    As you can see, you can navigate left and right here to view the next and previous image in this context, and you can otherwise interact with the image as you would have if you had visited the older-style image view page (including the ability to rate, review and comment).
    The new Gallery release will introduce a new advertisement location in the right hand column to allow you to show advertisements, even in the lightbox.
    If you follow a link to a full image view page, the lightbox will automatically launch when the page loads, still allowing you to interact in a familiar manner. Additionally, if you move through enough images in the lightbox to reach a new page (for example, if you click on the last image in the album listing and then click on the next image button), the listing itself behind the lightbox will update for easier usability if the user closes the lightbox.
    One final thing to note is that the interface has been made more mobile friendly, particularly through the introduction of swiping support. You can swipe left and right in the lightbox, and in image carousels, to see the next and previous images.
    Notable performance improvements
    As we mentioned at the beginning, we recognize there is a balance between performance, usability, and attractiveness, particularly with regards to an image Gallery. For that reason, we have made Gallery's performance a major focus in 4.3, and have implemented some changes that bring with them a noticeable performance improvement.
    Firstly, we have adjusted the software to only store two copies of an image (in addition to the original), instead of four. In previous versions, we stored a thumbnail, a small copy, a medium copy and a large copy of an image, all of which arbitrarily sized and designed to best meet our layout needs without showing an image too large or too small in a given space. We have simplified this vastly by storing a slightly larger "small" image, and storing a large copy. Diskspace usage is reduced dramatically as a result, and bandwidth usage is actually lowered as well since only two copies of an image need to be delivered to the browser instead of four.
    Next, we have implemented prefetching of the 'next' and 'previous' pages when you launch the lightbox image view. This means that when a user navigates to the next image in the lightbox, it loads immediately instead of waiting for the content to be fetched from the server. From a UX perspective, this provides a much snappier and responsive interface, making users more apt to interact with the site.
    We have additionally sped up the submission process as previously mentioned. The order of execution for certain events that must happen during submission has been moved around a bit, resulting in a faster experience for the end user actually submitting the images.
    Because we know the details matter, we have implemented other smaller improvements as well. For example, the link to rebuild images in the AdminCP previously resulted in a redirect process that rebuilt the images while you waited, but now a background task is launched so that you can continue with what you were doing while the images get rebuilt in the background.
    From start to finish, the Gallery UI and UX has been touched on and improved, and we hope you enjoy these improvements when you start using the new version.
  14. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from AtariAge for a blog entry, 4.3: Modernizing our Gallery   
    A picture says a thousand words, they say. If getting those pictures online is troublesome, some of those words might be a little choice.
    Gallery has been an integral part of our community suite for just about as long as T1 Tech Mark Higgins can remember (and he has many years of memories). It has seen many interfaces changes as the years have rolled by. The most recent version received a fair amount to feedback on usability.
    We've listened. We've re-engineered most of Gallery's key interfaces to make uploading new images to your community frictionless.
    Lets take a look through the major changes.
    Improved submission process
    Submitting images has to be simple or else users will give up and your gallery will be underutilized. We have spent a lot of time simplifying and speeding up the submissions process for your users. The first thing that will be noticed is that the submission process is not presented as a wizard anymore, and the choice to submit to a category or album has been significantly cleaned up and simplified.

     
    Choosing a container
    Here, I have chosen the category I wish to submit to, so now I am asked if I want to submit directly to the category, if I want to create a new album, or if I want to submit to an existing album.  Choosing one of those last two options will load the appropriate forms to create an album or select an existing album, respectively.
    Afterwards, the modal expands to full screen and you will naturally select your images next, and there's a lot to talk about here.
     

    Overhauled submission interface
    First and foremost, the interface has changed significantly to both simplify the UI and to make actually using the interface easier. When you click on an image, the form is loaded to the right immediately without an AJAX request needed to fetch the form.
    In addition to quickly setting the credit and copyright information for all images at once, you can now set the tags for all images quickly and easily without having to edit each image individually.
    Images support drag n drop reordering in the uploader here, which means that you can drag n drop images to different positions to control their order. Many users previously would name images "Image 1", "Image 2", and so on, and then set their albums to order images by name in order to control the order the images were displayed in. This is no longer necessary now that you can manually reposition the images.
    The default description editor is a pared down textarea box, but you can still use the rich text editor if you wish. The ability to enable maps for geo-encoded images and to upload thumbnails for videos is still supported as well, and those options will show up when appropriate in the right hand panel.
    The 100 image per submission limit has also been lifted. You can now upload many more images in one go with no hard limit imposed.
    Upon clicking submit images, you will see the typical multiredirector to store all of your images, however you will notice that it processes much faster than it did in 4.2 and below.
    Better submission control
    Administrators can now configure categories such that can accept only images, only albums, or both. This means you can now create categories that cannot be submitted to directly, and you can create categories that albums cannot be used with. This is a feature that has been oft-requested since the release of 4.0, and we are happy to report that it will be available in our next release.
    Additionally, album creators (if permitted) can also now create shared albums.  When you create a new album, you can now specify (under the Privacy menu) who can submit to the album, with your available options being:
    Only me Anyone Only the users I specify Only the groups I specify Prior to 4.3, albums have always been owned by one user and only that user could submit to them. Invision Community 4.3 will open up albums so that anyone can submit to them, dependent upon the album creator's preferences and needs.

    The choice is yours as to who can submit to your albums
    New image navigation
    Another major change with Gallery 4.3 is that clicking an image now launches that image in a lightbox to view it and interact with it. This lightbox is context-aware, allowing you to visit the next and previous images in the listing, whether that is a category or album listing, or the featured images or new images listings on the Gallery homepage, for example.
     

    The new image lightbox
    Firstly, I will note that you are seeing the image here with my mouse cursor over the image area, exposing the title, tags, and some various buttons. When you mouse away from the image those overlays fade away to highlight the image itself better.
    As you can see, you can navigate left and right here to view the next and previous image in this context, and you can otherwise interact with the image as you would have if you had visited the older-style image view page (including the ability to rate, review and comment).
    The new Gallery release will introduce a new advertisement location in the right hand column to allow you to show advertisements, even in the lightbox.
    If you follow a link to a full image view page, the lightbox will automatically launch when the page loads, still allowing you to interact in a familiar manner. Additionally, if you move through enough images in the lightbox to reach a new page (for example, if you click on the last image in the album listing and then click on the next image button), the listing itself behind the lightbox will update for easier usability if the user closes the lightbox.
    One final thing to note is that the interface has been made more mobile friendly, particularly through the introduction of swiping support. You can swipe left and right in the lightbox, and in image carousels, to see the next and previous images.
    Notable performance improvements
    As we mentioned at the beginning, we recognize there is a balance between performance, usability, and attractiveness, particularly with regards to an image Gallery. For that reason, we have made Gallery's performance a major focus in 4.3, and have implemented some changes that bring with them a noticeable performance improvement.
    Firstly, we have adjusted the software to only store two copies of an image (in addition to the original), instead of four. In previous versions, we stored a thumbnail, a small copy, a medium copy and a large copy of an image, all of which arbitrarily sized and designed to best meet our layout needs without showing an image too large or too small in a given space. We have simplified this vastly by storing a slightly larger "small" image, and storing a large copy. Diskspace usage is reduced dramatically as a result, and bandwidth usage is actually lowered as well since only two copies of an image need to be delivered to the browser instead of four.
    Next, we have implemented prefetching of the 'next' and 'previous' pages when you launch the lightbox image view. This means that when a user navigates to the next image in the lightbox, it loads immediately instead of waiting for the content to be fetched from the server. From a UX perspective, this provides a much snappier and responsive interface, making users more apt to interact with the site.
    We have additionally sped up the submission process as previously mentioned. The order of execution for certain events that must happen during submission has been moved around a bit, resulting in a faster experience for the end user actually submitting the images.
    Because we know the details matter, we have implemented other smaller improvements as well. For example, the link to rebuild images in the AdminCP previously resulted in a redirect process that rebuilt the images while you waited, but now a background task is launched so that you can continue with what you were doing while the images get rebuilt in the background.
    From start to finish, the Gallery UI and UX has been touched on and improved, and we hope you enjoy these improvements when you start using the new version.
  15. Thanks
    bfarber got a reaction from LiquidFractal for a blog entry, 4.3: Modernizing our Gallery   
    A picture says a thousand words, they say. If getting those pictures online is troublesome, some of those words might be a little choice.
    Gallery has been an integral part of our community suite for just about as long as T1 Tech Mark Higgins can remember (and he has many years of memories). It has seen many interfaces changes as the years have rolled by. The most recent version received a fair amount to feedback on usability.
    We've listened. We've re-engineered most of Gallery's key interfaces to make uploading new images to your community frictionless.
    Lets take a look through the major changes.
    Improved submission process
    Submitting images has to be simple or else users will give up and your gallery will be underutilized. We have spent a lot of time simplifying and speeding up the submissions process for your users. The first thing that will be noticed is that the submission process is not presented as a wizard anymore, and the choice to submit to a category or album has been significantly cleaned up and simplified.

     
    Choosing a container
    Here, I have chosen the category I wish to submit to, so now I am asked if I want to submit directly to the category, if I want to create a new album, or if I want to submit to an existing album.  Choosing one of those last two options will load the appropriate forms to create an album or select an existing album, respectively.
    Afterwards, the modal expands to full screen and you will naturally select your images next, and there's a lot to talk about here.
     

    Overhauled submission interface
    First and foremost, the interface has changed significantly to both simplify the UI and to make actually using the interface easier. When you click on an image, the form is loaded to the right immediately without an AJAX request needed to fetch the form.
    In addition to quickly setting the credit and copyright information for all images at once, you can now set the tags for all images quickly and easily without having to edit each image individually.
    Images support drag n drop reordering in the uploader here, which means that you can drag n drop images to different positions to control their order. Many users previously would name images "Image 1", "Image 2", and so on, and then set their albums to order images by name in order to control the order the images were displayed in. This is no longer necessary now that you can manually reposition the images.
    The default description editor is a pared down textarea box, but you can still use the rich text editor if you wish. The ability to enable maps for geo-encoded images and to upload thumbnails for videos is still supported as well, and those options will show up when appropriate in the right hand panel.
    The 100 image per submission limit has also been lifted. You can now upload many more images in one go with no hard limit imposed.
    Upon clicking submit images, you will see the typical multiredirector to store all of your images, however you will notice that it processes much faster than it did in 4.2 and below.
    Better submission control
    Administrators can now configure categories such that can accept only images, only albums, or both. This means you can now create categories that cannot be submitted to directly, and you can create categories that albums cannot be used with. This is a feature that has been oft-requested since the release of 4.0, and we are happy to report that it will be available in our next release.
    Additionally, album creators (if permitted) can also now create shared albums.  When you create a new album, you can now specify (under the Privacy menu) who can submit to the album, with your available options being:
    Only me Anyone Only the users I specify Only the groups I specify Prior to 4.3, albums have always been owned by one user and only that user could submit to them. Invision Community 4.3 will open up albums so that anyone can submit to them, dependent upon the album creator's preferences and needs.

    The choice is yours as to who can submit to your albums
    New image navigation
    Another major change with Gallery 4.3 is that clicking an image now launches that image in a lightbox to view it and interact with it. This lightbox is context-aware, allowing you to visit the next and previous images in the listing, whether that is a category or album listing, or the featured images or new images listings on the Gallery homepage, for example.
     

    The new image lightbox
    Firstly, I will note that you are seeing the image here with my mouse cursor over the image area, exposing the title, tags, and some various buttons. When you mouse away from the image those overlays fade away to highlight the image itself better.
    As you can see, you can navigate left and right here to view the next and previous image in this context, and you can otherwise interact with the image as you would have if you had visited the older-style image view page (including the ability to rate, review and comment).
    The new Gallery release will introduce a new advertisement location in the right hand column to allow you to show advertisements, even in the lightbox.
    If you follow a link to a full image view page, the lightbox will automatically launch when the page loads, still allowing you to interact in a familiar manner. Additionally, if you move through enough images in the lightbox to reach a new page (for example, if you click on the last image in the album listing and then click on the next image button), the listing itself behind the lightbox will update for easier usability if the user closes the lightbox.
    One final thing to note is that the interface has been made more mobile friendly, particularly through the introduction of swiping support. You can swipe left and right in the lightbox, and in image carousels, to see the next and previous images.
    Notable performance improvements
    As we mentioned at the beginning, we recognize there is a balance between performance, usability, and attractiveness, particularly with regards to an image Gallery. For that reason, we have made Gallery's performance a major focus in 4.3, and have implemented some changes that bring with them a noticeable performance improvement.
    Firstly, we have adjusted the software to only store two copies of an image (in addition to the original), instead of four. In previous versions, we stored a thumbnail, a small copy, a medium copy and a large copy of an image, all of which arbitrarily sized and designed to best meet our layout needs without showing an image too large or too small in a given space. We have simplified this vastly by storing a slightly larger "small" image, and storing a large copy. Diskspace usage is reduced dramatically as a result, and bandwidth usage is actually lowered as well since only two copies of an image need to be delivered to the browser instead of four.
    Next, we have implemented prefetching of the 'next' and 'previous' pages when you launch the lightbox image view. This means that when a user navigates to the next image in the lightbox, it loads immediately instead of waiting for the content to be fetched from the server. From a UX perspective, this provides a much snappier and responsive interface, making users more apt to interact with the site.
    We have additionally sped up the submission process as previously mentioned. The order of execution for certain events that must happen during submission has been moved around a bit, resulting in a faster experience for the end user actually submitting the images.
    Because we know the details matter, we have implemented other smaller improvements as well. For example, the link to rebuild images in the AdminCP previously resulted in a redirect process that rebuilt the images while you waited, but now a background task is launched so that you can continue with what you were doing while the images get rebuilt in the background.
    From start to finish, the Gallery UI and UX has been touched on and improved, and we hope you enjoy these improvements when you start using the new version.
  16. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from Emanoel for a blog entry, 4.3: Modernizing our Gallery   
    A picture says a thousand words, they say. If getting those pictures online is troublesome, some of those words might be a little choice.
    Gallery has been an integral part of our community suite for just about as long as T1 Tech Mark Higgins can remember (and he has many years of memories). It has seen many interfaces changes as the years have rolled by. The most recent version received a fair amount to feedback on usability.
    We've listened. We've re-engineered most of Gallery's key interfaces to make uploading new images to your community frictionless.
    Lets take a look through the major changes.
    Improved submission process
    Submitting images has to be simple or else users will give up and your gallery will be underutilized. We have spent a lot of time simplifying and speeding up the submissions process for your users. The first thing that will be noticed is that the submission process is not presented as a wizard anymore, and the choice to submit to a category or album has been significantly cleaned up and simplified.

     
    Choosing a container
    Here, I have chosen the category I wish to submit to, so now I am asked if I want to submit directly to the category, if I want to create a new album, or if I want to submit to an existing album.  Choosing one of those last two options will load the appropriate forms to create an album or select an existing album, respectively.
    Afterwards, the modal expands to full screen and you will naturally select your images next, and there's a lot to talk about here.
     

    Overhauled submission interface
    First and foremost, the interface has changed significantly to both simplify the UI and to make actually using the interface easier. When you click on an image, the form is loaded to the right immediately without an AJAX request needed to fetch the form.
    In addition to quickly setting the credit and copyright information for all images at once, you can now set the tags for all images quickly and easily without having to edit each image individually.
    Images support drag n drop reordering in the uploader here, which means that you can drag n drop images to different positions to control their order. Many users previously would name images "Image 1", "Image 2", and so on, and then set their albums to order images by name in order to control the order the images were displayed in. This is no longer necessary now that you can manually reposition the images.
    The default description editor is a pared down textarea box, but you can still use the rich text editor if you wish. The ability to enable maps for geo-encoded images and to upload thumbnails for videos is still supported as well, and those options will show up when appropriate in the right hand panel.
    The 100 image per submission limit has also been lifted. You can now upload many more images in one go with no hard limit imposed.
    Upon clicking submit images, you will see the typical multiredirector to store all of your images, however you will notice that it processes much faster than it did in 4.2 and below.
    Better submission control
    Administrators can now configure categories such that can accept only images, only albums, or both. This means you can now create categories that cannot be submitted to directly, and you can create categories that albums cannot be used with. This is a feature that has been oft-requested since the release of 4.0, and we are happy to report that it will be available in our next release.
    Additionally, album creators (if permitted) can also now create shared albums.  When you create a new album, you can now specify (under the Privacy menu) who can submit to the album, with your available options being:
    Only me Anyone Only the users I specify Only the groups I specify Prior to 4.3, albums have always been owned by one user and only that user could submit to them. Invision Community 4.3 will open up albums so that anyone can submit to them, dependent upon the album creator's preferences and needs.

    The choice is yours as to who can submit to your albums
    New image navigation
    Another major change with Gallery 4.3 is that clicking an image now launches that image in a lightbox to view it and interact with it. This lightbox is context-aware, allowing you to visit the next and previous images in the listing, whether that is a category or album listing, or the featured images or new images listings on the Gallery homepage, for example.
     

    The new image lightbox
    Firstly, I will note that you are seeing the image here with my mouse cursor over the image area, exposing the title, tags, and some various buttons. When you mouse away from the image those overlays fade away to highlight the image itself better.
    As you can see, you can navigate left and right here to view the next and previous image in this context, and you can otherwise interact with the image as you would have if you had visited the older-style image view page (including the ability to rate, review and comment).
    The new Gallery release will introduce a new advertisement location in the right hand column to allow you to show advertisements, even in the lightbox.
    If you follow a link to a full image view page, the lightbox will automatically launch when the page loads, still allowing you to interact in a familiar manner. Additionally, if you move through enough images in the lightbox to reach a new page (for example, if you click on the last image in the album listing and then click on the next image button), the listing itself behind the lightbox will update for easier usability if the user closes the lightbox.
    One final thing to note is that the interface has been made more mobile friendly, particularly through the introduction of swiping support. You can swipe left and right in the lightbox, and in image carousels, to see the next and previous images.
    Notable performance improvements
    As we mentioned at the beginning, we recognize there is a balance between performance, usability, and attractiveness, particularly with regards to an image Gallery. For that reason, we have made Gallery's performance a major focus in 4.3, and have implemented some changes that bring with them a noticeable performance improvement.
    Firstly, we have adjusted the software to only store two copies of an image (in addition to the original), instead of four. In previous versions, we stored a thumbnail, a small copy, a medium copy and a large copy of an image, all of which arbitrarily sized and designed to best meet our layout needs without showing an image too large or too small in a given space. We have simplified this vastly by storing a slightly larger "small" image, and storing a large copy. Diskspace usage is reduced dramatically as a result, and bandwidth usage is actually lowered as well since only two copies of an image need to be delivered to the browser instead of four.
    Next, we have implemented prefetching of the 'next' and 'previous' pages when you launch the lightbox image view. This means that when a user navigates to the next image in the lightbox, it loads immediately instead of waiting for the content to be fetched from the server. From a UX perspective, this provides a much snappier and responsive interface, making users more apt to interact with the site.
    We have additionally sped up the submission process as previously mentioned. The order of execution for certain events that must happen during submission has been moved around a bit, resulting in a faster experience for the end user actually submitting the images.
    Because we know the details matter, we have implemented other smaller improvements as well. For example, the link to rebuild images in the AdminCP previously resulted in a redirect process that rebuilt the images while you waited, but now a background task is launched so that you can continue with what you were doing while the images get rebuilt in the background.
    From start to finish, the Gallery UI and UX has been touched on and improved, and we hope you enjoy these improvements when you start using the new version.
  17. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from ABGenc for a blog entry, 4.3: Modernizing our Gallery   
    A picture says a thousand words, they say. If getting those pictures online is troublesome, some of those words might be a little choice.
    Gallery has been an integral part of our community suite for just about as long as T1 Tech Mark Higgins can remember (and he has many years of memories). It has seen many interfaces changes as the years have rolled by. The most recent version received a fair amount to feedback on usability.
    We've listened. We've re-engineered most of Gallery's key interfaces to make uploading new images to your community frictionless.
    Lets take a look through the major changes.
    Improved submission process
    Submitting images has to be simple or else users will give up and your gallery will be underutilized. We have spent a lot of time simplifying and speeding up the submissions process for your users. The first thing that will be noticed is that the submission process is not presented as a wizard anymore, and the choice to submit to a category or album has been significantly cleaned up and simplified.

     
    Choosing a container
    Here, I have chosen the category I wish to submit to, so now I am asked if I want to submit directly to the category, if I want to create a new album, or if I want to submit to an existing album.  Choosing one of those last two options will load the appropriate forms to create an album or select an existing album, respectively.
    Afterwards, the modal expands to full screen and you will naturally select your images next, and there's a lot to talk about here.
     

    Overhauled submission interface
    First and foremost, the interface has changed significantly to both simplify the UI and to make actually using the interface easier. When you click on an image, the form is loaded to the right immediately without an AJAX request needed to fetch the form.
    In addition to quickly setting the credit and copyright information for all images at once, you can now set the tags for all images quickly and easily without having to edit each image individually.
    Images support drag n drop reordering in the uploader here, which means that you can drag n drop images to different positions to control their order. Many users previously would name images "Image 1", "Image 2", and so on, and then set their albums to order images by name in order to control the order the images were displayed in. This is no longer necessary now that you can manually reposition the images.
    The default description editor is a pared down textarea box, but you can still use the rich text editor if you wish. The ability to enable maps for geo-encoded images and to upload thumbnails for videos is still supported as well, and those options will show up when appropriate in the right hand panel.
    The 100 image per submission limit has also been lifted. You can now upload many more images in one go with no hard limit imposed.
    Upon clicking submit images, you will see the typical multiredirector to store all of your images, however you will notice that it processes much faster than it did in 4.2 and below.
    Better submission control
    Administrators can now configure categories such that can accept only images, only albums, or both. This means you can now create categories that cannot be submitted to directly, and you can create categories that albums cannot be used with. This is a feature that has been oft-requested since the release of 4.0, and we are happy to report that it will be available in our next release.
    Additionally, album creators (if permitted) can also now create shared albums.  When you create a new album, you can now specify (under the Privacy menu) who can submit to the album, with your available options being:
    Only me Anyone Only the users I specify Only the groups I specify Prior to 4.3, albums have always been owned by one user and only that user could submit to them. Invision Community 4.3 will open up albums so that anyone can submit to them, dependent upon the album creator's preferences and needs.

    The choice is yours as to who can submit to your albums
    New image navigation
    Another major change with Gallery 4.3 is that clicking an image now launches that image in a lightbox to view it and interact with it. This lightbox is context-aware, allowing you to visit the next and previous images in the listing, whether that is a category or album listing, or the featured images or new images listings on the Gallery homepage, for example.
     

    The new image lightbox
    Firstly, I will note that you are seeing the image here with my mouse cursor over the image area, exposing the title, tags, and some various buttons. When you mouse away from the image those overlays fade away to highlight the image itself better.
    As you can see, you can navigate left and right here to view the next and previous image in this context, and you can otherwise interact with the image as you would have if you had visited the older-style image view page (including the ability to rate, review and comment).
    The new Gallery release will introduce a new advertisement location in the right hand column to allow you to show advertisements, even in the lightbox.
    If you follow a link to a full image view page, the lightbox will automatically launch when the page loads, still allowing you to interact in a familiar manner. Additionally, if you move through enough images in the lightbox to reach a new page (for example, if you click on the last image in the album listing and then click on the next image button), the listing itself behind the lightbox will update for easier usability if the user closes the lightbox.
    One final thing to note is that the interface has been made more mobile friendly, particularly through the introduction of swiping support. You can swipe left and right in the lightbox, and in image carousels, to see the next and previous images.
    Notable performance improvements
    As we mentioned at the beginning, we recognize there is a balance between performance, usability, and attractiveness, particularly with regards to an image Gallery. For that reason, we have made Gallery's performance a major focus in 4.3, and have implemented some changes that bring with them a noticeable performance improvement.
    Firstly, we have adjusted the software to only store two copies of an image (in addition to the original), instead of four. In previous versions, we stored a thumbnail, a small copy, a medium copy and a large copy of an image, all of which arbitrarily sized and designed to best meet our layout needs without showing an image too large or too small in a given space. We have simplified this vastly by storing a slightly larger "small" image, and storing a large copy. Diskspace usage is reduced dramatically as a result, and bandwidth usage is actually lowered as well since only two copies of an image need to be delivered to the browser instead of four.
    Next, we have implemented prefetching of the 'next' and 'previous' pages when you launch the lightbox image view. This means that when a user navigates to the next image in the lightbox, it loads immediately instead of waiting for the content to be fetched from the server. From a UX perspective, this provides a much snappier and responsive interface, making users more apt to interact with the site.
    We have additionally sped up the submission process as previously mentioned. The order of execution for certain events that must happen during submission has been moved around a bit, resulting in a faster experience for the end user actually submitting the images.
    Because we know the details matter, we have implemented other smaller improvements as well. For example, the link to rebuild images in the AdminCP previously resulted in a redirect process that rebuilt the images while you waited, but now a background task is launched so that you can continue with what you were doing while the images get rebuilt in the background.
    From start to finish, the Gallery UI and UX has been touched on and improved, and we hope you enjoy these improvements when you start using the new version.
  18. Thanks
    bfarber got a reaction from Nebthtet for a blog entry, 4.3: Modernizing our Gallery   
    A picture says a thousand words, they say. If getting those pictures online is troublesome, some of those words might be a little choice.
    Gallery has been an integral part of our community suite for just about as long as T1 Tech Mark Higgins can remember (and he has many years of memories). It has seen many interfaces changes as the years have rolled by. The most recent version received a fair amount to feedback on usability.
    We've listened. We've re-engineered most of Gallery's key interfaces to make uploading new images to your community frictionless.
    Lets take a look through the major changes.
    Improved submission process
    Submitting images has to be simple or else users will give up and your gallery will be underutilized. We have spent a lot of time simplifying and speeding up the submissions process for your users. The first thing that will be noticed is that the submission process is not presented as a wizard anymore, and the choice to submit to a category or album has been significantly cleaned up and simplified.

     
    Choosing a container
    Here, I have chosen the category I wish to submit to, so now I am asked if I want to submit directly to the category, if I want to create a new album, or if I want to submit to an existing album.  Choosing one of those last two options will load the appropriate forms to create an album or select an existing album, respectively.
    Afterwards, the modal expands to full screen and you will naturally select your images next, and there's a lot to talk about here.
     

    Overhauled submission interface
    First and foremost, the interface has changed significantly to both simplify the UI and to make actually using the interface easier. When you click on an image, the form is loaded to the right immediately without an AJAX request needed to fetch the form.
    In addition to quickly setting the credit and copyright information for all images at once, you can now set the tags for all images quickly and easily without having to edit each image individually.
    Images support drag n drop reordering in the uploader here, which means that you can drag n drop images to different positions to control their order. Many users previously would name images "Image 1", "Image 2", and so on, and then set their albums to order images by name in order to control the order the images were displayed in. This is no longer necessary now that you can manually reposition the images.
    The default description editor is a pared down textarea box, but you can still use the rich text editor if you wish. The ability to enable maps for geo-encoded images and to upload thumbnails for videos is still supported as well, and those options will show up when appropriate in the right hand panel.
    The 100 image per submission limit has also been lifted. You can now upload many more images in one go with no hard limit imposed.
    Upon clicking submit images, you will see the typical multiredirector to store all of your images, however you will notice that it processes much faster than it did in 4.2 and below.
    Better submission control
    Administrators can now configure categories such that can accept only images, only albums, or both. This means you can now create categories that cannot be submitted to directly, and you can create categories that albums cannot be used with. This is a feature that has been oft-requested since the release of 4.0, and we are happy to report that it will be available in our next release.
    Additionally, album creators (if permitted) can also now create shared albums.  When you create a new album, you can now specify (under the Privacy menu) who can submit to the album, with your available options being:
    Only me Anyone Only the users I specify Only the groups I specify Prior to 4.3, albums have always been owned by one user and only that user could submit to them. Invision Community 4.3 will open up albums so that anyone can submit to them, dependent upon the album creator's preferences and needs.

    The choice is yours as to who can submit to your albums
    New image navigation
    Another major change with Gallery 4.3 is that clicking an image now launches that image in a lightbox to view it and interact with it. This lightbox is context-aware, allowing you to visit the next and previous images in the listing, whether that is a category or album listing, or the featured images or new images listings on the Gallery homepage, for example.
     

    The new image lightbox
    Firstly, I will note that you are seeing the image here with my mouse cursor over the image area, exposing the title, tags, and some various buttons. When you mouse away from the image those overlays fade away to highlight the image itself better.
    As you can see, you can navigate left and right here to view the next and previous image in this context, and you can otherwise interact with the image as you would have if you had visited the older-style image view page (including the ability to rate, review and comment).
    The new Gallery release will introduce a new advertisement location in the right hand column to allow you to show advertisements, even in the lightbox.
    If you follow a link to a full image view page, the lightbox will automatically launch when the page loads, still allowing you to interact in a familiar manner. Additionally, if you move through enough images in the lightbox to reach a new page (for example, if you click on the last image in the album listing and then click on the next image button), the listing itself behind the lightbox will update for easier usability if the user closes the lightbox.
    One final thing to note is that the interface has been made more mobile friendly, particularly through the introduction of swiping support. You can swipe left and right in the lightbox, and in image carousels, to see the next and previous images.
    Notable performance improvements
    As we mentioned at the beginning, we recognize there is a balance between performance, usability, and attractiveness, particularly with regards to an image Gallery. For that reason, we have made Gallery's performance a major focus in 4.3, and have implemented some changes that bring with them a noticeable performance improvement.
    Firstly, we have adjusted the software to only store two copies of an image (in addition to the original), instead of four. In previous versions, we stored a thumbnail, a small copy, a medium copy and a large copy of an image, all of which arbitrarily sized and designed to best meet our layout needs without showing an image too large or too small in a given space. We have simplified this vastly by storing a slightly larger "small" image, and storing a large copy. Diskspace usage is reduced dramatically as a result, and bandwidth usage is actually lowered as well since only two copies of an image need to be delivered to the browser instead of four.
    Next, we have implemented prefetching of the 'next' and 'previous' pages when you launch the lightbox image view. This means that when a user navigates to the next image in the lightbox, it loads immediately instead of waiting for the content to be fetched from the server. From a UX perspective, this provides a much snappier and responsive interface, making users more apt to interact with the site.
    We have additionally sped up the submission process as previously mentioned. The order of execution for certain events that must happen during submission has been moved around a bit, resulting in a faster experience for the end user actually submitting the images.
    Because we know the details matter, we have implemented other smaller improvements as well. For example, the link to rebuild images in the AdminCP previously resulted in a redirect process that rebuilt the images while you waited, but now a background task is launched so that you can continue with what you were doing while the images get rebuilt in the background.
    From start to finish, the Gallery UI and UX has been touched on and improved, and we hope you enjoy these improvements when you start using the new version.
  19. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from AlexWright for a blog entry, 4.3: Modernizing our Gallery   
    A picture says a thousand words, they say. If getting those pictures online is troublesome, some of those words might be a little choice.
    Gallery has been an integral part of our community suite for just about as long as T1 Tech Mark Higgins can remember (and he has many years of memories). It has seen many interfaces changes as the years have rolled by. The most recent version received a fair amount to feedback on usability.
    We've listened. We've re-engineered most of Gallery's key interfaces to make uploading new images to your community frictionless.
    Lets take a look through the major changes.
    Improved submission process
    Submitting images has to be simple or else users will give up and your gallery will be underutilized. We have spent a lot of time simplifying and speeding up the submissions process for your users. The first thing that will be noticed is that the submission process is not presented as a wizard anymore, and the choice to submit to a category or album has been significantly cleaned up and simplified.

     
    Choosing a container
    Here, I have chosen the category I wish to submit to, so now I am asked if I want to submit directly to the category, if I want to create a new album, or if I want to submit to an existing album.  Choosing one of those last two options will load the appropriate forms to create an album or select an existing album, respectively.
    Afterwards, the modal expands to full screen and you will naturally select your images next, and there's a lot to talk about here.
     

    Overhauled submission interface
    First and foremost, the interface has changed significantly to both simplify the UI and to make actually using the interface easier. When you click on an image, the form is loaded to the right immediately without an AJAX request needed to fetch the form.
    In addition to quickly setting the credit and copyright information for all images at once, you can now set the tags for all images quickly and easily without having to edit each image individually.
    Images support drag n drop reordering in the uploader here, which means that you can drag n drop images to different positions to control their order. Many users previously would name images "Image 1", "Image 2", and so on, and then set their albums to order images by name in order to control the order the images were displayed in. This is no longer necessary now that you can manually reposition the images.
    The default description editor is a pared down textarea box, but you can still use the rich text editor if you wish. The ability to enable maps for geo-encoded images and to upload thumbnails for videos is still supported as well, and those options will show up when appropriate in the right hand panel.
    The 100 image per submission limit has also been lifted. You can now upload many more images in one go with no hard limit imposed.
    Upon clicking submit images, you will see the typical multiredirector to store all of your images, however you will notice that it processes much faster than it did in 4.2 and below.
    Better submission control
    Administrators can now configure categories such that can accept only images, only albums, or both. This means you can now create categories that cannot be submitted to directly, and you can create categories that albums cannot be used with. This is a feature that has been oft-requested since the release of 4.0, and we are happy to report that it will be available in our next release.
    Additionally, album creators (if permitted) can also now create shared albums.  When you create a new album, you can now specify (under the Privacy menu) who can submit to the album, with your available options being:
    Only me Anyone Only the users I specify Only the groups I specify Prior to 4.3, albums have always been owned by one user and only that user could submit to them. Invision Community 4.3 will open up albums so that anyone can submit to them, dependent upon the album creator's preferences and needs.

    The choice is yours as to who can submit to your albums
    New image navigation
    Another major change with Gallery 4.3 is that clicking an image now launches that image in a lightbox to view it and interact with it. This lightbox is context-aware, allowing you to visit the next and previous images in the listing, whether that is a category or album listing, or the featured images or new images listings on the Gallery homepage, for example.
     

    The new image lightbox
    Firstly, I will note that you are seeing the image here with my mouse cursor over the image area, exposing the title, tags, and some various buttons. When you mouse away from the image those overlays fade away to highlight the image itself better.
    As you can see, you can navigate left and right here to view the next and previous image in this context, and you can otherwise interact with the image as you would have if you had visited the older-style image view page (including the ability to rate, review and comment).
    The new Gallery release will introduce a new advertisement location in the right hand column to allow you to show advertisements, even in the lightbox.
    If you follow a link to a full image view page, the lightbox will automatically launch when the page loads, still allowing you to interact in a familiar manner. Additionally, if you move through enough images in the lightbox to reach a new page (for example, if you click on the last image in the album listing and then click on the next image button), the listing itself behind the lightbox will update for easier usability if the user closes the lightbox.
    One final thing to note is that the interface has been made more mobile friendly, particularly through the introduction of swiping support. You can swipe left and right in the lightbox, and in image carousels, to see the next and previous images.
    Notable performance improvements
    As we mentioned at the beginning, we recognize there is a balance between performance, usability, and attractiveness, particularly with regards to an image Gallery. For that reason, we have made Gallery's performance a major focus in 4.3, and have implemented some changes that bring with them a noticeable performance improvement.
    Firstly, we have adjusted the software to only store two copies of an image (in addition to the original), instead of four. In previous versions, we stored a thumbnail, a small copy, a medium copy and a large copy of an image, all of which arbitrarily sized and designed to best meet our layout needs without showing an image too large or too small in a given space. We have simplified this vastly by storing a slightly larger "small" image, and storing a large copy. Diskspace usage is reduced dramatically as a result, and bandwidth usage is actually lowered as well since only two copies of an image need to be delivered to the browser instead of four.
    Next, we have implemented prefetching of the 'next' and 'previous' pages when you launch the lightbox image view. This means that when a user navigates to the next image in the lightbox, it loads immediately instead of waiting for the content to be fetched from the server. From a UX perspective, this provides a much snappier and responsive interface, making users more apt to interact with the site.
    We have additionally sped up the submission process as previously mentioned. The order of execution for certain events that must happen during submission has been moved around a bit, resulting in a faster experience for the end user actually submitting the images.
    Because we know the details matter, we have implemented other smaller improvements as well. For example, the link to rebuild images in the AdminCP previously resulted in a redirect process that rebuilt the images while you waited, but now a background task is launched so that you can continue with what you were doing while the images get rebuilt in the background.
    From start to finish, the Gallery UI and UX has been touched on and improved, and we hope you enjoy these improvements when you start using the new version.
  20. Thanks
    bfarber got a reaction from crmarks for a blog entry, 4.3: Modernizing our Gallery   
    A picture says a thousand words, they say. If getting those pictures online is troublesome, some of those words might be a little choice.
    Gallery has been an integral part of our community suite for just about as long as T1 Tech Mark Higgins can remember (and he has many years of memories). It has seen many interfaces changes as the years have rolled by. The most recent version received a fair amount to feedback on usability.
    We've listened. We've re-engineered most of Gallery's key interfaces to make uploading new images to your community frictionless.
    Lets take a look through the major changes.
    Improved submission process
    Submitting images has to be simple or else users will give up and your gallery will be underutilized. We have spent a lot of time simplifying and speeding up the submissions process for your users. The first thing that will be noticed is that the submission process is not presented as a wizard anymore, and the choice to submit to a category or album has been significantly cleaned up and simplified.

     
    Choosing a container
    Here, I have chosen the category I wish to submit to, so now I am asked if I want to submit directly to the category, if I want to create a new album, or if I want to submit to an existing album.  Choosing one of those last two options will load the appropriate forms to create an album or select an existing album, respectively.
    Afterwards, the modal expands to full screen and you will naturally select your images next, and there's a lot to talk about here.
     

    Overhauled submission interface
    First and foremost, the interface has changed significantly to both simplify the UI and to make actually using the interface easier. When you click on an image, the form is loaded to the right immediately without an AJAX request needed to fetch the form.
    In addition to quickly setting the credit and copyright information for all images at once, you can now set the tags for all images quickly and easily without having to edit each image individually.
    Images support drag n drop reordering in the uploader here, which means that you can drag n drop images to different positions to control their order. Many users previously would name images "Image 1", "Image 2", and so on, and then set their albums to order images by name in order to control the order the images were displayed in. This is no longer necessary now that you can manually reposition the images.
    The default description editor is a pared down textarea box, but you can still use the rich text editor if you wish. The ability to enable maps for geo-encoded images and to upload thumbnails for videos is still supported as well, and those options will show up when appropriate in the right hand panel.
    The 100 image per submission limit has also been lifted. You can now upload many more images in one go with no hard limit imposed.
    Upon clicking submit images, you will see the typical multiredirector to store all of your images, however you will notice that it processes much faster than it did in 4.2 and below.
    Better submission control
    Administrators can now configure categories such that can accept only images, only albums, or both. This means you can now create categories that cannot be submitted to directly, and you can create categories that albums cannot be used with. This is a feature that has been oft-requested since the release of 4.0, and we are happy to report that it will be available in our next release.
    Additionally, album creators (if permitted) can also now create shared albums.  When you create a new album, you can now specify (under the Privacy menu) who can submit to the album, with your available options being:
    Only me Anyone Only the users I specify Only the groups I specify Prior to 4.3, albums have always been owned by one user and only that user could submit to them. Invision Community 4.3 will open up albums so that anyone can submit to them, dependent upon the album creator's preferences and needs.

    The choice is yours as to who can submit to your albums
    New image navigation
    Another major change with Gallery 4.3 is that clicking an image now launches that image in a lightbox to view it and interact with it. This lightbox is context-aware, allowing you to visit the next and previous images in the listing, whether that is a category or album listing, or the featured images or new images listings on the Gallery homepage, for example.
     

    The new image lightbox
    Firstly, I will note that you are seeing the image here with my mouse cursor over the image area, exposing the title, tags, and some various buttons. When you mouse away from the image those overlays fade away to highlight the image itself better.
    As you can see, you can navigate left and right here to view the next and previous image in this context, and you can otherwise interact with the image as you would have if you had visited the older-style image view page (including the ability to rate, review and comment).
    The new Gallery release will introduce a new advertisement location in the right hand column to allow you to show advertisements, even in the lightbox.
    If you follow a link to a full image view page, the lightbox will automatically launch when the page loads, still allowing you to interact in a familiar manner. Additionally, if you move through enough images in the lightbox to reach a new page (for example, if you click on the last image in the album listing and then click on the next image button), the listing itself behind the lightbox will update for easier usability if the user closes the lightbox.
    One final thing to note is that the interface has been made more mobile friendly, particularly through the introduction of swiping support. You can swipe left and right in the lightbox, and in image carousels, to see the next and previous images.
    Notable performance improvements
    As we mentioned at the beginning, we recognize there is a balance between performance, usability, and attractiveness, particularly with regards to an image Gallery. For that reason, we have made Gallery's performance a major focus in 4.3, and have implemented some changes that bring with them a noticeable performance improvement.
    Firstly, we have adjusted the software to only store two copies of an image (in addition to the original), instead of four. In previous versions, we stored a thumbnail, a small copy, a medium copy and a large copy of an image, all of which arbitrarily sized and designed to best meet our layout needs without showing an image too large or too small in a given space. We have simplified this vastly by storing a slightly larger "small" image, and storing a large copy. Diskspace usage is reduced dramatically as a result, and bandwidth usage is actually lowered as well since only two copies of an image need to be delivered to the browser instead of four.
    Next, we have implemented prefetching of the 'next' and 'previous' pages when you launch the lightbox image view. This means that when a user navigates to the next image in the lightbox, it loads immediately instead of waiting for the content to be fetched from the server. From a UX perspective, this provides a much snappier and responsive interface, making users more apt to interact with the site.
    We have additionally sped up the submission process as previously mentioned. The order of execution for certain events that must happen during submission has been moved around a bit, resulting in a faster experience for the end user actually submitting the images.
    Because we know the details matter, we have implemented other smaller improvements as well. For example, the link to rebuild images in the AdminCP previously resulted in a redirect process that rebuilt the images while you waited, but now a background task is launched so that you can continue with what you were doing while the images get rebuilt in the background.
    From start to finish, the Gallery UI and UX has been touched on and improved, and we hope you enjoy these improvements when you start using the new version.
  21. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from BomAle for a blog entry, 4.3: Modernizing our Gallery   
    A picture says a thousand words, they say. If getting those pictures online is troublesome, some of those words might be a little choice.
    Gallery has been an integral part of our community suite for just about as long as T1 Tech Mark Higgins can remember (and he has many years of memories). It has seen many interfaces changes as the years have rolled by. The most recent version received a fair amount to feedback on usability.
    We've listened. We've re-engineered most of Gallery's key interfaces to make uploading new images to your community frictionless.
    Lets take a look through the major changes.
    Improved submission process
    Submitting images has to be simple or else users will give up and your gallery will be underutilized. We have spent a lot of time simplifying and speeding up the submissions process for your users. The first thing that will be noticed is that the submission process is not presented as a wizard anymore, and the choice to submit to a category or album has been significantly cleaned up and simplified.

     
    Choosing a container
    Here, I have chosen the category I wish to submit to, so now I am asked if I want to submit directly to the category, if I want to create a new album, or if I want to submit to an existing album.  Choosing one of those last two options will load the appropriate forms to create an album or select an existing album, respectively.
    Afterwards, the modal expands to full screen and you will naturally select your images next, and there's a lot to talk about here.
     

    Overhauled submission interface
    First and foremost, the interface has changed significantly to both simplify the UI and to make actually using the interface easier. When you click on an image, the form is loaded to the right immediately without an AJAX request needed to fetch the form.
    In addition to quickly setting the credit and copyright information for all images at once, you can now set the tags for all images quickly and easily without having to edit each image individually.
    Images support drag n drop reordering in the uploader here, which means that you can drag n drop images to different positions to control their order. Many users previously would name images "Image 1", "Image 2", and so on, and then set their albums to order images by name in order to control the order the images were displayed in. This is no longer necessary now that you can manually reposition the images.
    The default description editor is a pared down textarea box, but you can still use the rich text editor if you wish. The ability to enable maps for geo-encoded images and to upload thumbnails for videos is still supported as well, and those options will show up when appropriate in the right hand panel.
    The 100 image per submission limit has also been lifted. You can now upload many more images in one go with no hard limit imposed.
    Upon clicking submit images, you will see the typical multiredirector to store all of your images, however you will notice that it processes much faster than it did in 4.2 and below.
    Better submission control
    Administrators can now configure categories such that can accept only images, only albums, or both. This means you can now create categories that cannot be submitted to directly, and you can create categories that albums cannot be used with. This is a feature that has been oft-requested since the release of 4.0, and we are happy to report that it will be available in our next release.
    Additionally, album creators (if permitted) can also now create shared albums.  When you create a new album, you can now specify (under the Privacy menu) who can submit to the album, with your available options being:
    Only me Anyone Only the users I specify Only the groups I specify Prior to 4.3, albums have always been owned by one user and only that user could submit to them. Invision Community 4.3 will open up albums so that anyone can submit to them, dependent upon the album creator's preferences and needs.

    The choice is yours as to who can submit to your albums
    New image navigation
    Another major change with Gallery 4.3 is that clicking an image now launches that image in a lightbox to view it and interact with it. This lightbox is context-aware, allowing you to visit the next and previous images in the listing, whether that is a category or album listing, or the featured images or new images listings on the Gallery homepage, for example.
     

    The new image lightbox
    Firstly, I will note that you are seeing the image here with my mouse cursor over the image area, exposing the title, tags, and some various buttons. When you mouse away from the image those overlays fade away to highlight the image itself better.
    As you can see, you can navigate left and right here to view the next and previous image in this context, and you can otherwise interact with the image as you would have if you had visited the older-style image view page (including the ability to rate, review and comment).
    The new Gallery release will introduce a new advertisement location in the right hand column to allow you to show advertisements, even in the lightbox.
    If you follow a link to a full image view page, the lightbox will automatically launch when the page loads, still allowing you to interact in a familiar manner. Additionally, if you move through enough images in the lightbox to reach a new page (for example, if you click on the last image in the album listing and then click on the next image button), the listing itself behind the lightbox will update for easier usability if the user closes the lightbox.
    One final thing to note is that the interface has been made more mobile friendly, particularly through the introduction of swiping support. You can swipe left and right in the lightbox, and in image carousels, to see the next and previous images.
    Notable performance improvements
    As we mentioned at the beginning, we recognize there is a balance between performance, usability, and attractiveness, particularly with regards to an image Gallery. For that reason, we have made Gallery's performance a major focus in 4.3, and have implemented some changes that bring with them a noticeable performance improvement.
    Firstly, we have adjusted the software to only store two copies of an image (in addition to the original), instead of four. In previous versions, we stored a thumbnail, a small copy, a medium copy and a large copy of an image, all of which arbitrarily sized and designed to best meet our layout needs without showing an image too large or too small in a given space. We have simplified this vastly by storing a slightly larger "small" image, and storing a large copy. Diskspace usage is reduced dramatically as a result, and bandwidth usage is actually lowered as well since only two copies of an image need to be delivered to the browser instead of four.
    Next, we have implemented prefetching of the 'next' and 'previous' pages when you launch the lightbox image view. This means that when a user navigates to the next image in the lightbox, it loads immediately instead of waiting for the content to be fetched from the server. From a UX perspective, this provides a much snappier and responsive interface, making users more apt to interact with the site.
    We have additionally sped up the submission process as previously mentioned. The order of execution for certain events that must happen during submission has been moved around a bit, resulting in a faster experience for the end user actually submitting the images.
    Because we know the details matter, we have implemented other smaller improvements as well. For example, the link to rebuild images in the AdminCP previously resulted in a redirect process that rebuilt the images while you waited, but now a background task is launched so that you can continue with what you were doing while the images get rebuilt in the background.
    From start to finish, the Gallery UI and UX has been touched on and improved, and we hope you enjoy these improvements when you start using the new version.
  22. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from ASTRAPI for a blog entry, 4.3: Modernizing our Gallery   
    A picture says a thousand words, they say. If getting those pictures online is troublesome, some of those words might be a little choice.
    Gallery has been an integral part of our community suite for just about as long as T1 Tech Mark Higgins can remember (and he has many years of memories). It has seen many interfaces changes as the years have rolled by. The most recent version received a fair amount to feedback on usability.
    We've listened. We've re-engineered most of Gallery's key interfaces to make uploading new images to your community frictionless.
    Lets take a look through the major changes.
    Improved submission process
    Submitting images has to be simple or else users will give up and your gallery will be underutilized. We have spent a lot of time simplifying and speeding up the submissions process for your users. The first thing that will be noticed is that the submission process is not presented as a wizard anymore, and the choice to submit to a category or album has been significantly cleaned up and simplified.

     
    Choosing a container
    Here, I have chosen the category I wish to submit to, so now I am asked if I want to submit directly to the category, if I want to create a new album, or if I want to submit to an existing album.  Choosing one of those last two options will load the appropriate forms to create an album or select an existing album, respectively.
    Afterwards, the modal expands to full screen and you will naturally select your images next, and there's a lot to talk about here.
     

    Overhauled submission interface
    First and foremost, the interface has changed significantly to both simplify the UI and to make actually using the interface easier. When you click on an image, the form is loaded to the right immediately without an AJAX request needed to fetch the form.
    In addition to quickly setting the credit and copyright information for all images at once, you can now set the tags for all images quickly and easily without having to edit each image individually.
    Images support drag n drop reordering in the uploader here, which means that you can drag n drop images to different positions to control their order. Many users previously would name images "Image 1", "Image 2", and so on, and then set their albums to order images by name in order to control the order the images were displayed in. This is no longer necessary now that you can manually reposition the images.
    The default description editor is a pared down textarea box, but you can still use the rich text editor if you wish. The ability to enable maps for geo-encoded images and to upload thumbnails for videos is still supported as well, and those options will show up when appropriate in the right hand panel.
    The 100 image per submission limit has also been lifted. You can now upload many more images in one go with no hard limit imposed.
    Upon clicking submit images, you will see the typical multiredirector to store all of your images, however you will notice that it processes much faster than it did in 4.2 and below.
    Better submission control
    Administrators can now configure categories such that can accept only images, only albums, or both. This means you can now create categories that cannot be submitted to directly, and you can create categories that albums cannot be used with. This is a feature that has been oft-requested since the release of 4.0, and we are happy to report that it will be available in our next release.
    Additionally, album creators (if permitted) can also now create shared albums.  When you create a new album, you can now specify (under the Privacy menu) who can submit to the album, with your available options being:
    Only me Anyone Only the users I specify Only the groups I specify Prior to 4.3, albums have always been owned by one user and only that user could submit to them. Invision Community 4.3 will open up albums so that anyone can submit to them, dependent upon the album creator's preferences and needs.

    The choice is yours as to who can submit to your albums
    New image navigation
    Another major change with Gallery 4.3 is that clicking an image now launches that image in a lightbox to view it and interact with it. This lightbox is context-aware, allowing you to visit the next and previous images in the listing, whether that is a category or album listing, or the featured images or new images listings on the Gallery homepage, for example.
     

    The new image lightbox
    Firstly, I will note that you are seeing the image here with my mouse cursor over the image area, exposing the title, tags, and some various buttons. When you mouse away from the image those overlays fade away to highlight the image itself better.
    As you can see, you can navigate left and right here to view the next and previous image in this context, and you can otherwise interact with the image as you would have if you had visited the older-style image view page (including the ability to rate, review and comment).
    The new Gallery release will introduce a new advertisement location in the right hand column to allow you to show advertisements, even in the lightbox.
    If you follow a link to a full image view page, the lightbox will automatically launch when the page loads, still allowing you to interact in a familiar manner. Additionally, if you move through enough images in the lightbox to reach a new page (for example, if you click on the last image in the album listing and then click on the next image button), the listing itself behind the lightbox will update for easier usability if the user closes the lightbox.
    One final thing to note is that the interface has been made more mobile friendly, particularly through the introduction of swiping support. You can swipe left and right in the lightbox, and in image carousels, to see the next and previous images.
    Notable performance improvements
    As we mentioned at the beginning, we recognize there is a balance between performance, usability, and attractiveness, particularly with regards to an image Gallery. For that reason, we have made Gallery's performance a major focus in 4.3, and have implemented some changes that bring with them a noticeable performance improvement.
    Firstly, we have adjusted the software to only store two copies of an image (in addition to the original), instead of four. In previous versions, we stored a thumbnail, a small copy, a medium copy and a large copy of an image, all of which arbitrarily sized and designed to best meet our layout needs without showing an image too large or too small in a given space. We have simplified this vastly by storing a slightly larger "small" image, and storing a large copy. Diskspace usage is reduced dramatically as a result, and bandwidth usage is actually lowered as well since only two copies of an image need to be delivered to the browser instead of four.
    Next, we have implemented prefetching of the 'next' and 'previous' pages when you launch the lightbox image view. This means that when a user navigates to the next image in the lightbox, it loads immediately instead of waiting for the content to be fetched from the server. From a UX perspective, this provides a much snappier and responsive interface, making users more apt to interact with the site.
    We have additionally sped up the submission process as previously mentioned. The order of execution for certain events that must happen during submission has been moved around a bit, resulting in a faster experience for the end user actually submitting the images.
    Because we know the details matter, we have implemented other smaller improvements as well. For example, the link to rebuild images in the AdminCP previously resulted in a redirect process that rebuilt the images while you waited, but now a background task is launched so that you can continue with what you were doing while the images get rebuilt in the background.
    From start to finish, the Gallery UI and UX has been touched on and improved, and we hope you enjoy these improvements when you start using the new version.
  23. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from Adriano Faria for a blog entry, 4.3: Modernizing our Gallery   
    A picture says a thousand words, they say. If getting those pictures online is troublesome, some of those words might be a little choice.
    Gallery has been an integral part of our community suite for just about as long as T1 Tech Mark Higgins can remember (and he has many years of memories). It has seen many interfaces changes as the years have rolled by. The most recent version received a fair amount to feedback on usability.
    We've listened. We've re-engineered most of Gallery's key interfaces to make uploading new images to your community frictionless.
    Lets take a look through the major changes.
    Improved submission process
    Submitting images has to be simple or else users will give up and your gallery will be underutilized. We have spent a lot of time simplifying and speeding up the submissions process for your users. The first thing that will be noticed is that the submission process is not presented as a wizard anymore, and the choice to submit to a category or album has been significantly cleaned up and simplified.

     
    Choosing a container
    Here, I have chosen the category I wish to submit to, so now I am asked if I want to submit directly to the category, if I want to create a new album, or if I want to submit to an existing album.  Choosing one of those last two options will load the appropriate forms to create an album or select an existing album, respectively.
    Afterwards, the modal expands to full screen and you will naturally select your images next, and there's a lot to talk about here.
     

    Overhauled submission interface
    First and foremost, the interface has changed significantly to both simplify the UI and to make actually using the interface easier. When you click on an image, the form is loaded to the right immediately without an AJAX request needed to fetch the form.
    In addition to quickly setting the credit and copyright information for all images at once, you can now set the tags for all images quickly and easily without having to edit each image individually.
    Images support drag n drop reordering in the uploader here, which means that you can drag n drop images to different positions to control their order. Many users previously would name images "Image 1", "Image 2", and so on, and then set their albums to order images by name in order to control the order the images were displayed in. This is no longer necessary now that you can manually reposition the images.
    The default description editor is a pared down textarea box, but you can still use the rich text editor if you wish. The ability to enable maps for geo-encoded images and to upload thumbnails for videos is still supported as well, and those options will show up when appropriate in the right hand panel.
    The 100 image per submission limit has also been lifted. You can now upload many more images in one go with no hard limit imposed.
    Upon clicking submit images, you will see the typical multiredirector to store all of your images, however you will notice that it processes much faster than it did in 4.2 and below.
    Better submission control
    Administrators can now configure categories such that can accept only images, only albums, or both. This means you can now create categories that cannot be submitted to directly, and you can create categories that albums cannot be used with. This is a feature that has been oft-requested since the release of 4.0, and we are happy to report that it will be available in our next release.
    Additionally, album creators (if permitted) can also now create shared albums.  When you create a new album, you can now specify (under the Privacy menu) who can submit to the album, with your available options being:
    Only me Anyone Only the users I specify Only the groups I specify Prior to 4.3, albums have always been owned by one user and only that user could submit to them. Invision Community 4.3 will open up albums so that anyone can submit to them, dependent upon the album creator's preferences and needs.

    The choice is yours as to who can submit to your albums
    New image navigation
    Another major change with Gallery 4.3 is that clicking an image now launches that image in a lightbox to view it and interact with it. This lightbox is context-aware, allowing you to visit the next and previous images in the listing, whether that is a category or album listing, or the featured images or new images listings on the Gallery homepage, for example.
     

    The new image lightbox
    Firstly, I will note that you are seeing the image here with my mouse cursor over the image area, exposing the title, tags, and some various buttons. When you mouse away from the image those overlays fade away to highlight the image itself better.
    As you can see, you can navigate left and right here to view the next and previous image in this context, and you can otherwise interact with the image as you would have if you had visited the older-style image view page (including the ability to rate, review and comment).
    The new Gallery release will introduce a new advertisement location in the right hand column to allow you to show advertisements, even in the lightbox.
    If you follow a link to a full image view page, the lightbox will automatically launch when the page loads, still allowing you to interact in a familiar manner. Additionally, if you move through enough images in the lightbox to reach a new page (for example, if you click on the last image in the album listing and then click on the next image button), the listing itself behind the lightbox will update for easier usability if the user closes the lightbox.
    One final thing to note is that the interface has been made more mobile friendly, particularly through the introduction of swiping support. You can swipe left and right in the lightbox, and in image carousels, to see the next and previous images.
    Notable performance improvements
    As we mentioned at the beginning, we recognize there is a balance between performance, usability, and attractiveness, particularly with regards to an image Gallery. For that reason, we have made Gallery's performance a major focus in 4.3, and have implemented some changes that bring with them a noticeable performance improvement.
    Firstly, we have adjusted the software to only store two copies of an image (in addition to the original), instead of four. In previous versions, we stored a thumbnail, a small copy, a medium copy and a large copy of an image, all of which arbitrarily sized and designed to best meet our layout needs without showing an image too large or too small in a given space. We have simplified this vastly by storing a slightly larger "small" image, and storing a large copy. Diskspace usage is reduced dramatically as a result, and bandwidth usage is actually lowered as well since only two copies of an image need to be delivered to the browser instead of four.
    Next, we have implemented prefetching of the 'next' and 'previous' pages when you launch the lightbox image view. This means that when a user navigates to the next image in the lightbox, it loads immediately instead of waiting for the content to be fetched from the server. From a UX perspective, this provides a much snappier and responsive interface, making users more apt to interact with the site.
    We have additionally sped up the submission process as previously mentioned. The order of execution for certain events that must happen during submission has been moved around a bit, resulting in a faster experience for the end user actually submitting the images.
    Because we know the details matter, we have implemented other smaller improvements as well. For example, the link to rebuild images in the AdminCP previously resulted in a redirect process that rebuilt the images while you waited, but now a background task is launched so that you can continue with what you were doing while the images get rebuilt in the background.
    From start to finish, the Gallery UI and UX has been touched on and improved, and we hope you enjoy these improvements when you start using the new version.
  24. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from Ryan Ashbrook for a blog entry, 4.3: Modernizing our Gallery   
    A picture says a thousand words, they say. If getting those pictures online is troublesome, some of those words might be a little choice.
    Gallery has been an integral part of our community suite for just about as long as T1 Tech Mark Higgins can remember (and he has many years of memories). It has seen many interfaces changes as the years have rolled by. The most recent version received a fair amount to feedback on usability.
    We've listened. We've re-engineered most of Gallery's key interfaces to make uploading new images to your community frictionless.
    Lets take a look through the major changes.
    Improved submission process
    Submitting images has to be simple or else users will give up and your gallery will be underutilized. We have spent a lot of time simplifying and speeding up the submissions process for your users. The first thing that will be noticed is that the submission process is not presented as a wizard anymore, and the choice to submit to a category or album has been significantly cleaned up and simplified.

     
    Choosing a container
    Here, I have chosen the category I wish to submit to, so now I am asked if I want to submit directly to the category, if I want to create a new album, or if I want to submit to an existing album.  Choosing one of those last two options will load the appropriate forms to create an album or select an existing album, respectively.
    Afterwards, the modal expands to full screen and you will naturally select your images next, and there's a lot to talk about here.
     

    Overhauled submission interface
    First and foremost, the interface has changed significantly to both simplify the UI and to make actually using the interface easier. When you click on an image, the form is loaded to the right immediately without an AJAX request needed to fetch the form.
    In addition to quickly setting the credit and copyright information for all images at once, you can now set the tags for all images quickly and easily without having to edit each image individually.
    Images support drag n drop reordering in the uploader here, which means that you can drag n drop images to different positions to control their order. Many users previously would name images "Image 1", "Image 2", and so on, and then set their albums to order images by name in order to control the order the images were displayed in. This is no longer necessary now that you can manually reposition the images.
    The default description editor is a pared down textarea box, but you can still use the rich text editor if you wish. The ability to enable maps for geo-encoded images and to upload thumbnails for videos is still supported as well, and those options will show up when appropriate in the right hand panel.
    The 100 image per submission limit has also been lifted. You can now upload many more images in one go with no hard limit imposed.
    Upon clicking submit images, you will see the typical multiredirector to store all of your images, however you will notice that it processes much faster than it did in 4.2 and below.
    Better submission control
    Administrators can now configure categories such that can accept only images, only albums, or both. This means you can now create categories that cannot be submitted to directly, and you can create categories that albums cannot be used with. This is a feature that has been oft-requested since the release of 4.0, and we are happy to report that it will be available in our next release.
    Additionally, album creators (if permitted) can also now create shared albums.  When you create a new album, you can now specify (under the Privacy menu) who can submit to the album, with your available options being:
    Only me Anyone Only the users I specify Only the groups I specify Prior to 4.3, albums have always been owned by one user and only that user could submit to them. Invision Community 4.3 will open up albums so that anyone can submit to them, dependent upon the album creator's preferences and needs.

    The choice is yours as to who can submit to your albums
    New image navigation
    Another major change with Gallery 4.3 is that clicking an image now launches that image in a lightbox to view it and interact with it. This lightbox is context-aware, allowing you to visit the next and previous images in the listing, whether that is a category or album listing, or the featured images or new images listings on the Gallery homepage, for example.
     

    The new image lightbox
    Firstly, I will note that you are seeing the image here with my mouse cursor over the image area, exposing the title, tags, and some various buttons. When you mouse away from the image those overlays fade away to highlight the image itself better.
    As you can see, you can navigate left and right here to view the next and previous image in this context, and you can otherwise interact with the image as you would have if you had visited the older-style image view page (including the ability to rate, review and comment).
    The new Gallery release will introduce a new advertisement location in the right hand column to allow you to show advertisements, even in the lightbox.
    If you follow a link to a full image view page, the lightbox will automatically launch when the page loads, still allowing you to interact in a familiar manner. Additionally, if you move through enough images in the lightbox to reach a new page (for example, if you click on the last image in the album listing and then click on the next image button), the listing itself behind the lightbox will update for easier usability if the user closes the lightbox.
    One final thing to note is that the interface has been made more mobile friendly, particularly through the introduction of swiping support. You can swipe left and right in the lightbox, and in image carousels, to see the next and previous images.
    Notable performance improvements
    As we mentioned at the beginning, we recognize there is a balance between performance, usability, and attractiveness, particularly with regards to an image Gallery. For that reason, we have made Gallery's performance a major focus in 4.3, and have implemented some changes that bring with them a noticeable performance improvement.
    Firstly, we have adjusted the software to only store two copies of an image (in addition to the original), instead of four. In previous versions, we stored a thumbnail, a small copy, a medium copy and a large copy of an image, all of which arbitrarily sized and designed to best meet our layout needs without showing an image too large or too small in a given space. We have simplified this vastly by storing a slightly larger "small" image, and storing a large copy. Diskspace usage is reduced dramatically as a result, and bandwidth usage is actually lowered as well since only two copies of an image need to be delivered to the browser instead of four.
    Next, we have implemented prefetching of the 'next' and 'previous' pages when you launch the lightbox image view. This means that when a user navigates to the next image in the lightbox, it loads immediately instead of waiting for the content to be fetched from the server. From a UX perspective, this provides a much snappier and responsive interface, making users more apt to interact with the site.
    We have additionally sped up the submission process as previously mentioned. The order of execution for certain events that must happen during submission has been moved around a bit, resulting in a faster experience for the end user actually submitting the images.
    Because we know the details matter, we have implemented other smaller improvements as well. For example, the link to rebuild images in the AdminCP previously resulted in a redirect process that rebuilt the images while you waited, but now a background task is launched so that you can continue with what you were doing while the images get rebuilt in the background.
    From start to finish, the Gallery UI and UX has been touched on and improved, and we hope you enjoy these improvements when you start using the new version.
  25. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from Hexsplosions for a blog entry, 4.3: Modernizing our Gallery   
    A picture says a thousand words, they say. If getting those pictures online is troublesome, some of those words might be a little choice.
    Gallery has been an integral part of our community suite for just about as long as T1 Tech Mark Higgins can remember (and he has many years of memories). It has seen many interfaces changes as the years have rolled by. The most recent version received a fair amount to feedback on usability.
    We've listened. We've re-engineered most of Gallery's key interfaces to make uploading new images to your community frictionless.
    Lets take a look through the major changes.
    Improved submission process
    Submitting images has to be simple or else users will give up and your gallery will be underutilized. We have spent a lot of time simplifying and speeding up the submissions process for your users. The first thing that will be noticed is that the submission process is not presented as a wizard anymore, and the choice to submit to a category or album has been significantly cleaned up and simplified.

     
    Choosing a container
    Here, I have chosen the category I wish to submit to, so now I am asked if I want to submit directly to the category, if I want to create a new album, or if I want to submit to an existing album.  Choosing one of those last two options will load the appropriate forms to create an album or select an existing album, respectively.
    Afterwards, the modal expands to full screen and you will naturally select your images next, and there's a lot to talk about here.
     

    Overhauled submission interface
    First and foremost, the interface has changed significantly to both simplify the UI and to make actually using the interface easier. When you click on an image, the form is loaded to the right immediately without an AJAX request needed to fetch the form.
    In addition to quickly setting the credit and copyright information for all images at once, you can now set the tags for all images quickly and easily without having to edit each image individually.
    Images support drag n drop reordering in the uploader here, which means that you can drag n drop images to different positions to control their order. Many users previously would name images "Image 1", "Image 2", and so on, and then set their albums to order images by name in order to control the order the images were displayed in. This is no longer necessary now that you can manually reposition the images.
    The default description editor is a pared down textarea box, but you can still use the rich text editor if you wish. The ability to enable maps for geo-encoded images and to upload thumbnails for videos is still supported as well, and those options will show up when appropriate in the right hand panel.
    The 100 image per submission limit has also been lifted. You can now upload many more images in one go with no hard limit imposed.
    Upon clicking submit images, you will see the typical multiredirector to store all of your images, however you will notice that it processes much faster than it did in 4.2 and below.
    Better submission control
    Administrators can now configure categories such that can accept only images, only albums, or both. This means you can now create categories that cannot be submitted to directly, and you can create categories that albums cannot be used with. This is a feature that has been oft-requested since the release of 4.0, and we are happy to report that it will be available in our next release.
    Additionally, album creators (if permitted) can also now create shared albums.  When you create a new album, you can now specify (under the Privacy menu) who can submit to the album, with your available options being:
    Only me Anyone Only the users I specify Only the groups I specify Prior to 4.3, albums have always been owned by one user and only that user could submit to them. Invision Community 4.3 will open up albums so that anyone can submit to them, dependent upon the album creator's preferences and needs.

    The choice is yours as to who can submit to your albums
    New image navigation
    Another major change with Gallery 4.3 is that clicking an image now launches that image in a lightbox to view it and interact with it. This lightbox is context-aware, allowing you to visit the next and previous images in the listing, whether that is a category or album listing, or the featured images or new images listings on the Gallery homepage, for example.
     

    The new image lightbox
    Firstly, I will note that you are seeing the image here with my mouse cursor over the image area, exposing the title, tags, and some various buttons. When you mouse away from the image those overlays fade away to highlight the image itself better.
    As you can see, you can navigate left and right here to view the next and previous image in this context, and you can otherwise interact with the image as you would have if you had visited the older-style image view page (including the ability to rate, review and comment).
    The new Gallery release will introduce a new advertisement location in the right hand column to allow you to show advertisements, even in the lightbox.
    If you follow a link to a full image view page, the lightbox will automatically launch when the page loads, still allowing you to interact in a familiar manner. Additionally, if you move through enough images in the lightbox to reach a new page (for example, if you click on the last image in the album listing and then click on the next image button), the listing itself behind the lightbox will update for easier usability if the user closes the lightbox.
    One final thing to note is that the interface has been made more mobile friendly, particularly through the introduction of swiping support. You can swipe left and right in the lightbox, and in image carousels, to see the next and previous images.
    Notable performance improvements
    As we mentioned at the beginning, we recognize there is a balance between performance, usability, and attractiveness, particularly with regards to an image Gallery. For that reason, we have made Gallery's performance a major focus in 4.3, and have implemented some changes that bring with them a noticeable performance improvement.
    Firstly, we have adjusted the software to only store two copies of an image (in addition to the original), instead of four. In previous versions, we stored a thumbnail, a small copy, a medium copy and a large copy of an image, all of which arbitrarily sized and designed to best meet our layout needs without showing an image too large or too small in a given space. We have simplified this vastly by storing a slightly larger "small" image, and storing a large copy. Diskspace usage is reduced dramatically as a result, and bandwidth usage is actually lowered as well since only two copies of an image need to be delivered to the browser instead of four.
    Next, we have implemented prefetching of the 'next' and 'previous' pages when you launch the lightbox image view. This means that when a user navigates to the next image in the lightbox, it loads immediately instead of waiting for the content to be fetched from the server. From a UX perspective, this provides a much snappier and responsive interface, making users more apt to interact with the site.
    We have additionally sped up the submission process as previously mentioned. The order of execution for certain events that must happen during submission has been moved around a bit, resulting in a faster experience for the end user actually submitting the images.
    Because we know the details matter, we have implemented other smaller improvements as well. For example, the link to rebuild images in the AdminCP previously resulted in a redirect process that rebuilt the images while you waited, but now a background task is launched so that you can continue with what you were doing while the images get rebuilt in the background.
    From start to finish, the Gallery UI and UX has been touched on and improved, and we hope you enjoy these improvements when you start using the new version.
  26. Thanks
    bfarber got a reaction from Myr for a blog entry, 4.3: Modernizing our Gallery   
    A picture says a thousand words, they say. If getting those pictures online is troublesome, some of those words might be a little choice.
    Gallery has been an integral part of our community suite for just about as long as T1 Tech Mark Higgins can remember (and he has many years of memories). It has seen many interfaces changes as the years have rolled by. The most recent version received a fair amount to feedback on usability.
    We've listened. We've re-engineered most of Gallery's key interfaces to make uploading new images to your community frictionless.
    Lets take a look through the major changes.
    Improved submission process
    Submitting images has to be simple or else users will give up and your gallery will be underutilized. We have spent a lot of time simplifying and speeding up the submissions process for your users. The first thing that will be noticed is that the submission process is not presented as a wizard anymore, and the choice to submit to a category or album has been significantly cleaned up and simplified.

     
    Choosing a container
    Here, I have chosen the category I wish to submit to, so now I am asked if I want to submit directly to the category, if I want to create a new album, or if I want to submit to an existing album.  Choosing one of those last two options will load the appropriate forms to create an album or select an existing album, respectively.
    Afterwards, the modal expands to full screen and you will naturally select your images next, and there's a lot to talk about here.
     

    Overhauled submission interface
    First and foremost, the interface has changed significantly to both simplify the UI and to make actually using the interface easier. When you click on an image, the form is loaded to the right immediately without an AJAX request needed to fetch the form.
    In addition to quickly setting the credit and copyright information for all images at once, you can now set the tags for all images quickly and easily without having to edit each image individually.
    Images support drag n drop reordering in the uploader here, which means that you can drag n drop images to different positions to control their order. Many users previously would name images "Image 1", "Image 2", and so on, and then set their albums to order images by name in order to control the order the images were displayed in. This is no longer necessary now that you can manually reposition the images.
    The default description editor is a pared down textarea box, but you can still use the rich text editor if you wish. The ability to enable maps for geo-encoded images and to upload thumbnails for videos is still supported as well, and those options will show up when appropriate in the right hand panel.
    The 100 image per submission limit has also been lifted. You can now upload many more images in one go with no hard limit imposed.
    Upon clicking submit images, you will see the typical multiredirector to store all of your images, however you will notice that it processes much faster than it did in 4.2 and below.
    Better submission control
    Administrators can now configure categories such that can accept only images, only albums, or both. This means you can now create categories that cannot be submitted to directly, and you can create categories that albums cannot be used with. This is a feature that has been oft-requested since the release of 4.0, and we are happy to report that it will be available in our next release.
    Additionally, album creators (if permitted) can also now create shared albums.  When you create a new album, you can now specify (under the Privacy menu) who can submit to the album, with your available options being:
    Only me Anyone Only the users I specify Only the groups I specify Prior to 4.3, albums have always been owned by one user and only that user could submit to them. Invision Community 4.3 will open up albums so that anyone can submit to them, dependent upon the album creator's preferences and needs.

    The choice is yours as to who can submit to your albums
    New image navigation
    Another major change with Gallery 4.3 is that clicking an image now launches that image in a lightbox to view it and interact with it. This lightbox is context-aware, allowing you to visit the next and previous images in the listing, whether that is a category or album listing, or the featured images or new images listings on the Gallery homepage, for example.
     

    The new image lightbox
    Firstly, I will note that you are seeing the image here with my mouse cursor over the image area, exposing the title, tags, and some various buttons. When you mouse away from the image those overlays fade away to highlight the image itself better.
    As you can see, you can navigate left and right here to view the next and previous image in this context, and you can otherwise interact with the image as you would have if you had visited the older-style image view page (including the ability to rate, review and comment).
    The new Gallery release will introduce a new advertisement location in the right hand column to allow you to show advertisements, even in the lightbox.
    If you follow a link to a full image view page, the lightbox will automatically launch when the page loads, still allowing you to interact in a familiar manner. Additionally, if you move through enough images in the lightbox to reach a new page (for example, if you click on the last image in the album listing and then click on the next image button), the listing itself behind the lightbox will update for easier usability if the user closes the lightbox.
    One final thing to note is that the interface has been made more mobile friendly, particularly through the introduction of swiping support. You can swipe left and right in the lightbox, and in image carousels, to see the next and previous images.
    Notable performance improvements
    As we mentioned at the beginning, we recognize there is a balance between performance, usability, and attractiveness, particularly with regards to an image Gallery. For that reason, we have made Gallery's performance a major focus in 4.3, and have implemented some changes that bring with them a noticeable performance improvement.
    Firstly, we have adjusted the software to only store two copies of an image (in addition to the original), instead of four. In previous versions, we stored a thumbnail, a small copy, a medium copy and a large copy of an image, all of which arbitrarily sized and designed to best meet our layout needs without showing an image too large or too small in a given space. We have simplified this vastly by storing a slightly larger "small" image, and storing a large copy. Diskspace usage is reduced dramatically as a result, and bandwidth usage is actually lowered as well since only two copies of an image need to be delivered to the browser instead of four.
    Next, we have implemented prefetching of the 'next' and 'previous' pages when you launch the lightbox image view. This means that when a user navigates to the next image in the lightbox, it loads immediately instead of waiting for the content to be fetched from the server. From a UX perspective, this provides a much snappier and responsive interface, making users more apt to interact with the site.
    We have additionally sped up the submission process as previously mentioned. The order of execution for certain events that must happen during submission has been moved around a bit, resulting in a faster experience for the end user actually submitting the images.
    Because we know the details matter, we have implemented other smaller improvements as well. For example, the link to rebuild images in the AdminCP previously resulted in a redirect process that rebuilt the images while you waited, but now a background task is launched so that you can continue with what you were doing while the images get rebuilt in the background.
    From start to finish, the Gallery UI and UX has been touched on and improved, and we hope you enjoy these improvements when you start using the new version.
  27. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from Cemmos for a blog entry, 4.3: Modernizing our Gallery   
    A picture says a thousand words, they say. If getting those pictures online is troublesome, some of those words might be a little choice.
    Gallery has been an integral part of our community suite for just about as long as T1 Tech Mark Higgins can remember (and he has many years of memories). It has seen many interfaces changes as the years have rolled by. The most recent version received a fair amount to feedback on usability.
    We've listened. We've re-engineered most of Gallery's key interfaces to make uploading new images to your community frictionless.
    Lets take a look through the major changes.
    Improved submission process
    Submitting images has to be simple or else users will give up and your gallery will be underutilized. We have spent a lot of time simplifying and speeding up the submissions process for your users. The first thing that will be noticed is that the submission process is not presented as a wizard anymore, and the choice to submit to a category or album has been significantly cleaned up and simplified.

     
    Choosing a container
    Here, I have chosen the category I wish to submit to, so now I am asked if I want to submit directly to the category, if I want to create a new album, or if I want to submit to an existing album.  Choosing one of those last two options will load the appropriate forms to create an album or select an existing album, respectively.
    Afterwards, the modal expands to full screen and you will naturally select your images next, and there's a lot to talk about here.
     

    Overhauled submission interface
    First and foremost, the interface has changed significantly to both simplify the UI and to make actually using the interface easier. When you click on an image, the form is loaded to the right immediately without an AJAX request needed to fetch the form.
    In addition to quickly setting the credit and copyright information for all images at once, you can now set the tags for all images quickly and easily without having to edit each image individually.
    Images support drag n drop reordering in the uploader here, which means that you can drag n drop images to different positions to control their order. Many users previously would name images "Image 1", "Image 2", and so on, and then set their albums to order images by name in order to control the order the images were displayed in. This is no longer necessary now that you can manually reposition the images.
    The default description editor is a pared down textarea box, but you can still use the rich text editor if you wish. The ability to enable maps for geo-encoded images and to upload thumbnails for videos is still supported as well, and those options will show up when appropriate in the right hand panel.
    The 100 image per submission limit has also been lifted. You can now upload many more images in one go with no hard limit imposed.
    Upon clicking submit images, you will see the typical multiredirector to store all of your images, however you will notice that it processes much faster than it did in 4.2 and below.
    Better submission control
    Administrators can now configure categories such that can accept only images, only albums, or both. This means you can now create categories that cannot be submitted to directly, and you can create categories that albums cannot be used with. This is a feature that has been oft-requested since the release of 4.0, and we are happy to report that it will be available in our next release.
    Additionally, album creators (if permitted) can also now create shared albums.  When you create a new album, you can now specify (under the Privacy menu) who can submit to the album, with your available options being:
    Only me Anyone Only the users I specify Only the groups I specify Prior to 4.3, albums have always been owned by one user and only that user could submit to them. Invision Community 4.3 will open up albums so that anyone can submit to them, dependent upon the album creator's preferences and needs.

    The choice is yours as to who can submit to your albums
    New image navigation
    Another major change with Gallery 4.3 is that clicking an image now launches that image in a lightbox to view it and interact with it. This lightbox is context-aware, allowing you to visit the next and previous images in the listing, whether that is a category or album listing, or the featured images or new images listings on the Gallery homepage, for example.
     

    The new image lightbox
    Firstly, I will note that you are seeing the image here with my mouse cursor over the image area, exposing the title, tags, and some various buttons. When you mouse away from the image those overlays fade away to highlight the image itself better.
    As you can see, you can navigate left and right here to view the next and previous image in this context, and you can otherwise interact with the image as you would have if you had visited the older-style image view page (including the ability to rate, review and comment).
    The new Gallery release will introduce a new advertisement location in the right hand column to allow you to show advertisements, even in the lightbox.
    If you follow a link to a full image view page, the lightbox will automatically launch when the page loads, still allowing you to interact in a familiar manner. Additionally, if you move through enough images in the lightbox to reach a new page (for example, if you click on the last image in the album listing and then click on the next image button), the listing itself behind the lightbox will update for easier usability if the user closes the lightbox.
    One final thing to note is that the interface has been made more mobile friendly, particularly through the introduction of swiping support. You can swipe left and right in the lightbox, and in image carousels, to see the next and previous images.
    Notable performance improvements
    As we mentioned at the beginning, we recognize there is a balance between performance, usability, and attractiveness, particularly with regards to an image Gallery. For that reason, we have made Gallery's performance a major focus in 4.3, and have implemented some changes that bring with them a noticeable performance improvement.
    Firstly, we have adjusted the software to only store two copies of an image (in addition to the original), instead of four. In previous versions, we stored a thumbnail, a small copy, a medium copy and a large copy of an image, all of which arbitrarily sized and designed to best meet our layout needs without showing an image too large or too small in a given space. We have simplified this vastly by storing a slightly larger "small" image, and storing a large copy. Diskspace usage is reduced dramatically as a result, and bandwidth usage is actually lowered as well since only two copies of an image need to be delivered to the browser instead of four.
    Next, we have implemented prefetching of the 'next' and 'previous' pages when you launch the lightbox image view. This means that when a user navigates to the next image in the lightbox, it loads immediately instead of waiting for the content to be fetched from the server. From a UX perspective, this provides a much snappier and responsive interface, making users more apt to interact with the site.
    We have additionally sped up the submission process as previously mentioned. The order of execution for certain events that must happen during submission has been moved around a bit, resulting in a faster experience for the end user actually submitting the images.
    Because we know the details matter, we have implemented other smaller improvements as well. For example, the link to rebuild images in the AdminCP previously resulted in a redirect process that rebuilt the images while you waited, but now a background task is launched so that you can continue with what you were doing while the images get rebuilt in the background.
    From start to finish, the Gallery UI and UX has been touched on and improved, and we hope you enjoy these improvements when you start using the new version.
  28. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from Rikki for a blog entry, 4.3: Modernizing our Gallery   
    A picture says a thousand words, they say. If getting those pictures online is troublesome, some of those words might be a little choice.
    Gallery has been an integral part of our community suite for just about as long as T1 Tech Mark Higgins can remember (and he has many years of memories). It has seen many interfaces changes as the years have rolled by. The most recent version received a fair amount to feedback on usability.
    We've listened. We've re-engineered most of Gallery's key interfaces to make uploading new images to your community frictionless.
    Lets take a look through the major changes.
    Improved submission process
    Submitting images has to be simple or else users will give up and your gallery will be underutilized. We have spent a lot of time simplifying and speeding up the submissions process for your users. The first thing that will be noticed is that the submission process is not presented as a wizard anymore, and the choice to submit to a category or album has been significantly cleaned up and simplified.

     
    Choosing a container
    Here, I have chosen the category I wish to submit to, so now I am asked if I want to submit directly to the category, if I want to create a new album, or if I want to submit to an existing album.  Choosing one of those last two options will load the appropriate forms to create an album or select an existing album, respectively.
    Afterwards, the modal expands to full screen and you will naturally select your images next, and there's a lot to talk about here.
     

    Overhauled submission interface
    First and foremost, the interface has changed significantly to both simplify the UI and to make actually using the interface easier. When you click on an image, the form is loaded to the right immediately without an AJAX request needed to fetch the form.
    In addition to quickly setting the credit and copyright information for all images at once, you can now set the tags for all images quickly and easily without having to edit each image individually.
    Images support drag n drop reordering in the uploader here, which means that you can drag n drop images to different positions to control their order. Many users previously would name images "Image 1", "Image 2", and so on, and then set their albums to order images by name in order to control the order the images were displayed in. This is no longer necessary now that you can manually reposition the images.
    The default description editor is a pared down textarea box, but you can still use the rich text editor if you wish. The ability to enable maps for geo-encoded images and to upload thumbnails for videos is still supported as well, and those options will show up when appropriate in the right hand panel.
    The 100 image per submission limit has also been lifted. You can now upload many more images in one go with no hard limit imposed.
    Upon clicking submit images, you will see the typical multiredirector to store all of your images, however you will notice that it processes much faster than it did in 4.2 and below.
    Better submission control
    Administrators can now configure categories such that can accept only images, only albums, or both. This means you can now create categories that cannot be submitted to directly, and you can create categories that albums cannot be used with. This is a feature that has been oft-requested since the release of 4.0, and we are happy to report that it will be available in our next release.
    Additionally, album creators (if permitted) can also now create shared albums.  When you create a new album, you can now specify (under the Privacy menu) who can submit to the album, with your available options being:
    Only me Anyone Only the users I specify Only the groups I specify Prior to 4.3, albums have always been owned by one user and only that user could submit to them. Invision Community 4.3 will open up albums so that anyone can submit to them, dependent upon the album creator's preferences and needs.

    The choice is yours as to who can submit to your albums
    New image navigation
    Another major change with Gallery 4.3 is that clicking an image now launches that image in a lightbox to view it and interact with it. This lightbox is context-aware, allowing you to visit the next and previous images in the listing, whether that is a category or album listing, or the featured images or new images listings on the Gallery homepage, for example.
     

    The new image lightbox
    Firstly, I will note that you are seeing the image here with my mouse cursor over the image area, exposing the title, tags, and some various buttons. When you mouse away from the image those overlays fade away to highlight the image itself better.
    As you can see, you can navigate left and right here to view the next and previous image in this context, and you can otherwise interact with the image as you would have if you had visited the older-style image view page (including the ability to rate, review and comment).
    The new Gallery release will introduce a new advertisement location in the right hand column to allow you to show advertisements, even in the lightbox.
    If you follow a link to a full image view page, the lightbox will automatically launch when the page loads, still allowing you to interact in a familiar manner. Additionally, if you move through enough images in the lightbox to reach a new page (for example, if you click on the last image in the album listing and then click on the next image button), the listing itself behind the lightbox will update for easier usability if the user closes the lightbox.
    One final thing to note is that the interface has been made more mobile friendly, particularly through the introduction of swiping support. You can swipe left and right in the lightbox, and in image carousels, to see the next and previous images.
    Notable performance improvements
    As we mentioned at the beginning, we recognize there is a balance between performance, usability, and attractiveness, particularly with regards to an image Gallery. For that reason, we have made Gallery's performance a major focus in 4.3, and have implemented some changes that bring with them a noticeable performance improvement.
    Firstly, we have adjusted the software to only store two copies of an image (in addition to the original), instead of four. In previous versions, we stored a thumbnail, a small copy, a medium copy and a large copy of an image, all of which arbitrarily sized and designed to best meet our layout needs without showing an image too large or too small in a given space. We have simplified this vastly by storing a slightly larger "small" image, and storing a large copy. Diskspace usage is reduced dramatically as a result, and bandwidth usage is actually lowered as well since only two copies of an image need to be delivered to the browser instead of four.
    Next, we have implemented prefetching of the 'next' and 'previous' pages when you launch the lightbox image view. This means that when a user navigates to the next image in the lightbox, it loads immediately instead of waiting for the content to be fetched from the server. From a UX perspective, this provides a much snappier and responsive interface, making users more apt to interact with the site.
    We have additionally sped up the submission process as previously mentioned. The order of execution for certain events that must happen during submission has been moved around a bit, resulting in a faster experience for the end user actually submitting the images.
    Because we know the details matter, we have implemented other smaller improvements as well. For example, the link to rebuild images in the AdminCP previously resulted in a redirect process that rebuilt the images while you waited, but now a background task is launched so that you can continue with what you were doing while the images get rebuilt in the background.
    From start to finish, the Gallery UI and UX has been touched on and improved, and we hope you enjoy these improvements when you start using the new version.
  29. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from Daniel F for a blog entry, 4.3: Modernizing our Gallery   
    A picture says a thousand words, they say. If getting those pictures online is troublesome, some of those words might be a little choice.
    Gallery has been an integral part of our community suite for just about as long as T1 Tech Mark Higgins can remember (and he has many years of memories). It has seen many interfaces changes as the years have rolled by. The most recent version received a fair amount to feedback on usability.
    We've listened. We've re-engineered most of Gallery's key interfaces to make uploading new images to your community frictionless.
    Lets take a look through the major changes.
    Improved submission process
    Submitting images has to be simple or else users will give up and your gallery will be underutilized. We have spent a lot of time simplifying and speeding up the submissions process for your users. The first thing that will be noticed is that the submission process is not presented as a wizard anymore, and the choice to submit to a category or album has been significantly cleaned up and simplified.

     
    Choosing a container
    Here, I have chosen the category I wish to submit to, so now I am asked if I want to submit directly to the category, if I want to create a new album, or if I want to submit to an existing album.  Choosing one of those last two options will load the appropriate forms to create an album or select an existing album, respectively.
    Afterwards, the modal expands to full screen and you will naturally select your images next, and there's a lot to talk about here.
     

    Overhauled submission interface
    First and foremost, the interface has changed significantly to both simplify the UI and to make actually using the interface easier. When you click on an image, the form is loaded to the right immediately without an AJAX request needed to fetch the form.
    In addition to quickly setting the credit and copyright information for all images at once, you can now set the tags for all images quickly and easily without having to edit each image individually.
    Images support drag n drop reordering in the uploader here, which means that you can drag n drop images to different positions to control their order. Many users previously would name images "Image 1", "Image 2", and so on, and then set their albums to order images by name in order to control the order the images were displayed in. This is no longer necessary now that you can manually reposition the images.
    The default description editor is a pared down textarea box, but you can still use the rich text editor if you wish. The ability to enable maps for geo-encoded images and to upload thumbnails for videos is still supported as well, and those options will show up when appropriate in the right hand panel.
    The 100 image per submission limit has also been lifted. You can now upload many more images in one go with no hard limit imposed.
    Upon clicking submit images, you will see the typical multiredirector to store all of your images, however you will notice that it processes much faster than it did in 4.2 and below.
    Better submission control
    Administrators can now configure categories such that can accept only images, only albums, or both. This means you can now create categories that cannot be submitted to directly, and you can create categories that albums cannot be used with. This is a feature that has been oft-requested since the release of 4.0, and we are happy to report that it will be available in our next release.
    Additionally, album creators (if permitted) can also now create shared albums.  When you create a new album, you can now specify (under the Privacy menu) who can submit to the album, with your available options being:
    Only me Anyone Only the users I specify Only the groups I specify Prior to 4.3, albums have always been owned by one user and only that user could submit to them. Invision Community 4.3 will open up albums so that anyone can submit to them, dependent upon the album creator's preferences and needs.

    The choice is yours as to who can submit to your albums
    New image navigation
    Another major change with Gallery 4.3 is that clicking an image now launches that image in a lightbox to view it and interact with it. This lightbox is context-aware, allowing you to visit the next and previous images in the listing, whether that is a category or album listing, or the featured images or new images listings on the Gallery homepage, for example.
     

    The new image lightbox
    Firstly, I will note that you are seeing the image here with my mouse cursor over the image area, exposing the title, tags, and some various buttons. When you mouse away from the image those overlays fade away to highlight the image itself better.
    As you can see, you can navigate left and right here to view the next and previous image in this context, and you can otherwise interact with the image as you would have if you had visited the older-style image view page (including the ability to rate, review and comment).
    The new Gallery release will introduce a new advertisement location in the right hand column to allow you to show advertisements, even in the lightbox.
    If you follow a link to a full image view page, the lightbox will automatically launch when the page loads, still allowing you to interact in a familiar manner. Additionally, if you move through enough images in the lightbox to reach a new page (for example, if you click on the last image in the album listing and then click on the next image button), the listing itself behind the lightbox will update for easier usability if the user closes the lightbox.
    One final thing to note is that the interface has been made more mobile friendly, particularly through the introduction of swiping support. You can swipe left and right in the lightbox, and in image carousels, to see the next and previous images.
    Notable performance improvements
    As we mentioned at the beginning, we recognize there is a balance between performance, usability, and attractiveness, particularly with regards to an image Gallery. For that reason, we have made Gallery's performance a major focus in 4.3, and have implemented some changes that bring with them a noticeable performance improvement.
    Firstly, we have adjusted the software to only store two copies of an image (in addition to the original), instead of four. In previous versions, we stored a thumbnail, a small copy, a medium copy and a large copy of an image, all of which arbitrarily sized and designed to best meet our layout needs without showing an image too large or too small in a given space. We have simplified this vastly by storing a slightly larger "small" image, and storing a large copy. Diskspace usage is reduced dramatically as a result, and bandwidth usage is actually lowered as well since only two copies of an image need to be delivered to the browser instead of four.
    Next, we have implemented prefetching of the 'next' and 'previous' pages when you launch the lightbox image view. This means that when a user navigates to the next image in the lightbox, it loads immediately instead of waiting for the content to be fetched from the server. From a UX perspective, this provides a much snappier and responsive interface, making users more apt to interact with the site.
    We have additionally sped up the submission process as previously mentioned. The order of execution for certain events that must happen during submission has been moved around a bit, resulting in a faster experience for the end user actually submitting the images.
    Because we know the details matter, we have implemented other smaller improvements as well. For example, the link to rebuild images in the AdminCP previously resulted in a redirect process that rebuilt the images while you waited, but now a background task is launched so that you can continue with what you were doing while the images get rebuilt in the background.
    From start to finish, the Gallery UI and UX has been touched on and improved, and we hope you enjoy these improvements when you start using the new version.
  30. Like
    bfarber reacted to Mark for a blog entry, 4.3: Paid club memberships, and other club improvements   
    We released news of Clubs just under a year ago for Invision Community 4.2 and it has been the best received feature to date.
    Clubs opens up new ways to run your community by allowing members to create sub-communities away from the central forum area.
    Since the feature was released, we've collated an immense amount of feedback on the feature. Here's what we're improving for Invision Community 4.3.
    Paid Club Memberships
    If you have Commerce installed on your community, 4.3 adds the ability for members to create paid clubs. Users wishing to join the club will be required to pay a membership fee (which can be one off or recurring) which will be paid to the club owner, minus any commission you want to keep for the site. You can choose which groups can create paid clubs.

    Paid Club Settings
    If enabled, the club directory will show the price for membership in each club.

    Club directory with paid clubs
    The process for joining works a little differently depending on the type of club...
    For open clubs, the user will immediately be prompted to pay the joining fee. Once they have paid, they are added to the club as normal. For closed clubs, the user will need to request to join as normal. Once they have been accepted to join the club, they will then be able to pay the membership fee, after which they'll be added to the club. For private and read-only (a new type in 4.3, which we'll talk about below) users have to be invited to join the club Public clubs have no membership, and so cannot be paid.
    Joining a paid club (a closed club in this screenshot)

    Paid club after request to join has been accepted

    Paying for club membership
    Club leaders can also waive the membership fee, allowing certain users to join the club for free.

    Waiving fee when approving request to join

    Waiving fee when inviting members

    Waiving renewal fees on an existing member
    If a member fails to pay their renewal charge, they are moved into an "expired" state. The club leaders can see the status and renewal date for all members, and use the filter tools to just see active or expired members.

    Club members management
    Paying out membership fees works just as it does with paid files in Downloads. Users receive the amount as account credit. If enabled, they can then request a payout of this via PayPal or a manual payout method you want to use.

    Viewing an invoice in the AdminCP where some payment has been given to a member

    Viewing account credit with options to withdraw funds
     
     
    Club content throughout the community
    Currently content in clubs is only visible within the club itself. In 4.3 a new setting allows you to show the content from clubs throughout the community - for example, if a club contains a forum, that forum can show in the main forum list.
     
    Club forums showing on main forum list
    This is a single toggle: if enabled, all content from clubs that each user has joined will show throughout the community, appearing below the normal categories/etc in that application.
     
     
    New Club Type: Read Only
    In addition to Open, Closed, Private and Public, we have added a new club type in 4.3: read only. In a read only club, everyone can (without joining) view everything in the club, but cannot participate unless they are invited by a club leader.
     
    Following
    Users can now follow a club, and will then receive notifications about all new content in the club - the same as if they followed every content area in the club.
     
    List View
    In addition to the current grid layout of clubs, there is a new list-style.

    Clubs List View
    The admin can choose which views are available and what the default should be.
     
    AdminCP Approval
    You can now filter the list of clubs in the AdminCP to clubs requiring approval and approve clubs from within the AdminCP.

    Approving clubs in AdminCP
     
    Deleting Content Areas
    Club leaders can now delete content areas within their clubs. This can be useful if, for example, the leader added a club feature by mistake.
    Content areas can only be removed if there is no content within it, or if you have granted club leaders the ability to delete content in their clubs (since they would be able to empty it).

    Ability to remove features from clubs
     
    Other Minor Tweaks
    You can now set per-group the maximum number of clubs a member in that group can create. A member invited to join a club can now delete the invitation if they do not want to accept it (rather than just ignoring it).
  31. Like
    bfarber reacted to Mark for a blog entry, 4.3: Sign in from other sites using OAuth   
    The best way to convert guests into members is to make the onboarding process as simple as possible.
    Over the years, we've added special log in methods for Facebook, Google, LinkedIn and Microsoft. We've carefully hand coded these integrations to allow guests to sign up with just a few clicks using services they're already a member of.
    These services used to use proprietary methods to link with other websites, but a new standard has emerged.
    OAuth
    You may not know it, but you're probably familiar with OAuth already. If you have enabled the ability for users of your community to sign in with their Facebook, Twitter, Google, LinkedIn or Microsoft account, you may have noticed that the process for setting up each of these is quite similar. This is because they all use the OAuth protocol.
    In Invision Community 4.3, we are introducing several exciting new features:
    In addition to all of the existing social networks above, which retain their "easy setup" status, we have also added Wordpress. Users on your community can now sign in with any Wordpress site you control (you will need to install a Wordpress plugin to enable OAuth capabilities). As well as those "easy setup" options, we have also added the ability for you to allow users on your site to sign in with any OAuth 2.0 based provider. This means, for example, if your community is based in a location where other social networks are popular, if they use OAuth, you can set those up too. While the setup is a little bit more complicated, this doesn't require any custom programming - you'll just need to find out a few more pieces of information from the provider (an example is provided below). Invision Community itself can now also serve as an OAuth 2.0 server so you can set up other sites to be able to facilitate logins using credentials from your community. This works in conjunction with our REST API, allowing you to make API calls as an authenticated member, which will return just the information that user has access to. With the ability for Invision Community to serve as both an OAuth server and client, this now provides standard integration for multiple Invision Communities together, which will now replace the old IPS Connect feature. We have also taken this opportunity to make a few other minor tweaks to login, registration and account management features, especially for communities which rely heavily on non-standard login methods (more details below).  
    Setting Up a Custom OAuth Provider
    For this example, I'm going to use vk.com, which is a popular social network in Europe. While Invision Community doesn't provide this as one of the "easy setup" options, it is based on OAuth 2.0 so we can use the new functionality in Invision Community 4.3 to set it up.
    In older versions, the list of login handlers in the AdminCP had all of the providers listed with enable/disable toggles - because now you can add as many custom handlers as you like in 4.3, it's now a list where you can add/delete options:

    Login Handlers List
    When clicking the "Create New" button, you'll see all of the different handlers Invision Community supports. Since vk.com isn't in the list, but is still OAuth 2.0-based, I'll choose the "Other OAuth 2.0" option:
     
    Choosing a Login Handler
    You'll now need to use the documentation provided by the site you want to integrate with to fill out this form. While no custom programming is required, the documentation is usually quite technical in nature - but you only need a few key pieces of information. We anticipate that for some of the more popular options, guides will be provided to help you find the information you need.
    I have created an application in vk.com's developer center and so I will copy and paste my credentials into the form:

    Inputting vk.com credentials
    I then need to find the endpoints from vk.com's documentation and input those too.

    Inputting vk.com endpoints
    Next I need to find the endpoint where I can access the user's information within their API and the parameters they are returned by. The only required piece of information is an ID, but you can also provide the parameters for accessing the display name, email address and profile photo. If display name/email address isn't available/provided, the user will be asked for this the first time they sign in. vk.com's API doesn't provide access to the email, but I can use the screen name as the display name, and they do provide access to the photo:


    Inputting vk.com User Information Endpoint and response parameters
    Finally, provide a logo and a color for the sign in button and some final settings:

    Inputting vk.com Logo and Button Color
    And now vk.com login is set up. A button will now show up on the front end which I can use to sign in. I didn't provide a way to access the email address, so on the first sign in, the user will be prompted to provide that, but the screen name and profile photo from vk.com will be used:

    Signing in with vk.com
     
    Using Invision Community as an OAuth Server
    You can also set up Invision Community itself to be an OAuth Server. This may be useful for two main reasons:
    If you want to integrate two communities together, or integrate with something else which supports adding custom OAuth clients. If you are a developer and want to use the REST API using OAuth for authentication rather than an API Key. You can either make requests as an authenticated user (by obtaining an access token) or using Client Credentials. The screenshots below show the full capabilities which are quite technical and mostly aimed at developers. If you will just use this feature to link two communities, don't be concerned if it looks too complicated, an easy-to-follow guide will be available to achieve that.
    You will set up the clients from the AdminCP:


    Setting up an OAuth Client
    When creating the OAuth Client, you can control which scopes are available, and which endpoints of the REST API they provide access to:

    Defining OAuth Client Scopes
    The login process is then the standard OAuth flow, and users have the ability to view authorisations in the account settings:

    Authenticating an OAuth Client
    The REST API has new and updated endpoints to be aware of the authenticated user:

    A new REST API endpoint which returns details of the currently authenticated user

    An updated REST API endpoint which, when called using OAuth authentication, will only return data the authenticated user has access to
     
    Other Login System Tweaks
    Users can now choose if they want to change their local display name or email address if it is changed by an external login method (or the administrator can choose this behaviour). If there is an issue with this (for example, it wants to change the email to one that is already taken), or profile photo syncing, this is now better communicated to the user. You can now control per-login-handler if new registrations are allowed using it. This addresses some confusion from previous versions as to if the "Allow New Registrations" setting applies to accounts being created by social network logins. The Standard login handler can be disabled if you rely totally on an alternate login method. To allow this to happen:  All areas where a user is prompted to re-enter their password (some areas of the account settings) now allow reauthentication using any login handler. You can disable local registration but still allow accounts to be created by other login handlers, or redirect users to an external URL to register an account. You can also disable or redirect to an external URL for changing email address / password or the Forgot Password tool. You can now create multiple instances of the external MySQL database and LDAP login methods which have also had some other minor tweaks: The external MySQL database handler now has PHP's password_hash() function as an available option for password encryption type, and defining a custom encryption method is now much easier, done entirely in the AdminCP without needing to modify PHP files. You can now choose if changes to the local display name / email address / password is synced back to the external database / LDAP database. You can optionally show these handlers in the Account Settings pages like other login handlers to allow users with an existing account to link their accounts. You can define a Forgot Password URL for the external database which the user will be redirected to if they try to use the Forgot Password tool and that is how their account is authenticated. 
  32. Like
    bfarber reacted to Matt for a blog entry, Team Talk: What are you looking forward to most in 2018?   
    The Christmas lights are twinkling, the mince pies baked and the egg nog has been poured. With Christmas just around the corner, we turn our thoughts to what 2018 may bring.
    Marc Stridgen (Tech support and kettlebell enthusiast)
    I'm just looking forward to 2018 being less of a mixed year, as 2017 has been a bit of a bad one on the side of family, yet good with regards work and personal achievements. So here goes for my 2018:
    Looking forward to 4.3 and beyond. 4.2 I feel has been a great release for people, and will be nice to expand on the 4.x platform over the next year. Getting my wife and daughter to a happier place in life. Various things this year have meant they really haven't been. I have 3 events so far this year that I'm attending. 1 x 5k obstacle course, 1 x 10k obstacle course, and a 60 mile ride from Manchester to Blackpool. I always look forward to these, as its always a good sense of achievement when they are done, and a good excuse to get that little more in shape. Dev, dev, dev!! Whilst I am currently tier 1 support here at IPS, I'm actually a developer by trade. Currently I write .NET windows applications/services, and vast experience with TSQL. My aim this year is to update my own skillsets to web based development, and mysql. Something I have already started to do, but I'm going to be pushing myself more on over the coming year. It's fun to learn new things! (Editor: Marc is a highly skilled SQL specialist. Even Wade has been known to ask Marc for advice)
    Ryan Ashbrook (Developer, T3 specialist and guitar collector)
    My life is actually pretty boring (Editor: nope, it's not) - I don't have a whole lot planned going into 2018, though I am looking forward to my 30th birthday in March. People think I'm weird for that.
    I plan on getting back into music, though, as I've actually stopped playing throughout all of 2017 (aside from a few rare instances here and there), so it'll be nice to pick that up again as a healthy hobby.
    I also wouldn't mind traveling more, and make a return trip to New Hampshire with my friends, which I haven't done in four-ish years now.
    For IPS, I'm looking forward to seeing how 4.3 evolves and matures, as well as the new Community in the Cloud infrastructure.

     
    Mark Wade (Senior Developer and praise withholder) 
    Obviously 4.3 and onwards ? I have some cool stuff (at least by my standards) planned, including weekends in Edinburgh and Berlin at the beginning of the year, and Country To Country Festival at the O2 in March ? and, best of all... Shania Twain at the O2 in October ? Prides! ?️‍? This year I only did Manchester... a terrible effort. I need to get at least 2 in in 2018 New TV seasons, especially Black Mirror and GBBO.
     
    (Editor: That's Great British Bake Off, the most British television show on the planet. People make cakes and then discuss cakes while drinking tea)
    Brandon Farber (Developer)
    For 2018 I'm most looking forward to:
    Watching my beautiful baby daughter grow. Even with 6 kids, the baby phase is always such a special and enjoyable time. Wrapping up some various challenges in real life that are finally coming to an end. Watching my eldest son start college in the fall (UNC most likely) Taking one big family vacation. We're hoping Disney World but we'll wait and see what's in store as the year gets going.
    Probably the cutest pictures you'll see today.
    Stuart Silvester (Developer and property mogul) 
    I'm looking forward to 2018 being a better all around year for my close family, 2017 wasn't the best. I'm definitely looking forward to taking some more trips abroad, most like back to Italy and Madeira (Where my Wife and I spent Christmas 2016). I'm also looking forward to hopefully finding some spare time to work on other things such as renovating my home and putting my classic car back on the road. Learning new things is always useful, I've been wanting to start working on something such as an App or Node.JS (I've used it a little in the past, but not a lot), the issue however is the lack of spare time this year.
    Mark Higgins (Tech Support and part-time Phil)
    For 2018, I am hoping for an early warm Spring, then a mild Summer. Also hopeful that I can get my pop-up camper fixed so I can have a relaxing vacation in the Fall somewhere "up north" in one of our fantastic State Parks. That, and good health for me and my relatives.

    (Editor's Tip: if you hear banjo music, get in your car and get out of there)
    Jennifer Merriman (Designer and owner of the only pink avatar in chat)
    What do I have to look forward to in 2018? Well this one was difficult because I prefer to live pretty spontaneously. However, I thought about the things in my life that I know will transpire this year.
    My youngest child will turn 10 and my eldest 13... I'm terrified but excited to see them as they grow more independent. Loosening up the mom reigns by letting my kids start to do things a little more out of my control more regularly. A few million new movies like Aquaman, Jurassic World, Deadpool 2 and Incredibles 2. Otherwise just improved situations for myself and those around me. Both health and whatever else needs improved upon. Daniel Fatkic (Developer and owner of a store with sauna)
    2018 is going to be a very busy year with my 3 jobs ( IPS, Dad and Handyman renovating a lot in the house) where I look forward in getting better in all 3 of them.  
    Right now I'm working on my new home-office which will hopefully be finished soon, in spring I want to start the work on the outdoor area and create a patio and a rooftop terrace and the next winter project is the gym/spa area which won't leave much spare time or money for anything else.
    So what I really really look forward to is 2019 where I can then finally relax and enjoy the stuff which was built in 2018.
    (Editor: If you're wondering where your spare money went, look at your two LG 27" 5K monitors)
    Rhett Buck (Hosting expert who needs a ladder to get into his car)
    I'm looking forward to some time off and a trip to Texas with just the wife and I, top down, no phones, and a few days on the road to get there via Las Vegas, Arizona and a few other stops along the way. Spending a few days with friends relaxing watching MotoGP in Austin Texas, then a few days of relaxing on the open road on the way home. We had planned to go last year, but due to nasty weather, torrential rains, and flooding locally, we were displaced for a couple weeks which ruined our plans.

     
    Andy Millne (Developer and international man of mystery)
    Continued learning mostly. I’m looking forward to further improving my basic Italian language knowledge that I started taking a lot more seriously (It’s not just about waving your arms around). I would also like to fit in some more travel and to visit some old friends I haven’t seen in a while. There’s still so much of the world left to see though! Where to start? 
    On an IPS related theme, I’m of course looking forward to 4.3 and seeing new features we’ve been working on released into the wild, and the stuff that hasn’t even been dreamt of yet.

    Matt Mecham (Senior Developer, social media stuff and object of ridicule)
    I'm really looking forward to 2018, personally and professionally.  I'm really excited about launching Invision Community 4.3 which is shaping up to build on the great foundation that 4.2 built and add some cool functionality. (Editor: yes, that's enough of the sales pitch, people want to read about the team).
    As a dad of two, I enjoy watching my kids grow. My nine year old is becoming more independent and my two year old is getting more confident with speech. I love watching them grow up. We've also booked to take them to Disneyland in Paris in April which we're all looking forward to.

    Disneyland Paris. Like the ones in America but colder and nearer to the UK.
    We would love to hear what you're looking forward to in 2018. Let us know in the comments below!
  33. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from raza ali for a blog entry, New: Group promotion improvements   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release.
    The ability to automatically promote users from one group to another based on set parameters has been a staple of community software for some time. Traditionally, the most common determination of promotion has been post count. Additionally, the 4.x Community Suite supports promoting members automatically based on the time elapsed since the user joined the site and based on their total reputation count.
    With 4.2, we have completely overhauled and enhanced the group promotion feature bringing many new options to administrators looking to promote members through different group levels.
    To start with, the group promotion options have been removed from the groups configuration pages into their own area.

    Group promotion rules overview page
    You will notice that rules are no longer strictly tied to a single group, and that rules can be sorted however you desire. When you create and edit rules, you can choose which groups the rule applies to, what parameters the user needs to meet in order for the rule to be activated, and then finally, which primary and secondary groups the user will be moved in to. You can also configure the rule to remove specified secondary groups, which can be useful if one rule adds a secondary group for users, and then the next rule should change them to be part of a different secondary group (i.e. add a new secondary group, but also remove the previously awarded secondary group).
    The system uses the same member filters available when configuring bulk mail, and we have made some updates to the member filters area (and have introduced some new filters) in this release as well. For example, you can create a rule that only applies to members who have won the daily leaderboard at least once, or members who have created a blog.

    Some of the group promotion filters, which are also available when sending bulk mails
    Any time a member account is updated for any reason (a new visit, editing the member, the member makes a new post, etc.), the software will loop through all configured rules and the last rule in the list that matches the member will be applied. This approach allows you to create promotion levels, for instance when a member reaches 100 posted content items they will be promoted to a new group, and when they reach 1000 posted content items they will be promoted to yet a different new group.
    Groups can be wholly excluded from any promotion rules, which is useful when you have administrator and/or moderator groups and you want to ensure that they are never moved to a different group. These groups will be disabled from selection when configuring group promotion rules, and these groups will be ignored if "any group" is selected for a promotion rule.
    Finally, if a user is moved to a new primary group by Commerce because they have purchased a product which moves them to a new group, they will also be excluded from group promotion rules (however, Commerce purchases that only adjust secondary groups will not exclude users from being checked by group promotion rules).
     
    Developer note: You can add your own filters for group promotion rules (and bulk mails) by adding MemberFilter extensions in 4.2, available in the Developer Center for your application.
  34. Thanks
    bfarber got a reaction from Xiaodidi8 for a blog entry, New: Statistics   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release
    Statistics can be an important part of monitoring your site and ensuring it grows and responds to your marketing and promotion efforts effectively, and several new statistic tools have been added to the 4.2 Community Suite which we know you will be excited to learn about!
    A simple tool has been added that will allow you to look up and list all member accounts that have last visited the site within a specified time period.

    Look up members who have visited within a set time period
    Additionally, online user (both logged in user and guest) counts are now tracked every 15 minutes and graphed in the AdminCP for you to reference. You can view online user trends over a specified date period, view just guest counts or just member counts (or both), and view the graph in multiple different modes (such as an area chart or as a column chart). By default, the data is retained for 180 days, however you can control how often to prune this statistical data in the AdminCP.

    Online user trends graphed
    You can also view a graph of member activity on the site. Member activity is defined as any "activity" beyond simply browsing, such as submitting a new post, reacting to any content item or comment, or following any content item or node.

    Activity information about your member base
    You will also be able to define keywords that you would like to monitor and then see both a graph of usage of those keywords, as well as a table listing all usages of those keywords. You can use this to track usage of competitor names, find out if hash tags you define are trending, or learn if promotional materials are making an impact on your membership.

    Keyword tracking can help you closely monitor your community
    Along with these additions, we've cleaned up the menu and wording for the rest of the existing statistic options to make their functions more clear.
    We hope these additions help you better track and control your community, making the most of your time and money.
     
    Note for developers: A new chart class has been added which allows you to populate dynamic charts using callbacks, in addition to the standard methods that already exist for pulling data directly from a specified database table.
  35. Thanks
    bfarber got a reaction from Sethhh. for a blog entry, 4.0 - Staff Directory   
    For many years, IP.Board has featured a "Moderating Team" page where the community moderators are listed so that users can quickly and easily identify who to contact in the event they need assistance. This page has typically been a somewhat generic table-style view of users who are a moderator of some level. The page is not configurable and has limited usefulness and relevance when you consider the entirety of the suite. It is a relic of an older age and it really stood out as needing an overhaul, so that is exactly what we have done in 4.0.


    Configurable

    As mentioned above, the moderating team page has never been configurable in IP.Board. If a user is a moderator (either a super moderator, or a forum-level moderator) then they are displayed on this page. The users are displayed in basic alphabetical order in a table-style view and you cannot easily see which user is responsible for which roles on the site. Furthermore, if you add a moderator to another application (for instance, IP.Downloads or IP.Gallery) then they may not be displayed on this page if they aren't also a moderator in the forums.

    We have completely done away with the way this page used to work and rethought it from the ground up. Its purpose is simple: show the viewing user which users on the site are "important" and their relevance to the site. To implement our goal, we have decided to make the entire page configurable.

    In the admin area you can now create groupings for this page. This means that you can put some users in one group, some users in another group, and so on in order to better reflect the hierarchy of your organization. For instance, here at IPS we would list Management staff at the top, followed by Developers, followed by Support Agents, and possibly followed by community moderators. You can reorder the groups however you see fit to ensure that the most important users are listed first.

    You can also now associate a template with each group. When you view the staff page, you will probably want to show a little more information for the most important users, but you may want to just show simple links to a profile for the regular community moderators. By default we will ship with 3 or 4 basic templates that we feel will allow you to display staff groups in different ways to better reflect your organization, however any administrator can add new templates by simply creating a template with the appropriate prefix in the appropriate template group.

    When you add users to a group, you can specify a custom name to show (which will fall back to the member's username), you can specify a custom title to show (which will fall back to the member's title) and you can specify a bio to show. Users who are displayed on this page can edit their details right from the staff page directly.




    Viewing the page

    We wanted to allow this page to be set up to better reflect the staff on a community. A simple listing of moderators is no longer relevant for many users of the Community Suite - you may want one moderator to not be displayed because they only manage pre-sales questions, or you may want an administrator who is not a moderator to be displayed, or perhaps you want to create a game roster instead of displaying staff but you don't want to give those users moderator privileges on the site. Now you can do that, and you can better present the page to your users.



    As you can see here, the first grouping (labeled "Management") is displayed in full width. The second grouping called "Developers" are blocks that take up half of the available width. The last grouping called "Support Agents" are rows of 4 blocks each. It is important to note that the interface is subject to change and we are still putting some finishing touches on this screen, however hopefully the screenshot will give you a good idea of how the page can be laid out to improve communication between your staff and your visitors.
  36. Thanks
    bfarber reacted to Charles for a blog entry, Update on Invision Community 4.2   
    We are working hard to get Invision Community 4.2 ready to go! If you have not been following this upcoming version, check out the details:
    Over the last month we have released several beta versions and feedback from those that have chosen to jump in on the beta has been great. We really could not be happier. Feedback has included amazement over how stable the beta is to reactions from community members enjoying all the new features.
    Everyone here at IPS is very excited to get the full release out so everyone can enjoy it. Not everyone is comfortable using beta releases .
    Back in March when we first announced 4.2 was coming soon we said that it would be out in mid-2017 and we are still on track for that. Be sure to keep an eye on announcements for the full release expected in the next 3 - 4 weeks.
    We really hope everyone is as excited as we are about 4.2's full release. Based on the feedback from those already using 4.2 beta on their live sites we really think this will be a huge hit with your community.
     
  37. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from VoronAlex for a blog entry, New: Group promotion improvements   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release.
    The ability to automatically promote users from one group to another based on set parameters has been a staple of community software for some time. Traditionally, the most common determination of promotion has been post count. Additionally, the 4.x Community Suite supports promoting members automatically based on the time elapsed since the user joined the site and based on their total reputation count.
    With 4.2, we have completely overhauled and enhanced the group promotion feature bringing many new options to administrators looking to promote members through different group levels.
    To start with, the group promotion options have been removed from the groups configuration pages into their own area.

    Group promotion rules overview page
    You will notice that rules are no longer strictly tied to a single group, and that rules can be sorted however you desire. When you create and edit rules, you can choose which groups the rule applies to, what parameters the user needs to meet in order for the rule to be activated, and then finally, which primary and secondary groups the user will be moved in to. You can also configure the rule to remove specified secondary groups, which can be useful if one rule adds a secondary group for users, and then the next rule should change them to be part of a different secondary group (i.e. add a new secondary group, but also remove the previously awarded secondary group).
    The system uses the same member filters available when configuring bulk mail, and we have made some updates to the member filters area (and have introduced some new filters) in this release as well. For example, you can create a rule that only applies to members who have won the daily leaderboard at least once, or members who have created a blog.

    Some of the group promotion filters, which are also available when sending bulk mails
    Any time a member account is updated for any reason (a new visit, editing the member, the member makes a new post, etc.), the software will loop through all configured rules and the last rule in the list that matches the member will be applied. This approach allows you to create promotion levels, for instance when a member reaches 100 posted content items they will be promoted to a new group, and when they reach 1000 posted content items they will be promoted to yet a different new group.
    Groups can be wholly excluded from any promotion rules, which is useful when you have administrator and/or moderator groups and you want to ensure that they are never moved to a different group. These groups will be disabled from selection when configuring group promotion rules, and these groups will be ignored if "any group" is selected for a promotion rule.
    Finally, if a user is moved to a new primary group by Commerce because they have purchased a product which moves them to a new group, they will also be excluded from group promotion rules (however, Commerce purchases that only adjust secondary groups will not exclude users from being checked by group promotion rules).
     
    Developer note: You can add your own filters for group promotion rules (and bulk mails) by adding MemberFilter extensions in 4.2, available in the Developer Center for your application.
  38. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from Omri Amos for a blog entry, New: Statistics   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release
    Statistics can be an important part of monitoring your site and ensuring it grows and responds to your marketing and promotion efforts effectively, and several new statistic tools have been added to the 4.2 Community Suite which we know you will be excited to learn about!
    A simple tool has been added that will allow you to look up and list all member accounts that have last visited the site within a specified time period.

    Look up members who have visited within a set time period
    Additionally, online user (both logged in user and guest) counts are now tracked every 15 minutes and graphed in the AdminCP for you to reference. You can view online user trends over a specified date period, view just guest counts or just member counts (or both), and view the graph in multiple different modes (such as an area chart or as a column chart). By default, the data is retained for 180 days, however you can control how often to prune this statistical data in the AdminCP.

    Online user trends graphed
    You can also view a graph of member activity on the site. Member activity is defined as any "activity" beyond simply browsing, such as submitting a new post, reacting to any content item or comment, or following any content item or node.

    Activity information about your member base
    You will also be able to define keywords that you would like to monitor and then see both a graph of usage of those keywords, as well as a table listing all usages of those keywords. You can use this to track usage of competitor names, find out if hash tags you define are trending, or learn if promotional materials are making an impact on your membership.

    Keyword tracking can help you closely monitor your community
    Along with these additions, we've cleaned up the menu and wording for the rest of the existing statistic options to make their functions more clear.
    We hope these additions help you better track and control your community, making the most of your time and money.
     
    Note for developers: A new chart class has been added which allows you to populate dynamic charts using callbacks, in addition to the standard methods that already exist for pulling data directly from a specified database table.
  39. Thanks
    bfarber got a reaction from Anonymous IPB User for a blog entry, New: Gallery improvements   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release
    We are happy to introduce several changes to our Gallery application to both refine the existing capabilities and to introduce new useful functionality; particularly for Albums.
    We have clarified how to submit images directly to a category on the first step of the upload form in Gallery.

    Clarification for submitting directly to a category
    When submitting images to the Gallery, a simple "Add more images" button has been added to the wizard. While it has always been possible to add more images by dragging and dropping them on to the upload area, or by clicking the "Choose files" button again, the addition of this button should help add some clarity for users who overlooked these capabilities.

    A new "Add more images" button makes adding additional images easier
    Applying the same details to all of the images you are submitting has been made much simpler. When you begin entering the details for the first image, you can specify a template to use for the caption name leveraging a special replacement "%n". A small help icon next to the caption field label explains how to use this capability. When you are done supplying the details, you can click "Copy details to all images" and your submission will start instantly, using all of the details supplied for the image you are editing. You can quickly set tags, an image description and a caption name template (for instance "Aquarium %n") to all images using this new capability, useful when submitting 50+ images at once. Of course, you can still supply the details for each individual image as well, if you wish.

    Submitting a lot of images at once has been made easier
    In addition to improvements for submitting images, albums have been updated to include many new features, including:
    Commenting Reviews Reactions Messages Featuring Hiding Locking Reporting Searching A new Gallery widget (sidebar block) to show albums anywhere throughout the Community Suite has been added as well.

    Album overview page
    Going along with these changes, we've improved how groups of images that are submitted to an album are handled in searches. If you submit multiple images to an album, you will only see the album listed in activity streams, and similarly if you follow a bunch of images in an album these are grouped as well, making activity streams more useful and easier to follow.

    Activity streams have been updated as well
    The changes to albums and image submissions will simplify your users' interaction with Gallery in 4.2, and make submitting images and new albums, and working with those albums more useful and robust.
  40. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from stepy for a blog entry, New: Gallery improvements   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release
    We are happy to introduce several changes to our Gallery application to both refine the existing capabilities and to introduce new useful functionality; particularly for Albums.
    We have clarified how to submit images directly to a category on the first step of the upload form in Gallery.

    Clarification for submitting directly to a category
    When submitting images to the Gallery, a simple "Add more images" button has been added to the wizard. While it has always been possible to add more images by dragging and dropping them on to the upload area, or by clicking the "Choose files" button again, the addition of this button should help add some clarity for users who overlooked these capabilities.

    A new "Add more images" button makes adding additional images easier
    Applying the same details to all of the images you are submitting has been made much simpler. When you begin entering the details for the first image, you can specify a template to use for the caption name leveraging a special replacement "%n". A small help icon next to the caption field label explains how to use this capability. When you are done supplying the details, you can click "Copy details to all images" and your submission will start instantly, using all of the details supplied for the image you are editing. You can quickly set tags, an image description and a caption name template (for instance "Aquarium %n") to all images using this new capability, useful when submitting 50+ images at once. Of course, you can still supply the details for each individual image as well, if you wish.

    Submitting a lot of images at once has been made easier
    In addition to improvements for submitting images, albums have been updated to include many new features, including:
    Commenting Reviews Reactions Messages Featuring Hiding Locking Reporting Searching A new Gallery widget (sidebar block) to show albums anywhere throughout the Community Suite has been added as well.

    Album overview page
    Going along with these changes, we've improved how groups of images that are submitted to an album are handled in searches. If you submit multiple images to an album, you will only see the album listed in activity streams, and similarly if you follow a bunch of images in an album these are grouped as well, making activity streams more useful and easier to follow.

    Activity streams have been updated as well
    The changes to albums and image submissions will simplify your users' interaction with Gallery in 4.2, and make submitting images and new albums, and working with those albums more useful and robust.
  41. Haha
    bfarber got a reaction from ايمن for a blog entry, New: Gallery improvements   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release
    We are happy to introduce several changes to our Gallery application to both refine the existing capabilities and to introduce new useful functionality; particularly for Albums.
    We have clarified how to submit images directly to a category on the first step of the upload form in Gallery.

    Clarification for submitting directly to a category
    When submitting images to the Gallery, a simple "Add more images" button has been added to the wizard. While it has always been possible to add more images by dragging and dropping them on to the upload area, or by clicking the "Choose files" button again, the addition of this button should help add some clarity for users who overlooked these capabilities.

    A new "Add more images" button makes adding additional images easier
    Applying the same details to all of the images you are submitting has been made much simpler. When you begin entering the details for the first image, you can specify a template to use for the caption name leveraging a special replacement "%n". A small help icon next to the caption field label explains how to use this capability. When you are done supplying the details, you can click "Copy details to all images" and your submission will start instantly, using all of the details supplied for the image you are editing. You can quickly set tags, an image description and a caption name template (for instance "Aquarium %n") to all images using this new capability, useful when submitting 50+ images at once. Of course, you can still supply the details for each individual image as well, if you wish.

    Submitting a lot of images at once has been made easier
    In addition to improvements for submitting images, albums have been updated to include many new features, including:
    Commenting Reviews Reactions Messages Featuring Hiding Locking Reporting Searching A new Gallery widget (sidebar block) to show albums anywhere throughout the Community Suite has been added as well.

    Album overview page
    Going along with these changes, we've improved how groups of images that are submitted to an album are handled in searches. If you submit multiple images to an album, you will only see the album listed in activity streams, and similarly if you follow a bunch of images in an album these are grouped as well, making activity streams more useful and easier to follow.

    Activity streams have been updated as well
    The changes to albums and image submissions will simplify your users' interaction with Gallery in 4.2, and make submitting images and new albums, and working with those albums more useful and robust.
  42. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from The Old Man for a blog entry, New: Group promotion improvements   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release.
    The ability to automatically promote users from one group to another based on set parameters has been a staple of community software for some time. Traditionally, the most common determination of promotion has been post count. Additionally, the 4.x Community Suite supports promoting members automatically based on the time elapsed since the user joined the site and based on their total reputation count.
    With 4.2, we have completely overhauled and enhanced the group promotion feature bringing many new options to administrators looking to promote members through different group levels.
    To start with, the group promotion options have been removed from the groups configuration pages into their own area.

    Group promotion rules overview page
    You will notice that rules are no longer strictly tied to a single group, and that rules can be sorted however you desire. When you create and edit rules, you can choose which groups the rule applies to, what parameters the user needs to meet in order for the rule to be activated, and then finally, which primary and secondary groups the user will be moved in to. You can also configure the rule to remove specified secondary groups, which can be useful if one rule adds a secondary group for users, and then the next rule should change them to be part of a different secondary group (i.e. add a new secondary group, but also remove the previously awarded secondary group).
    The system uses the same member filters available when configuring bulk mail, and we have made some updates to the member filters area (and have introduced some new filters) in this release as well. For example, you can create a rule that only applies to members who have won the daily leaderboard at least once, or members who have created a blog.

    Some of the group promotion filters, which are also available when sending bulk mails
    Any time a member account is updated for any reason (a new visit, editing the member, the member makes a new post, etc.), the software will loop through all configured rules and the last rule in the list that matches the member will be applied. This approach allows you to create promotion levels, for instance when a member reaches 100 posted content items they will be promoted to a new group, and when they reach 1000 posted content items they will be promoted to yet a different new group.
    Groups can be wholly excluded from any promotion rules, which is useful when you have administrator and/or moderator groups and you want to ensure that they are never moved to a different group. These groups will be disabled from selection when configuring group promotion rules, and these groups will be ignored if "any group" is selected for a promotion rule.
    Finally, if a user is moved to a new primary group by Commerce because they have purchased a product which moves them to a new group, they will also be excluded from group promotion rules (however, Commerce purchases that only adjust secondary groups will not exclude users from being checked by group promotion rules).
     
    Developer note: You can add your own filters for group promotion rules (and bulk mails) by adding MemberFilter extensions in 4.2, available in the Developer Center for your application.
  43. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from Tomasz Nowak_59903 for a blog entry, New: Group promotion improvements   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release.
    The ability to automatically promote users from one group to another based on set parameters has been a staple of community software for some time. Traditionally, the most common determination of promotion has been post count. Additionally, the 4.x Community Suite supports promoting members automatically based on the time elapsed since the user joined the site and based on their total reputation count.
    With 4.2, we have completely overhauled and enhanced the group promotion feature bringing many new options to administrators looking to promote members through different group levels.
    To start with, the group promotion options have been removed from the groups configuration pages into their own area.

    Group promotion rules overview page
    You will notice that rules are no longer strictly tied to a single group, and that rules can be sorted however you desire. When you create and edit rules, you can choose which groups the rule applies to, what parameters the user needs to meet in order for the rule to be activated, and then finally, which primary and secondary groups the user will be moved in to. You can also configure the rule to remove specified secondary groups, which can be useful if one rule adds a secondary group for users, and then the next rule should change them to be part of a different secondary group (i.e. add a new secondary group, but also remove the previously awarded secondary group).
    The system uses the same member filters available when configuring bulk mail, and we have made some updates to the member filters area (and have introduced some new filters) in this release as well. For example, you can create a rule that only applies to members who have won the daily leaderboard at least once, or members who have created a blog.

    Some of the group promotion filters, which are also available when sending bulk mails
    Any time a member account is updated for any reason (a new visit, editing the member, the member makes a new post, etc.), the software will loop through all configured rules and the last rule in the list that matches the member will be applied. This approach allows you to create promotion levels, for instance when a member reaches 100 posted content items they will be promoted to a new group, and when they reach 1000 posted content items they will be promoted to yet a different new group.
    Groups can be wholly excluded from any promotion rules, which is useful when you have administrator and/or moderator groups and you want to ensure that they are never moved to a different group. These groups will be disabled from selection when configuring group promotion rules, and these groups will be ignored if "any group" is selected for a promotion rule.
    Finally, if a user is moved to a new primary group by Commerce because they have purchased a product which moves them to a new group, they will also be excluded from group promotion rules (however, Commerce purchases that only adjust secondary groups will not exclude users from being checked by group promotion rules).
     
    Developer note: You can add your own filters for group promotion rules (and bulk mails) by adding MemberFilter extensions in 4.2, available in the Developer Center for your application.
  44. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from piotr1970 for a blog entry, New: Group promotion improvements   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release.
    The ability to automatically promote users from one group to another based on set parameters has been a staple of community software for some time. Traditionally, the most common determination of promotion has been post count. Additionally, the 4.x Community Suite supports promoting members automatically based on the time elapsed since the user joined the site and based on their total reputation count.
    With 4.2, we have completely overhauled and enhanced the group promotion feature bringing many new options to administrators looking to promote members through different group levels.
    To start with, the group promotion options have been removed from the groups configuration pages into their own area.

    Group promotion rules overview page
    You will notice that rules are no longer strictly tied to a single group, and that rules can be sorted however you desire. When you create and edit rules, you can choose which groups the rule applies to, what parameters the user needs to meet in order for the rule to be activated, and then finally, which primary and secondary groups the user will be moved in to. You can also configure the rule to remove specified secondary groups, which can be useful if one rule adds a secondary group for users, and then the next rule should change them to be part of a different secondary group (i.e. add a new secondary group, but also remove the previously awarded secondary group).
    The system uses the same member filters available when configuring bulk mail, and we have made some updates to the member filters area (and have introduced some new filters) in this release as well. For example, you can create a rule that only applies to members who have won the daily leaderboard at least once, or members who have created a blog.

    Some of the group promotion filters, which are also available when sending bulk mails
    Any time a member account is updated for any reason (a new visit, editing the member, the member makes a new post, etc.), the software will loop through all configured rules and the last rule in the list that matches the member will be applied. This approach allows you to create promotion levels, for instance when a member reaches 100 posted content items they will be promoted to a new group, and when they reach 1000 posted content items they will be promoted to yet a different new group.
    Groups can be wholly excluded from any promotion rules, which is useful when you have administrator and/or moderator groups and you want to ensure that they are never moved to a different group. These groups will be disabled from selection when configuring group promotion rules, and these groups will be ignored if "any group" is selected for a promotion rule.
    Finally, if a user is moved to a new primary group by Commerce because they have purchased a product which moves them to a new group, they will also be excluded from group promotion rules (however, Commerce purchases that only adjust secondary groups will not exclude users from being checked by group promotion rules).
     
    Developer note: You can add your own filters for group promotion rules (and bulk mails) by adding MemberFilter extensions in 4.2, available in the Developer Center for your application.
  45. Like
    bfarber reacted to Rikki for a blog entry, New: Richer Embeds   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release.
    You are probably already familiar with our content embedding feature in IPS Community Suite. When a link to content in the community is pasted into the editor (e.g. a topic, or a post, or a gallery image, etc.) it is automatically expanded into a preview of the content, usually with an accompanying image, allowing users to click through to that content if they are interested.

    An embedded Gallery image in IPS Community Suite 4.1
    While it has proved a useful feature to members, each embed used essentially the same structure - a small thumbnail on the left, a title, and a few lines of text. This works fine for topics, but isn't ideal for other kinds of rich content that might be posted.
    In IPS Community Suite 4.2, we greatly improved upon our embedding handling, giving every type of content within every application its own customized embed style, allowing that content to be displayed however works best. This means larger high-res previews of Gallery images, a button to download a file right from the embed for Downloads files, showing a map for Calendar events, and so on. We worked to keep a consistent overall style between apps, but allow each to display its own relevant information.
    For users, things will work exactly as they do now - they simply paste a link to content, and it will continue to expand automatically. The changes are also backwards compatible. Any existing embeds in your community will automatically show the new styling you see below - no rebuilding necessary.
    So with that in mind, let's take a look what the new embeds look like! I won't show every single embed here because there's a huge number, but I'll try and give you a feel for how we approached the embed styles for each app.

    Gallery Image

    Comment on a Gallery Image

    Gallery Album

    Forum Topic

    Downloads File

    Review on a Downloads File

    Calendar Event

    Comment on a Calendar Event

    Commerce Product

    Record from a Pages database
    I hope that gives you a good overview of what to expect when your users try out the new embeds for themselves. As always, please share your feedback in the comments below!
     
  46. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from Sonya* for a blog entry, New: Group promotion improvements   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release.
    The ability to automatically promote users from one group to another based on set parameters has been a staple of community software for some time. Traditionally, the most common determination of promotion has been post count. Additionally, the 4.x Community Suite supports promoting members automatically based on the time elapsed since the user joined the site and based on their total reputation count.
    With 4.2, we have completely overhauled and enhanced the group promotion feature bringing many new options to administrators looking to promote members through different group levels.
    To start with, the group promotion options have been removed from the groups configuration pages into their own area.

    Group promotion rules overview page
    You will notice that rules are no longer strictly tied to a single group, and that rules can be sorted however you desire. When you create and edit rules, you can choose which groups the rule applies to, what parameters the user needs to meet in order for the rule to be activated, and then finally, which primary and secondary groups the user will be moved in to. You can also configure the rule to remove specified secondary groups, which can be useful if one rule adds a secondary group for users, and then the next rule should change them to be part of a different secondary group (i.e. add a new secondary group, but also remove the previously awarded secondary group).
    The system uses the same member filters available when configuring bulk mail, and we have made some updates to the member filters area (and have introduced some new filters) in this release as well. For example, you can create a rule that only applies to members who have won the daily leaderboard at least once, or members who have created a blog.

    Some of the group promotion filters, which are also available when sending bulk mails
    Any time a member account is updated for any reason (a new visit, editing the member, the member makes a new post, etc.), the software will loop through all configured rules and the last rule in the list that matches the member will be applied. This approach allows you to create promotion levels, for instance when a member reaches 100 posted content items they will be promoted to a new group, and when they reach 1000 posted content items they will be promoted to yet a different new group.
    Groups can be wholly excluded from any promotion rules, which is useful when you have administrator and/or moderator groups and you want to ensure that they are never moved to a different group. These groups will be disabled from selection when configuring group promotion rules, and these groups will be ignored if "any group" is selected for a promotion rule.
    Finally, if a user is moved to a new primary group by Commerce because they have purchased a product which moves them to a new group, they will also be excluded from group promotion rules (however, Commerce purchases that only adjust secondary groups will not exclude users from being checked by group promotion rules).
     
    Developer note: You can add your own filters for group promotion rules (and bulk mails) by adding MemberFilter extensions in 4.2, available in the Developer Center for your application.
  47. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from WAQAS DAR for a blog entry, New: Group promotion improvements   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release.
    The ability to automatically promote users from one group to another based on set parameters has been a staple of community software for some time. Traditionally, the most common determination of promotion has been post count. Additionally, the 4.x Community Suite supports promoting members automatically based on the time elapsed since the user joined the site and based on their total reputation count.
    With 4.2, we have completely overhauled and enhanced the group promotion feature bringing many new options to administrators looking to promote members through different group levels.
    To start with, the group promotion options have been removed from the groups configuration pages into their own area.

    Group promotion rules overview page
    You will notice that rules are no longer strictly tied to a single group, and that rules can be sorted however you desire. When you create and edit rules, you can choose which groups the rule applies to, what parameters the user needs to meet in order for the rule to be activated, and then finally, which primary and secondary groups the user will be moved in to. You can also configure the rule to remove specified secondary groups, which can be useful if one rule adds a secondary group for users, and then the next rule should change them to be part of a different secondary group (i.e. add a new secondary group, but also remove the previously awarded secondary group).
    The system uses the same member filters available when configuring bulk mail, and we have made some updates to the member filters area (and have introduced some new filters) in this release as well. For example, you can create a rule that only applies to members who have won the daily leaderboard at least once, or members who have created a blog.

    Some of the group promotion filters, which are also available when sending bulk mails
    Any time a member account is updated for any reason (a new visit, editing the member, the member makes a new post, etc.), the software will loop through all configured rules and the last rule in the list that matches the member will be applied. This approach allows you to create promotion levels, for instance when a member reaches 100 posted content items they will be promoted to a new group, and when they reach 1000 posted content items they will be promoted to yet a different new group.
    Groups can be wholly excluded from any promotion rules, which is useful when you have administrator and/or moderator groups and you want to ensure that they are never moved to a different group. These groups will be disabled from selection when configuring group promotion rules, and these groups will be ignored if "any group" is selected for a promotion rule.
    Finally, if a user is moved to a new primary group by Commerce because they have purchased a product which moves them to a new group, they will also be excluded from group promotion rules (however, Commerce purchases that only adjust secondary groups will not exclude users from being checked by group promotion rules).
     
    Developer note: You can add your own filters for group promotion rules (and bulk mails) by adding MemberFilter extensions in 4.2, available in the Developer Center for your application.
  48. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from BN_IT_Support for a blog entry, New: Group promotion improvements   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release.
    The ability to automatically promote users from one group to another based on set parameters has been a staple of community software for some time. Traditionally, the most common determination of promotion has been post count. Additionally, the 4.x Community Suite supports promoting members automatically based on the time elapsed since the user joined the site and based on their total reputation count.
    With 4.2, we have completely overhauled and enhanced the group promotion feature bringing many new options to administrators looking to promote members through different group levels.
    To start with, the group promotion options have been removed from the groups configuration pages into their own area.

    Group promotion rules overview page
    You will notice that rules are no longer strictly tied to a single group, and that rules can be sorted however you desire. When you create and edit rules, you can choose which groups the rule applies to, what parameters the user needs to meet in order for the rule to be activated, and then finally, which primary and secondary groups the user will be moved in to. You can also configure the rule to remove specified secondary groups, which can be useful if one rule adds a secondary group for users, and then the next rule should change them to be part of a different secondary group (i.e. add a new secondary group, but also remove the previously awarded secondary group).
    The system uses the same member filters available when configuring bulk mail, and we have made some updates to the member filters area (and have introduced some new filters) in this release as well. For example, you can create a rule that only applies to members who have won the daily leaderboard at least once, or members who have created a blog.

    Some of the group promotion filters, which are also available when sending bulk mails
    Any time a member account is updated for any reason (a new visit, editing the member, the member makes a new post, etc.), the software will loop through all configured rules and the last rule in the list that matches the member will be applied. This approach allows you to create promotion levels, for instance when a member reaches 100 posted content items they will be promoted to a new group, and when they reach 1000 posted content items they will be promoted to yet a different new group.
    Groups can be wholly excluded from any promotion rules, which is useful when you have administrator and/or moderator groups and you want to ensure that they are never moved to a different group. These groups will be disabled from selection when configuring group promotion rules, and these groups will be ignored if "any group" is selected for a promotion rule.
    Finally, if a user is moved to a new primary group by Commerce because they have purchased a product which moves them to a new group, they will also be excluded from group promotion rules (however, Commerce purchases that only adjust secondary groups will not exclude users from being checked by group promotion rules).
     
    Developer note: You can add your own filters for group promotion rules (and bulk mails) by adding MemberFilter extensions in 4.2, available in the Developer Center for your application.
  49. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from sobrenome for a blog entry, New: Group promotion improvements   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release.
    The ability to automatically promote users from one group to another based on set parameters has been a staple of community software for some time. Traditionally, the most common determination of promotion has been post count. Additionally, the 4.x Community Suite supports promoting members automatically based on the time elapsed since the user joined the site and based on their total reputation count.
    With 4.2, we have completely overhauled and enhanced the group promotion feature bringing many new options to administrators looking to promote members through different group levels.
    To start with, the group promotion options have been removed from the groups configuration pages into their own area.

    Group promotion rules overview page
    You will notice that rules are no longer strictly tied to a single group, and that rules can be sorted however you desire. When you create and edit rules, you can choose which groups the rule applies to, what parameters the user needs to meet in order for the rule to be activated, and then finally, which primary and secondary groups the user will be moved in to. You can also configure the rule to remove specified secondary groups, which can be useful if one rule adds a secondary group for users, and then the next rule should change them to be part of a different secondary group (i.e. add a new secondary group, but also remove the previously awarded secondary group).
    The system uses the same member filters available when configuring bulk mail, and we have made some updates to the member filters area (and have introduced some new filters) in this release as well. For example, you can create a rule that only applies to members who have won the daily leaderboard at least once, or members who have created a blog.

    Some of the group promotion filters, which are also available when sending bulk mails
    Any time a member account is updated for any reason (a new visit, editing the member, the member makes a new post, etc.), the software will loop through all configured rules and the last rule in the list that matches the member will be applied. This approach allows you to create promotion levels, for instance when a member reaches 100 posted content items they will be promoted to a new group, and when they reach 1000 posted content items they will be promoted to yet a different new group.
    Groups can be wholly excluded from any promotion rules, which is useful when you have administrator and/or moderator groups and you want to ensure that they are never moved to a different group. These groups will be disabled from selection when configuring group promotion rules, and these groups will be ignored if "any group" is selected for a promotion rule.
    Finally, if a user is moved to a new primary group by Commerce because they have purchased a product which moves them to a new group, they will also be excluded from group promotion rules (however, Commerce purchases that only adjust secondary groups will not exclude users from being checked by group promotion rules).
     
    Developer note: You can add your own filters for group promotion rules (and bulk mails) by adding MemberFilter extensions in 4.2, available in the Developer Center for your application.
  50. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from Ilya Hoilik for a blog entry, New: Group promotion improvements   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release.
    The ability to automatically promote users from one group to another based on set parameters has been a staple of community software for some time. Traditionally, the most common determination of promotion has been post count. Additionally, the 4.x Community Suite supports promoting members automatically based on the time elapsed since the user joined the site and based on their total reputation count.
    With 4.2, we have completely overhauled and enhanced the group promotion feature bringing many new options to administrators looking to promote members through different group levels.
    To start with, the group promotion options have been removed from the groups configuration pages into their own area.

    Group promotion rules overview page
    You will notice that rules are no longer strictly tied to a single group, and that rules can be sorted however you desire. When you create and edit rules, you can choose which groups the rule applies to, what parameters the user needs to meet in order for the rule to be activated, and then finally, which primary and secondary groups the user will be moved in to. You can also configure the rule to remove specified secondary groups, which can be useful if one rule adds a secondary group for users, and then the next rule should change them to be part of a different secondary group (i.e. add a new secondary group, but also remove the previously awarded secondary group).
    The system uses the same member filters available when configuring bulk mail, and we have made some updates to the member filters area (and have introduced some new filters) in this release as well. For example, you can create a rule that only applies to members who have won the daily leaderboard at least once, or members who have created a blog.

    Some of the group promotion filters, which are also available when sending bulk mails
    Any time a member account is updated for any reason (a new visit, editing the member, the member makes a new post, etc.), the software will loop through all configured rules and the last rule in the list that matches the member will be applied. This approach allows you to create promotion levels, for instance when a member reaches 100 posted content items they will be promoted to a new group, and when they reach 1000 posted content items they will be promoted to yet a different new group.
    Groups can be wholly excluded from any promotion rules, which is useful when you have administrator and/or moderator groups and you want to ensure that they are never moved to a different group. These groups will be disabled from selection when configuring group promotion rules, and these groups will be ignored if "any group" is selected for a promotion rule.
    Finally, if a user is moved to a new primary group by Commerce because they have purchased a product which moves them to a new group, they will also be excluded from group promotion rules (however, Commerce purchases that only adjust secondary groups will not exclude users from being checked by group promotion rules).
     
    Developer note: You can add your own filters for group promotion rules (and bulk mails) by adding MemberFilter extensions in 4.2, available in the Developer Center for your application.
  51. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from Daddy for a blog entry, New: Group promotion improvements   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release.
    The ability to automatically promote users from one group to another based on set parameters has been a staple of community software for some time. Traditionally, the most common determination of promotion has been post count. Additionally, the 4.x Community Suite supports promoting members automatically based on the time elapsed since the user joined the site and based on their total reputation count.
    With 4.2, we have completely overhauled and enhanced the group promotion feature bringing many new options to administrators looking to promote members through different group levels.
    To start with, the group promotion options have been removed from the groups configuration pages into their own area.

    Group promotion rules overview page
    You will notice that rules are no longer strictly tied to a single group, and that rules can be sorted however you desire. When you create and edit rules, you can choose which groups the rule applies to, what parameters the user needs to meet in order for the rule to be activated, and then finally, which primary and secondary groups the user will be moved in to. You can also configure the rule to remove specified secondary groups, which can be useful if one rule adds a secondary group for users, and then the next rule should change them to be part of a different secondary group (i.e. add a new secondary group, but also remove the previously awarded secondary group).
    The system uses the same member filters available when configuring bulk mail, and we have made some updates to the member filters area (and have introduced some new filters) in this release as well. For example, you can create a rule that only applies to members who have won the daily leaderboard at least once, or members who have created a blog.

    Some of the group promotion filters, which are also available when sending bulk mails
    Any time a member account is updated for any reason (a new visit, editing the member, the member makes a new post, etc.), the software will loop through all configured rules and the last rule in the list that matches the member will be applied. This approach allows you to create promotion levels, for instance when a member reaches 100 posted content items they will be promoted to a new group, and when they reach 1000 posted content items they will be promoted to yet a different new group.
    Groups can be wholly excluded from any promotion rules, which is useful when you have administrator and/or moderator groups and you want to ensure that they are never moved to a different group. These groups will be disabled from selection when configuring group promotion rules, and these groups will be ignored if "any group" is selected for a promotion rule.
    Finally, if a user is moved to a new primary group by Commerce because they have purchased a product which moves them to a new group, they will also be excluded from group promotion rules (however, Commerce purchases that only adjust secondary groups will not exclude users from being checked by group promotion rules).
     
    Developer note: You can add your own filters for group promotion rules (and bulk mails) by adding MemberFilter extensions in 4.2, available in the Developer Center for your application.
  52. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from LiquidFractal for a blog entry, New: Group promotion improvements   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release.
    The ability to automatically promote users from one group to another based on set parameters has been a staple of community software for some time. Traditionally, the most common determination of promotion has been post count. Additionally, the 4.x Community Suite supports promoting members automatically based on the time elapsed since the user joined the site and based on their total reputation count.
    With 4.2, we have completely overhauled and enhanced the group promotion feature bringing many new options to administrators looking to promote members through different group levels.
    To start with, the group promotion options have been removed from the groups configuration pages into their own area.

    Group promotion rules overview page
    You will notice that rules are no longer strictly tied to a single group, and that rules can be sorted however you desire. When you create and edit rules, you can choose which groups the rule applies to, what parameters the user needs to meet in order for the rule to be activated, and then finally, which primary and secondary groups the user will be moved in to. You can also configure the rule to remove specified secondary groups, which can be useful if one rule adds a secondary group for users, and then the next rule should change them to be part of a different secondary group (i.e. add a new secondary group, but also remove the previously awarded secondary group).
    The system uses the same member filters available when configuring bulk mail, and we have made some updates to the member filters area (and have introduced some new filters) in this release as well. For example, you can create a rule that only applies to members who have won the daily leaderboard at least once, or members who have created a blog.

    Some of the group promotion filters, which are also available when sending bulk mails
    Any time a member account is updated for any reason (a new visit, editing the member, the member makes a new post, etc.), the software will loop through all configured rules and the last rule in the list that matches the member will be applied. This approach allows you to create promotion levels, for instance when a member reaches 100 posted content items they will be promoted to a new group, and when they reach 1000 posted content items they will be promoted to yet a different new group.
    Groups can be wholly excluded from any promotion rules, which is useful when you have administrator and/or moderator groups and you want to ensure that they are never moved to a different group. These groups will be disabled from selection when configuring group promotion rules, and these groups will be ignored if "any group" is selected for a promotion rule.
    Finally, if a user is moved to a new primary group by Commerce because they have purchased a product which moves them to a new group, they will also be excluded from group promotion rules (however, Commerce purchases that only adjust secondary groups will not exclude users from being checked by group promotion rules).
     
    Developer note: You can add your own filters for group promotion rules (and bulk mails) by adding MemberFilter extensions in 4.2, available in the Developer Center for your application.
  53. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from Core4D for a blog entry, New: Group promotion improvements   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release.
    The ability to automatically promote users from one group to another based on set parameters has been a staple of community software for some time. Traditionally, the most common determination of promotion has been post count. Additionally, the 4.x Community Suite supports promoting members automatically based on the time elapsed since the user joined the site and based on their total reputation count.
    With 4.2, we have completely overhauled and enhanced the group promotion feature bringing many new options to administrators looking to promote members through different group levels.
    To start with, the group promotion options have been removed from the groups configuration pages into their own area.

    Group promotion rules overview page
    You will notice that rules are no longer strictly tied to a single group, and that rules can be sorted however you desire. When you create and edit rules, you can choose which groups the rule applies to, what parameters the user needs to meet in order for the rule to be activated, and then finally, which primary and secondary groups the user will be moved in to. You can also configure the rule to remove specified secondary groups, which can be useful if one rule adds a secondary group for users, and then the next rule should change them to be part of a different secondary group (i.e. add a new secondary group, but also remove the previously awarded secondary group).
    The system uses the same member filters available when configuring bulk mail, and we have made some updates to the member filters area (and have introduced some new filters) in this release as well. For example, you can create a rule that only applies to members who have won the daily leaderboard at least once, or members who have created a blog.

    Some of the group promotion filters, which are also available when sending bulk mails
    Any time a member account is updated for any reason (a new visit, editing the member, the member makes a new post, etc.), the software will loop through all configured rules and the last rule in the list that matches the member will be applied. This approach allows you to create promotion levels, for instance when a member reaches 100 posted content items they will be promoted to a new group, and when they reach 1000 posted content items they will be promoted to yet a different new group.
    Groups can be wholly excluded from any promotion rules, which is useful when you have administrator and/or moderator groups and you want to ensure that they are never moved to a different group. These groups will be disabled from selection when configuring group promotion rules, and these groups will be ignored if "any group" is selected for a promotion rule.
    Finally, if a user is moved to a new primary group by Commerce because they have purchased a product which moves them to a new group, they will also be excluded from group promotion rules (however, Commerce purchases that only adjust secondary groups will not exclude users from being checked by group promotion rules).
     
    Developer note: You can add your own filters for group promotion rules (and bulk mails) by adding MemberFilter extensions in 4.2, available in the Developer Center for your application.
  54. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from openfire for a blog entry, New: Group promotion improvements   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release.
    The ability to automatically promote users from one group to another based on set parameters has been a staple of community software for some time. Traditionally, the most common determination of promotion has been post count. Additionally, the 4.x Community Suite supports promoting members automatically based on the time elapsed since the user joined the site and based on their total reputation count.
    With 4.2, we have completely overhauled and enhanced the group promotion feature bringing many new options to administrators looking to promote members through different group levels.
    To start with, the group promotion options have been removed from the groups configuration pages into their own area.

    Group promotion rules overview page
    You will notice that rules are no longer strictly tied to a single group, and that rules can be sorted however you desire. When you create and edit rules, you can choose which groups the rule applies to, what parameters the user needs to meet in order for the rule to be activated, and then finally, which primary and secondary groups the user will be moved in to. You can also configure the rule to remove specified secondary groups, which can be useful if one rule adds a secondary group for users, and then the next rule should change them to be part of a different secondary group (i.e. add a new secondary group, but also remove the previously awarded secondary group).
    The system uses the same member filters available when configuring bulk mail, and we have made some updates to the member filters area (and have introduced some new filters) in this release as well. For example, you can create a rule that only applies to members who have won the daily leaderboard at least once, or members who have created a blog.

    Some of the group promotion filters, which are also available when sending bulk mails
    Any time a member account is updated for any reason (a new visit, editing the member, the member makes a new post, etc.), the software will loop through all configured rules and the last rule in the list that matches the member will be applied. This approach allows you to create promotion levels, for instance when a member reaches 100 posted content items they will be promoted to a new group, and when they reach 1000 posted content items they will be promoted to yet a different new group.
    Groups can be wholly excluded from any promotion rules, which is useful when you have administrator and/or moderator groups and you want to ensure that they are never moved to a different group. These groups will be disabled from selection when configuring group promotion rules, and these groups will be ignored if "any group" is selected for a promotion rule.
    Finally, if a user is moved to a new primary group by Commerce because they have purchased a product which moves them to a new group, they will also be excluded from group promotion rules (however, Commerce purchases that only adjust secondary groups will not exclude users from being checked by group promotion rules).
     
    Developer note: You can add your own filters for group promotion rules (and bulk mails) by adding MemberFilter extensions in 4.2, available in the Developer Center for your application.
  55. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from Simon Woods for a blog entry, New: Group promotion improvements   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release.
    The ability to automatically promote users from one group to another based on set parameters has been a staple of community software for some time. Traditionally, the most common determination of promotion has been post count. Additionally, the 4.x Community Suite supports promoting members automatically based on the time elapsed since the user joined the site and based on their total reputation count.
    With 4.2, we have completely overhauled and enhanced the group promotion feature bringing many new options to administrators looking to promote members through different group levels.
    To start with, the group promotion options have been removed from the groups configuration pages into their own area.

    Group promotion rules overview page
    You will notice that rules are no longer strictly tied to a single group, and that rules can be sorted however you desire. When you create and edit rules, you can choose which groups the rule applies to, what parameters the user needs to meet in order for the rule to be activated, and then finally, which primary and secondary groups the user will be moved in to. You can also configure the rule to remove specified secondary groups, which can be useful if one rule adds a secondary group for users, and then the next rule should change them to be part of a different secondary group (i.e. add a new secondary group, but also remove the previously awarded secondary group).
    The system uses the same member filters available when configuring bulk mail, and we have made some updates to the member filters area (and have introduced some new filters) in this release as well. For example, you can create a rule that only applies to members who have won the daily leaderboard at least once, or members who have created a blog.

    Some of the group promotion filters, which are also available when sending bulk mails
    Any time a member account is updated for any reason (a new visit, editing the member, the member makes a new post, etc.), the software will loop through all configured rules and the last rule in the list that matches the member will be applied. This approach allows you to create promotion levels, for instance when a member reaches 100 posted content items they will be promoted to a new group, and when they reach 1000 posted content items they will be promoted to yet a different new group.
    Groups can be wholly excluded from any promotion rules, which is useful when you have administrator and/or moderator groups and you want to ensure that they are never moved to a different group. These groups will be disabled from selection when configuring group promotion rules, and these groups will be ignored if "any group" is selected for a promotion rule.
    Finally, if a user is moved to a new primary group by Commerce because they have purchased a product which moves them to a new group, they will also be excluded from group promotion rules (however, Commerce purchases that only adjust secondary groups will not exclude users from being checked by group promotion rules).
     
    Developer note: You can add your own filters for group promotion rules (and bulk mails) by adding MemberFilter extensions in 4.2, available in the Developer Center for your application.
  56. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from IPB3 for a blog entry, New: Group promotion improvements   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release.
    The ability to automatically promote users from one group to another based on set parameters has been a staple of community software for some time. Traditionally, the most common determination of promotion has been post count. Additionally, the 4.x Community Suite supports promoting members automatically based on the time elapsed since the user joined the site and based on their total reputation count.
    With 4.2, we have completely overhauled and enhanced the group promotion feature bringing many new options to administrators looking to promote members through different group levels.
    To start with, the group promotion options have been removed from the groups configuration pages into their own area.

    Group promotion rules overview page
    You will notice that rules are no longer strictly tied to a single group, and that rules can be sorted however you desire. When you create and edit rules, you can choose which groups the rule applies to, what parameters the user needs to meet in order for the rule to be activated, and then finally, which primary and secondary groups the user will be moved in to. You can also configure the rule to remove specified secondary groups, which can be useful if one rule adds a secondary group for users, and then the next rule should change them to be part of a different secondary group (i.e. add a new secondary group, but also remove the previously awarded secondary group).
    The system uses the same member filters available when configuring bulk mail, and we have made some updates to the member filters area (and have introduced some new filters) in this release as well. For example, you can create a rule that only applies to members who have won the daily leaderboard at least once, or members who have created a blog.

    Some of the group promotion filters, which are also available when sending bulk mails
    Any time a member account is updated for any reason (a new visit, editing the member, the member makes a new post, etc.), the software will loop through all configured rules and the last rule in the list that matches the member will be applied. This approach allows you to create promotion levels, for instance when a member reaches 100 posted content items they will be promoted to a new group, and when they reach 1000 posted content items they will be promoted to yet a different new group.
    Groups can be wholly excluded from any promotion rules, which is useful when you have administrator and/or moderator groups and you want to ensure that they are never moved to a different group. These groups will be disabled from selection when configuring group promotion rules, and these groups will be ignored if "any group" is selected for a promotion rule.
    Finally, if a user is moved to a new primary group by Commerce because they have purchased a product which moves them to a new group, they will also be excluded from group promotion rules (however, Commerce purchases that only adjust secondary groups will not exclude users from being checked by group promotion rules).
     
    Developer note: You can add your own filters for group promotion rules (and bulk mails) by adding MemberFilter extensions in 4.2, available in the Developer Center for your application.
  57. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from Thomas. for a blog entry, New: Group promotion improvements   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release.
    The ability to automatically promote users from one group to another based on set parameters has been a staple of community software for some time. Traditionally, the most common determination of promotion has been post count. Additionally, the 4.x Community Suite supports promoting members automatically based on the time elapsed since the user joined the site and based on their total reputation count.
    With 4.2, we have completely overhauled and enhanced the group promotion feature bringing many new options to administrators looking to promote members through different group levels.
    To start with, the group promotion options have been removed from the groups configuration pages into their own area.

    Group promotion rules overview page
    You will notice that rules are no longer strictly tied to a single group, and that rules can be sorted however you desire. When you create and edit rules, you can choose which groups the rule applies to, what parameters the user needs to meet in order for the rule to be activated, and then finally, which primary and secondary groups the user will be moved in to. You can also configure the rule to remove specified secondary groups, which can be useful if one rule adds a secondary group for users, and then the next rule should change them to be part of a different secondary group (i.e. add a new secondary group, but also remove the previously awarded secondary group).
    The system uses the same member filters available when configuring bulk mail, and we have made some updates to the member filters area (and have introduced some new filters) in this release as well. For example, you can create a rule that only applies to members who have won the daily leaderboard at least once, or members who have created a blog.

    Some of the group promotion filters, which are also available when sending bulk mails
    Any time a member account is updated for any reason (a new visit, editing the member, the member makes a new post, etc.), the software will loop through all configured rules and the last rule in the list that matches the member will be applied. This approach allows you to create promotion levels, for instance when a member reaches 100 posted content items they will be promoted to a new group, and when they reach 1000 posted content items they will be promoted to yet a different new group.
    Groups can be wholly excluded from any promotion rules, which is useful when you have administrator and/or moderator groups and you want to ensure that they are never moved to a different group. These groups will be disabled from selection when configuring group promotion rules, and these groups will be ignored if "any group" is selected for a promotion rule.
    Finally, if a user is moved to a new primary group by Commerce because they have purchased a product which moves them to a new group, they will also be excluded from group promotion rules (however, Commerce purchases that only adjust secondary groups will not exclude users from being checked by group promotion rules).
     
    Developer note: You can add your own filters for group promotion rules (and bulk mails) by adding MemberFilter extensions in 4.2, available in the Developer Center for your application.
  58. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from TAMAN for a blog entry, New: Group promotion improvements   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release.
    The ability to automatically promote users from one group to another based on set parameters has been a staple of community software for some time. Traditionally, the most common determination of promotion has been post count. Additionally, the 4.x Community Suite supports promoting members automatically based on the time elapsed since the user joined the site and based on their total reputation count.
    With 4.2, we have completely overhauled and enhanced the group promotion feature bringing many new options to administrators looking to promote members through different group levels.
    To start with, the group promotion options have been removed from the groups configuration pages into their own area.

    Group promotion rules overview page
    You will notice that rules are no longer strictly tied to a single group, and that rules can be sorted however you desire. When you create and edit rules, you can choose which groups the rule applies to, what parameters the user needs to meet in order for the rule to be activated, and then finally, which primary and secondary groups the user will be moved in to. You can also configure the rule to remove specified secondary groups, which can be useful if one rule adds a secondary group for users, and then the next rule should change them to be part of a different secondary group (i.e. add a new secondary group, but also remove the previously awarded secondary group).
    The system uses the same member filters available when configuring bulk mail, and we have made some updates to the member filters area (and have introduced some new filters) in this release as well. For example, you can create a rule that only applies to members who have won the daily leaderboard at least once, or members who have created a blog.

    Some of the group promotion filters, which are also available when sending bulk mails
    Any time a member account is updated for any reason (a new visit, editing the member, the member makes a new post, etc.), the software will loop through all configured rules and the last rule in the list that matches the member will be applied. This approach allows you to create promotion levels, for instance when a member reaches 100 posted content items they will be promoted to a new group, and when they reach 1000 posted content items they will be promoted to yet a different new group.
    Groups can be wholly excluded from any promotion rules, which is useful when you have administrator and/or moderator groups and you want to ensure that they are never moved to a different group. These groups will be disabled from selection when configuring group promotion rules, and these groups will be ignored if "any group" is selected for a promotion rule.
    Finally, if a user is moved to a new primary group by Commerce because they have purchased a product which moves them to a new group, they will also be excluded from group promotion rules (however, Commerce purchases that only adjust secondary groups will not exclude users from being checked by group promotion rules).
     
    Developer note: You can add your own filters for group promotion rules (and bulk mails) by adding MemberFilter extensions in 4.2, available in the Developer Center for your application.
  59. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from Emanoel for a blog entry, New: Group promotion improvements   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release.
    The ability to automatically promote users from one group to another based on set parameters has been a staple of community software for some time. Traditionally, the most common determination of promotion has been post count. Additionally, the 4.x Community Suite supports promoting members automatically based on the time elapsed since the user joined the site and based on their total reputation count.
    With 4.2, we have completely overhauled and enhanced the group promotion feature bringing many new options to administrators looking to promote members through different group levels.
    To start with, the group promotion options have been removed from the groups configuration pages into their own area.

    Group promotion rules overview page
    You will notice that rules are no longer strictly tied to a single group, and that rules can be sorted however you desire. When you create and edit rules, you can choose which groups the rule applies to, what parameters the user needs to meet in order for the rule to be activated, and then finally, which primary and secondary groups the user will be moved in to. You can also configure the rule to remove specified secondary groups, which can be useful if one rule adds a secondary group for users, and then the next rule should change them to be part of a different secondary group (i.e. add a new secondary group, but also remove the previously awarded secondary group).
    The system uses the same member filters available when configuring bulk mail, and we have made some updates to the member filters area (and have introduced some new filters) in this release as well. For example, you can create a rule that only applies to members who have won the daily leaderboard at least once, or members who have created a blog.

    Some of the group promotion filters, which are also available when sending bulk mails
    Any time a member account is updated for any reason (a new visit, editing the member, the member makes a new post, etc.), the software will loop through all configured rules and the last rule in the list that matches the member will be applied. This approach allows you to create promotion levels, for instance when a member reaches 100 posted content items they will be promoted to a new group, and when they reach 1000 posted content items they will be promoted to yet a different new group.
    Groups can be wholly excluded from any promotion rules, which is useful when you have administrator and/or moderator groups and you want to ensure that they are never moved to a different group. These groups will be disabled from selection when configuring group promotion rules, and these groups will be ignored if "any group" is selected for a promotion rule.
    Finally, if a user is moved to a new primary group by Commerce because they have purchased a product which moves them to a new group, they will also be excluded from group promotion rules (however, Commerce purchases that only adjust secondary groups will not exclude users from being checked by group promotion rules).
     
    Developer note: You can add your own filters for group promotion rules (and bulk mails) by adding MemberFilter extensions in 4.2, available in the Developer Center for your application.
  60. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from inkredible for a blog entry, New: Group promotion improvements   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release.
    The ability to automatically promote users from one group to another based on set parameters has been a staple of community software for some time. Traditionally, the most common determination of promotion has been post count. Additionally, the 4.x Community Suite supports promoting members automatically based on the time elapsed since the user joined the site and based on their total reputation count.
    With 4.2, we have completely overhauled and enhanced the group promotion feature bringing many new options to administrators looking to promote members through different group levels.
    To start with, the group promotion options have been removed from the groups configuration pages into their own area.

    Group promotion rules overview page
    You will notice that rules are no longer strictly tied to a single group, and that rules can be sorted however you desire. When you create and edit rules, you can choose which groups the rule applies to, what parameters the user needs to meet in order for the rule to be activated, and then finally, which primary and secondary groups the user will be moved in to. You can also configure the rule to remove specified secondary groups, which can be useful if one rule adds a secondary group for users, and then the next rule should change them to be part of a different secondary group (i.e. add a new secondary group, but also remove the previously awarded secondary group).
    The system uses the same member filters available when configuring bulk mail, and we have made some updates to the member filters area (and have introduced some new filters) in this release as well. For example, you can create a rule that only applies to members who have won the daily leaderboard at least once, or members who have created a blog.

    Some of the group promotion filters, which are also available when sending bulk mails
    Any time a member account is updated for any reason (a new visit, editing the member, the member makes a new post, etc.), the software will loop through all configured rules and the last rule in the list that matches the member will be applied. This approach allows you to create promotion levels, for instance when a member reaches 100 posted content items they will be promoted to a new group, and when they reach 1000 posted content items they will be promoted to yet a different new group.
    Groups can be wholly excluded from any promotion rules, which is useful when you have administrator and/or moderator groups and you want to ensure that they are never moved to a different group. These groups will be disabled from selection when configuring group promotion rules, and these groups will be ignored if "any group" is selected for a promotion rule.
    Finally, if a user is moved to a new primary group by Commerce because they have purchased a product which moves them to a new group, they will also be excluded from group promotion rules (however, Commerce purchases that only adjust secondary groups will not exclude users from being checked by group promotion rules).
     
    Developer note: You can add your own filters for group promotion rules (and bulk mails) by adding MemberFilter extensions in 4.2, available in the Developer Center for your application.
  61. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from BomAle for a blog entry, New: Group promotion improvements   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release.
    The ability to automatically promote users from one group to another based on set parameters has been a staple of community software for some time. Traditionally, the most common determination of promotion has been post count. Additionally, the 4.x Community Suite supports promoting members automatically based on the time elapsed since the user joined the site and based on their total reputation count.
    With 4.2, we have completely overhauled and enhanced the group promotion feature bringing many new options to administrators looking to promote members through different group levels.
    To start with, the group promotion options have been removed from the groups configuration pages into their own area.

    Group promotion rules overview page
    You will notice that rules are no longer strictly tied to a single group, and that rules can be sorted however you desire. When you create and edit rules, you can choose which groups the rule applies to, what parameters the user needs to meet in order for the rule to be activated, and then finally, which primary and secondary groups the user will be moved in to. You can also configure the rule to remove specified secondary groups, which can be useful if one rule adds a secondary group for users, and then the next rule should change them to be part of a different secondary group (i.e. add a new secondary group, but also remove the previously awarded secondary group).
    The system uses the same member filters available when configuring bulk mail, and we have made some updates to the member filters area (and have introduced some new filters) in this release as well. For example, you can create a rule that only applies to members who have won the daily leaderboard at least once, or members who have created a blog.

    Some of the group promotion filters, which are also available when sending bulk mails
    Any time a member account is updated for any reason (a new visit, editing the member, the member makes a new post, etc.), the software will loop through all configured rules and the last rule in the list that matches the member will be applied. This approach allows you to create promotion levels, for instance when a member reaches 100 posted content items they will be promoted to a new group, and when they reach 1000 posted content items they will be promoted to yet a different new group.
    Groups can be wholly excluded from any promotion rules, which is useful when you have administrator and/or moderator groups and you want to ensure that they are never moved to a different group. These groups will be disabled from selection when configuring group promotion rules, and these groups will be ignored if "any group" is selected for a promotion rule.
    Finally, if a user is moved to a new primary group by Commerce because they have purchased a product which moves them to a new group, they will also be excluded from group promotion rules (however, Commerce purchases that only adjust secondary groups will not exclude users from being checked by group promotion rules).
     
    Developer note: You can add your own filters for group promotion rules (and bulk mails) by adding MemberFilter extensions in 4.2, available in the Developer Center for your application.
  62. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from RObiN-HoOD for a blog entry, New: Group promotion improvements   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release.
    The ability to automatically promote users from one group to another based on set parameters has been a staple of community software for some time. Traditionally, the most common determination of promotion has been post count. Additionally, the 4.x Community Suite supports promoting members automatically based on the time elapsed since the user joined the site and based on their total reputation count.
    With 4.2, we have completely overhauled and enhanced the group promotion feature bringing many new options to administrators looking to promote members through different group levels.
    To start with, the group promotion options have been removed from the groups configuration pages into their own area.

    Group promotion rules overview page
    You will notice that rules are no longer strictly tied to a single group, and that rules can be sorted however you desire. When you create and edit rules, you can choose which groups the rule applies to, what parameters the user needs to meet in order for the rule to be activated, and then finally, which primary and secondary groups the user will be moved in to. You can also configure the rule to remove specified secondary groups, which can be useful if one rule adds a secondary group for users, and then the next rule should change them to be part of a different secondary group (i.e. add a new secondary group, but also remove the previously awarded secondary group).
    The system uses the same member filters available when configuring bulk mail, and we have made some updates to the member filters area (and have introduced some new filters) in this release as well. For example, you can create a rule that only applies to members who have won the daily leaderboard at least once, or members who have created a blog.

    Some of the group promotion filters, which are also available when sending bulk mails
    Any time a member account is updated for any reason (a new visit, editing the member, the member makes a new post, etc.), the software will loop through all configured rules and the last rule in the list that matches the member will be applied. This approach allows you to create promotion levels, for instance when a member reaches 100 posted content items they will be promoted to a new group, and when they reach 1000 posted content items they will be promoted to yet a different new group.
    Groups can be wholly excluded from any promotion rules, which is useful when you have administrator and/or moderator groups and you want to ensure that they are never moved to a different group. These groups will be disabled from selection when configuring group promotion rules, and these groups will be ignored if "any group" is selected for a promotion rule.
    Finally, if a user is moved to a new primary group by Commerce because they have purchased a product which moves them to a new group, they will also be excluded from group promotion rules (however, Commerce purchases that only adjust secondary groups will not exclude users from being checked by group promotion rules).
     
    Developer note: You can add your own filters for group promotion rules (and bulk mails) by adding MemberFilter extensions in 4.2, available in the Developer Center for your application.
  63. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from Cyboman for a blog entry, New: Group promotion improvements   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release.
    The ability to automatically promote users from one group to another based on set parameters has been a staple of community software for some time. Traditionally, the most common determination of promotion has been post count. Additionally, the 4.x Community Suite supports promoting members automatically based on the time elapsed since the user joined the site and based on their total reputation count.
    With 4.2, we have completely overhauled and enhanced the group promotion feature bringing many new options to administrators looking to promote members through different group levels.
    To start with, the group promotion options have been removed from the groups configuration pages into their own area.

    Group promotion rules overview page
    You will notice that rules are no longer strictly tied to a single group, and that rules can be sorted however you desire. When you create and edit rules, you can choose which groups the rule applies to, what parameters the user needs to meet in order for the rule to be activated, and then finally, which primary and secondary groups the user will be moved in to. You can also configure the rule to remove specified secondary groups, which can be useful if one rule adds a secondary group for users, and then the next rule should change them to be part of a different secondary group (i.e. add a new secondary group, but also remove the previously awarded secondary group).
    The system uses the same member filters available when configuring bulk mail, and we have made some updates to the member filters area (and have introduced some new filters) in this release as well. For example, you can create a rule that only applies to members who have won the daily leaderboard at least once, or members who have created a blog.

    Some of the group promotion filters, which are also available when sending bulk mails
    Any time a member account is updated for any reason (a new visit, editing the member, the member makes a new post, etc.), the software will loop through all configured rules and the last rule in the list that matches the member will be applied. This approach allows you to create promotion levels, for instance when a member reaches 100 posted content items they will be promoted to a new group, and when they reach 1000 posted content items they will be promoted to yet a different new group.
    Groups can be wholly excluded from any promotion rules, which is useful when you have administrator and/or moderator groups and you want to ensure that they are never moved to a different group. These groups will be disabled from selection when configuring group promotion rules, and these groups will be ignored if "any group" is selected for a promotion rule.
    Finally, if a user is moved to a new primary group by Commerce because they have purchased a product which moves them to a new group, they will also be excluded from group promotion rules (however, Commerce purchases that only adjust secondary groups will not exclude users from being checked by group promotion rules).
     
    Developer note: You can add your own filters for group promotion rules (and bulk mails) by adding MemberFilter extensions in 4.2, available in the Developer Center for your application.
  64. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from Maxxius for a blog entry, New: Group promotion improvements   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release.
    The ability to automatically promote users from one group to another based on set parameters has been a staple of community software for some time. Traditionally, the most common determination of promotion has been post count. Additionally, the 4.x Community Suite supports promoting members automatically based on the time elapsed since the user joined the site and based on their total reputation count.
    With 4.2, we have completely overhauled and enhanced the group promotion feature bringing many new options to administrators looking to promote members through different group levels.
    To start with, the group promotion options have been removed from the groups configuration pages into their own area.

    Group promotion rules overview page
    You will notice that rules are no longer strictly tied to a single group, and that rules can be sorted however you desire. When you create and edit rules, you can choose which groups the rule applies to, what parameters the user needs to meet in order for the rule to be activated, and then finally, which primary and secondary groups the user will be moved in to. You can also configure the rule to remove specified secondary groups, which can be useful if one rule adds a secondary group for users, and then the next rule should change them to be part of a different secondary group (i.e. add a new secondary group, but also remove the previously awarded secondary group).
    The system uses the same member filters available when configuring bulk mail, and we have made some updates to the member filters area (and have introduced some new filters) in this release as well. For example, you can create a rule that only applies to members who have won the daily leaderboard at least once, or members who have created a blog.

    Some of the group promotion filters, which are also available when sending bulk mails
    Any time a member account is updated for any reason (a new visit, editing the member, the member makes a new post, etc.), the software will loop through all configured rules and the last rule in the list that matches the member will be applied. This approach allows you to create promotion levels, for instance when a member reaches 100 posted content items they will be promoted to a new group, and when they reach 1000 posted content items they will be promoted to yet a different new group.
    Groups can be wholly excluded from any promotion rules, which is useful when you have administrator and/or moderator groups and you want to ensure that they are never moved to a different group. These groups will be disabled from selection when configuring group promotion rules, and these groups will be ignored if "any group" is selected for a promotion rule.
    Finally, if a user is moved to a new primary group by Commerce because they have purchased a product which moves them to a new group, they will also be excluded from group promotion rules (however, Commerce purchases that only adjust secondary groups will not exclude users from being checked by group promotion rules).
     
    Developer note: You can add your own filters for group promotion rules (and bulk mails) by adding MemberFilter extensions in 4.2, available in the Developer Center for your application.
  65. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from Wonster for a blog entry, New: Group promotion improvements   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release.
    The ability to automatically promote users from one group to another based on set parameters has been a staple of community software for some time. Traditionally, the most common determination of promotion has been post count. Additionally, the 4.x Community Suite supports promoting members automatically based on the time elapsed since the user joined the site and based on their total reputation count.
    With 4.2, we have completely overhauled and enhanced the group promotion feature bringing many new options to administrators looking to promote members through different group levels.
    To start with, the group promotion options have been removed from the groups configuration pages into their own area.

    Group promotion rules overview page
    You will notice that rules are no longer strictly tied to a single group, and that rules can be sorted however you desire. When you create and edit rules, you can choose which groups the rule applies to, what parameters the user needs to meet in order for the rule to be activated, and then finally, which primary and secondary groups the user will be moved in to. You can also configure the rule to remove specified secondary groups, which can be useful if one rule adds a secondary group for users, and then the next rule should change them to be part of a different secondary group (i.e. add a new secondary group, but also remove the previously awarded secondary group).
    The system uses the same member filters available when configuring bulk mail, and we have made some updates to the member filters area (and have introduced some new filters) in this release as well. For example, you can create a rule that only applies to members who have won the daily leaderboard at least once, or members who have created a blog.

    Some of the group promotion filters, which are also available when sending bulk mails
    Any time a member account is updated for any reason (a new visit, editing the member, the member makes a new post, etc.), the software will loop through all configured rules and the last rule in the list that matches the member will be applied. This approach allows you to create promotion levels, for instance when a member reaches 100 posted content items they will be promoted to a new group, and when they reach 1000 posted content items they will be promoted to yet a different new group.
    Groups can be wholly excluded from any promotion rules, which is useful when you have administrator and/or moderator groups and you want to ensure that they are never moved to a different group. These groups will be disabled from selection when configuring group promotion rules, and these groups will be ignored if "any group" is selected for a promotion rule.
    Finally, if a user is moved to a new primary group by Commerce because they have purchased a product which moves them to a new group, they will also be excluded from group promotion rules (however, Commerce purchases that only adjust secondary groups will not exclude users from being checked by group promotion rules).
     
    Developer note: You can add your own filters for group promotion rules (and bulk mails) by adding MemberFilter extensions in 4.2, available in the Developer Center for your application.
  66. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from ric4rdo for a blog entry, New: Group promotion improvements   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release.
    The ability to automatically promote users from one group to another based on set parameters has been a staple of community software for some time. Traditionally, the most common determination of promotion has been post count. Additionally, the 4.x Community Suite supports promoting members automatically based on the time elapsed since the user joined the site and based on their total reputation count.
    With 4.2, we have completely overhauled and enhanced the group promotion feature bringing many new options to administrators looking to promote members through different group levels.
    To start with, the group promotion options have been removed from the groups configuration pages into their own area.

    Group promotion rules overview page
    You will notice that rules are no longer strictly tied to a single group, and that rules can be sorted however you desire. When you create and edit rules, you can choose which groups the rule applies to, what parameters the user needs to meet in order for the rule to be activated, and then finally, which primary and secondary groups the user will be moved in to. You can also configure the rule to remove specified secondary groups, which can be useful if one rule adds a secondary group for users, and then the next rule should change them to be part of a different secondary group (i.e. add a new secondary group, but also remove the previously awarded secondary group).
    The system uses the same member filters available when configuring bulk mail, and we have made some updates to the member filters area (and have introduced some new filters) in this release as well. For example, you can create a rule that only applies to members who have won the daily leaderboard at least once, or members who have created a blog.

    Some of the group promotion filters, which are also available when sending bulk mails
    Any time a member account is updated for any reason (a new visit, editing the member, the member makes a new post, etc.), the software will loop through all configured rules and the last rule in the list that matches the member will be applied. This approach allows you to create promotion levels, for instance when a member reaches 100 posted content items they will be promoted to a new group, and when they reach 1000 posted content items they will be promoted to yet a different new group.
    Groups can be wholly excluded from any promotion rules, which is useful when you have administrator and/or moderator groups and you want to ensure that they are never moved to a different group. These groups will be disabled from selection when configuring group promotion rules, and these groups will be ignored if "any group" is selected for a promotion rule.
    Finally, if a user is moved to a new primary group by Commerce because they have purchased a product which moves them to a new group, they will also be excluded from group promotion rules (however, Commerce purchases that only adjust secondary groups will not exclude users from being checked by group promotion rules).
     
    Developer note: You can add your own filters for group promotion rules (and bulk mails) by adding MemberFilter extensions in 4.2, available in the Developer Center for your application.
  67. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from Jujuwar for a blog entry, New: Group promotion improvements   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release.
    The ability to automatically promote users from one group to another based on set parameters has been a staple of community software for some time. Traditionally, the most common determination of promotion has been post count. Additionally, the 4.x Community Suite supports promoting members automatically based on the time elapsed since the user joined the site and based on their total reputation count.
    With 4.2, we have completely overhauled and enhanced the group promotion feature bringing many new options to administrators looking to promote members through different group levels.
    To start with, the group promotion options have been removed from the groups configuration pages into their own area.

    Group promotion rules overview page
    You will notice that rules are no longer strictly tied to a single group, and that rules can be sorted however you desire. When you create and edit rules, you can choose which groups the rule applies to, what parameters the user needs to meet in order for the rule to be activated, and then finally, which primary and secondary groups the user will be moved in to. You can also configure the rule to remove specified secondary groups, which can be useful if one rule adds a secondary group for users, and then the next rule should change them to be part of a different secondary group (i.e. add a new secondary group, but also remove the previously awarded secondary group).
    The system uses the same member filters available when configuring bulk mail, and we have made some updates to the member filters area (and have introduced some new filters) in this release as well. For example, you can create a rule that only applies to members who have won the daily leaderboard at least once, or members who have created a blog.

    Some of the group promotion filters, which are also available when sending bulk mails
    Any time a member account is updated for any reason (a new visit, editing the member, the member makes a new post, etc.), the software will loop through all configured rules and the last rule in the list that matches the member will be applied. This approach allows you to create promotion levels, for instance when a member reaches 100 posted content items they will be promoted to a new group, and when they reach 1000 posted content items they will be promoted to yet a different new group.
    Groups can be wholly excluded from any promotion rules, which is useful when you have administrator and/or moderator groups and you want to ensure that they are never moved to a different group. These groups will be disabled from selection when configuring group promotion rules, and these groups will be ignored if "any group" is selected for a promotion rule.
    Finally, if a user is moved to a new primary group by Commerce because they have purchased a product which moves them to a new group, they will also be excluded from group promotion rules (however, Commerce purchases that only adjust secondary groups will not exclude users from being checked by group promotion rules).
     
    Developer note: You can add your own filters for group promotion rules (and bulk mails) by adding MemberFilter extensions in 4.2, available in the Developer Center for your application.
  68. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from Adriano Faria for a blog entry, New: Group promotion improvements   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release.
    The ability to automatically promote users from one group to another based on set parameters has been a staple of community software for some time. Traditionally, the most common determination of promotion has been post count. Additionally, the 4.x Community Suite supports promoting members automatically based on the time elapsed since the user joined the site and based on their total reputation count.
    With 4.2, we have completely overhauled and enhanced the group promotion feature bringing many new options to administrators looking to promote members through different group levels.
    To start with, the group promotion options have been removed from the groups configuration pages into their own area.

    Group promotion rules overview page
    You will notice that rules are no longer strictly tied to a single group, and that rules can be sorted however you desire. When you create and edit rules, you can choose which groups the rule applies to, what parameters the user needs to meet in order for the rule to be activated, and then finally, which primary and secondary groups the user will be moved in to. You can also configure the rule to remove specified secondary groups, which can be useful if one rule adds a secondary group for users, and then the next rule should change them to be part of a different secondary group (i.e. add a new secondary group, but also remove the previously awarded secondary group).
    The system uses the same member filters available when configuring bulk mail, and we have made some updates to the member filters area (and have introduced some new filters) in this release as well. For example, you can create a rule that only applies to members who have won the daily leaderboard at least once, or members who have created a blog.

    Some of the group promotion filters, which are also available when sending bulk mails
    Any time a member account is updated for any reason (a new visit, editing the member, the member makes a new post, etc.), the software will loop through all configured rules and the last rule in the list that matches the member will be applied. This approach allows you to create promotion levels, for instance when a member reaches 100 posted content items they will be promoted to a new group, and when they reach 1000 posted content items they will be promoted to yet a different new group.
    Groups can be wholly excluded from any promotion rules, which is useful when you have administrator and/or moderator groups and you want to ensure that they are never moved to a different group. These groups will be disabled from selection when configuring group promotion rules, and these groups will be ignored if "any group" is selected for a promotion rule.
    Finally, if a user is moved to a new primary group by Commerce because they have purchased a product which moves them to a new group, they will also be excluded from group promotion rules (however, Commerce purchases that only adjust secondary groups will not exclude users from being checked by group promotion rules).
     
    Developer note: You can add your own filters for group promotion rules (and bulk mails) by adding MemberFilter extensions in 4.2, available in the Developer Center for your application.
  69. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from Aaron M for a blog entry, New: Group promotion improvements   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release.
    The ability to automatically promote users from one group to another based on set parameters has been a staple of community software for some time. Traditionally, the most common determination of promotion has been post count. Additionally, the 4.x Community Suite supports promoting members automatically based on the time elapsed since the user joined the site and based on their total reputation count.
    With 4.2, we have completely overhauled and enhanced the group promotion feature bringing many new options to administrators looking to promote members through different group levels.
    To start with, the group promotion options have been removed from the groups configuration pages into their own area.

    Group promotion rules overview page
    You will notice that rules are no longer strictly tied to a single group, and that rules can be sorted however you desire. When you create and edit rules, you can choose which groups the rule applies to, what parameters the user needs to meet in order for the rule to be activated, and then finally, which primary and secondary groups the user will be moved in to. You can also configure the rule to remove specified secondary groups, which can be useful if one rule adds a secondary group for users, and then the next rule should change them to be part of a different secondary group (i.e. add a new secondary group, but also remove the previously awarded secondary group).
    The system uses the same member filters available when configuring bulk mail, and we have made some updates to the member filters area (and have introduced some new filters) in this release as well. For example, you can create a rule that only applies to members who have won the daily leaderboard at least once, or members who have created a blog.

    Some of the group promotion filters, which are also available when sending bulk mails
    Any time a member account is updated for any reason (a new visit, editing the member, the member makes a new post, etc.), the software will loop through all configured rules and the last rule in the list that matches the member will be applied. This approach allows you to create promotion levels, for instance when a member reaches 100 posted content items they will be promoted to a new group, and when they reach 1000 posted content items they will be promoted to yet a different new group.
    Groups can be wholly excluded from any promotion rules, which is useful when you have administrator and/or moderator groups and you want to ensure that they are never moved to a different group. These groups will be disabled from selection when configuring group promotion rules, and these groups will be ignored if "any group" is selected for a promotion rule.
    Finally, if a user is moved to a new primary group by Commerce because they have purchased a product which moves them to a new group, they will also be excluded from group promotion rules (however, Commerce purchases that only adjust secondary groups will not exclude users from being checked by group promotion rules).
     
    Developer note: You can add your own filters for group promotion rules (and bulk mails) by adding MemberFilter extensions in 4.2, available in the Developer Center for your application.
  70. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from Charles for a blog entry, New: Group promotion improvements   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release.
    The ability to automatically promote users from one group to another based on set parameters has been a staple of community software for some time. Traditionally, the most common determination of promotion has been post count. Additionally, the 4.x Community Suite supports promoting members automatically based on the time elapsed since the user joined the site and based on their total reputation count.
    With 4.2, we have completely overhauled and enhanced the group promotion feature bringing many new options to administrators looking to promote members through different group levels.
    To start with, the group promotion options have been removed from the groups configuration pages into their own area.

    Group promotion rules overview page
    You will notice that rules are no longer strictly tied to a single group, and that rules can be sorted however you desire. When you create and edit rules, you can choose which groups the rule applies to, what parameters the user needs to meet in order for the rule to be activated, and then finally, which primary and secondary groups the user will be moved in to. You can also configure the rule to remove specified secondary groups, which can be useful if one rule adds a secondary group for users, and then the next rule should change them to be part of a different secondary group (i.e. add a new secondary group, but also remove the previously awarded secondary group).
    The system uses the same member filters available when configuring bulk mail, and we have made some updates to the member filters area (and have introduced some new filters) in this release as well. For example, you can create a rule that only applies to members who have won the daily leaderboard at least once, or members who have created a blog.

    Some of the group promotion filters, which are also available when sending bulk mails
    Any time a member account is updated for any reason (a new visit, editing the member, the member makes a new post, etc.), the software will loop through all configured rules and the last rule in the list that matches the member will be applied. This approach allows you to create promotion levels, for instance when a member reaches 100 posted content items they will be promoted to a new group, and when they reach 1000 posted content items they will be promoted to yet a different new group.
    Groups can be wholly excluded from any promotion rules, which is useful when you have administrator and/or moderator groups and you want to ensure that they are never moved to a different group. These groups will be disabled from selection when configuring group promotion rules, and these groups will be ignored if "any group" is selected for a promotion rule.
    Finally, if a user is moved to a new primary group by Commerce because they have purchased a product which moves them to a new group, they will also be excluded from group promotion rules (however, Commerce purchases that only adjust secondary groups will not exclude users from being checked by group promotion rules).
     
    Developer note: You can add your own filters for group promotion rules (and bulk mails) by adding MemberFilter extensions in 4.2, available in the Developer Center for your application.
  71. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from Daniel F for a blog entry, New: Group promotion improvements   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release.
    The ability to automatically promote users from one group to another based on set parameters has been a staple of community software for some time. Traditionally, the most common determination of promotion has been post count. Additionally, the 4.x Community Suite supports promoting members automatically based on the time elapsed since the user joined the site and based on their total reputation count.
    With 4.2, we have completely overhauled and enhanced the group promotion feature bringing many new options to administrators looking to promote members through different group levels.
    To start with, the group promotion options have been removed from the groups configuration pages into their own area.

    Group promotion rules overview page
    You will notice that rules are no longer strictly tied to a single group, and that rules can be sorted however you desire. When you create and edit rules, you can choose which groups the rule applies to, what parameters the user needs to meet in order for the rule to be activated, and then finally, which primary and secondary groups the user will be moved in to. You can also configure the rule to remove specified secondary groups, which can be useful if one rule adds a secondary group for users, and then the next rule should change them to be part of a different secondary group (i.e. add a new secondary group, but also remove the previously awarded secondary group).
    The system uses the same member filters available when configuring bulk mail, and we have made some updates to the member filters area (and have introduced some new filters) in this release as well. For example, you can create a rule that only applies to members who have won the daily leaderboard at least once, or members who have created a blog.

    Some of the group promotion filters, which are also available when sending bulk mails
    Any time a member account is updated for any reason (a new visit, editing the member, the member makes a new post, etc.), the software will loop through all configured rules and the last rule in the list that matches the member will be applied. This approach allows you to create promotion levels, for instance when a member reaches 100 posted content items they will be promoted to a new group, and when they reach 1000 posted content items they will be promoted to yet a different new group.
    Groups can be wholly excluded from any promotion rules, which is useful when you have administrator and/or moderator groups and you want to ensure that they are never moved to a different group. These groups will be disabled from selection when configuring group promotion rules, and these groups will be ignored if "any group" is selected for a promotion rule.
    Finally, if a user is moved to a new primary group by Commerce because they have purchased a product which moves them to a new group, they will also be excluded from group promotion rules (however, Commerce purchases that only adjust secondary groups will not exclude users from being checked by group promotion rules).
     
    Developer note: You can add your own filters for group promotion rules (and bulk mails) by adding MemberFilter extensions in 4.2, available in the Developer Center for your application.
  72. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from Jim M for a blog entry, New: Gallery improvements   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release
    We are happy to introduce several changes to our Gallery application to both refine the existing capabilities and to introduce new useful functionality; particularly for Albums.
    We have clarified how to submit images directly to a category on the first step of the upload form in Gallery.

    Clarification for submitting directly to a category
    When submitting images to the Gallery, a simple "Add more images" button has been added to the wizard. While it has always been possible to add more images by dragging and dropping them on to the upload area, or by clicking the "Choose files" button again, the addition of this button should help add some clarity for users who overlooked these capabilities.

    A new "Add more images" button makes adding additional images easier
    Applying the same details to all of the images you are submitting has been made much simpler. When you begin entering the details for the first image, you can specify a template to use for the caption name leveraging a special replacement "%n". A small help icon next to the caption field label explains how to use this capability. When you are done supplying the details, you can click "Copy details to all images" and your submission will start instantly, using all of the details supplied for the image you are editing. You can quickly set tags, an image description and a caption name template (for instance "Aquarium %n") to all images using this new capability, useful when submitting 50+ images at once. Of course, you can still supply the details for each individual image as well, if you wish.

    Submitting a lot of images at once has been made easier
    In addition to improvements for submitting images, albums have been updated to include many new features, including:
    Commenting Reviews Reactions Messages Featuring Hiding Locking Reporting Searching A new Gallery widget (sidebar block) to show albums anywhere throughout the Community Suite has been added as well.

    Album overview page
    Going along with these changes, we've improved how groups of images that are submitted to an album are handled in searches. If you submit multiple images to an album, you will only see the album listed in activity streams, and similarly if you follow a bunch of images in an album these are grouped as well, making activity streams more useful and easier to follow.

    Activity streams have been updated as well
    The changes to albums and image submissions will simplify your users' interaction with Gallery in 4.2, and make submitting images and new albums, and working with those albums more useful and robust.
  73. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from raza ali for a blog entry, New: Statistics   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release
    Statistics can be an important part of monitoring your site and ensuring it grows and responds to your marketing and promotion efforts effectively, and several new statistic tools have been added to the 4.2 Community Suite which we know you will be excited to learn about!
    A simple tool has been added that will allow you to look up and list all member accounts that have last visited the site within a specified time period.

    Look up members who have visited within a set time period
    Additionally, online user (both logged in user and guest) counts are now tracked every 15 minutes and graphed in the AdminCP for you to reference. You can view online user trends over a specified date period, view just guest counts or just member counts (or both), and view the graph in multiple different modes (such as an area chart or as a column chart). By default, the data is retained for 180 days, however you can control how often to prune this statistical data in the AdminCP.

    Online user trends graphed
    You can also view a graph of member activity on the site. Member activity is defined as any "activity" beyond simply browsing, such as submitting a new post, reacting to any content item or comment, or following any content item or node.

    Activity information about your member base
    You will also be able to define keywords that you would like to monitor and then see both a graph of usage of those keywords, as well as a table listing all usages of those keywords. You can use this to track usage of competitor names, find out if hash tags you define are trending, or learn if promotional materials are making an impact on your membership.

    Keyword tracking can help you closely monitor your community
    Along with these additions, we've cleaned up the menu and wording for the rest of the existing statistic options to make their functions more clear.
    We hope these additions help you better track and control your community, making the most of your time and money.
     
    Note for developers: A new chart class has been added which allows you to populate dynamic charts using callbacks, in addition to the standard methods that already exist for pulling data directly from a specified database table.
  74. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from raza ali for a blog entry, New: Gallery improvements   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release
    We are happy to introduce several changes to our Gallery application to both refine the existing capabilities and to introduce new useful functionality; particularly for Albums.
    We have clarified how to submit images directly to a category on the first step of the upload form in Gallery.

    Clarification for submitting directly to a category
    When submitting images to the Gallery, a simple "Add more images" button has been added to the wizard. While it has always been possible to add more images by dragging and dropping them on to the upload area, or by clicking the "Choose files" button again, the addition of this button should help add some clarity for users who overlooked these capabilities.

    A new "Add more images" button makes adding additional images easier
    Applying the same details to all of the images you are submitting has been made much simpler. When you begin entering the details for the first image, you can specify a template to use for the caption name leveraging a special replacement "%n". A small help icon next to the caption field label explains how to use this capability. When you are done supplying the details, you can click "Copy details to all images" and your submission will start instantly, using all of the details supplied for the image you are editing. You can quickly set tags, an image description and a caption name template (for instance "Aquarium %n") to all images using this new capability, useful when submitting 50+ images at once. Of course, you can still supply the details for each individual image as well, if you wish.

    Submitting a lot of images at once has been made easier
    In addition to improvements for submitting images, albums have been updated to include many new features, including:
    Commenting Reviews Reactions Messages Featuring Hiding Locking Reporting Searching A new Gallery widget (sidebar block) to show albums anywhere throughout the Community Suite has been added as well.

    Album overview page
    Going along with these changes, we've improved how groups of images that are submitted to an album are handled in searches. If you submit multiple images to an album, you will only see the album listed in activity streams, and similarly if you follow a bunch of images in an album these are grouped as well, making activity streams more useful and easier to follow.

    Activity streams have been updated as well
    The changes to albums and image submissions will simplify your users' interaction with Gallery in 4.2, and make submitting images and new albums, and working with those albums more useful and robust.
  75. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from Emanoel for a blog entry, New: Statistics   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release
    Statistics can be an important part of monitoring your site and ensuring it grows and responds to your marketing and promotion efforts effectively, and several new statistic tools have been added to the 4.2 Community Suite which we know you will be excited to learn about!
    A simple tool has been added that will allow you to look up and list all member accounts that have last visited the site within a specified time period.

    Look up members who have visited within a set time period
    Additionally, online user (both logged in user and guest) counts are now tracked every 15 minutes and graphed in the AdminCP for you to reference. You can view online user trends over a specified date period, view just guest counts or just member counts (or both), and view the graph in multiple different modes (such as an area chart or as a column chart). By default, the data is retained for 180 days, however you can control how often to prune this statistical data in the AdminCP.

    Online user trends graphed
    You can also view a graph of member activity on the site. Member activity is defined as any "activity" beyond simply browsing, such as submitting a new post, reacting to any content item or comment, or following any content item or node.

    Activity information about your member base
    You will also be able to define keywords that you would like to monitor and then see both a graph of usage of those keywords, as well as a table listing all usages of those keywords. You can use this to track usage of competitor names, find out if hash tags you define are trending, or learn if promotional materials are making an impact on your membership.

    Keyword tracking can help you closely monitor your community
    Along with these additions, we've cleaned up the menu and wording for the rest of the existing statistic options to make their functions more clear.
    We hope these additions help you better track and control your community, making the most of your time and money.
     
    Note for developers: A new chart class has been added which allows you to populate dynamic charts using callbacks, in addition to the standard methods that already exist for pulling data directly from a specified database table.
  76. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from Emanoel for a blog entry, New: Gallery improvements   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release
    We are happy to introduce several changes to our Gallery application to both refine the existing capabilities and to introduce new useful functionality; particularly for Albums.
    We have clarified how to submit images directly to a category on the first step of the upload form in Gallery.

    Clarification for submitting directly to a category
    When submitting images to the Gallery, a simple "Add more images" button has been added to the wizard. While it has always been possible to add more images by dragging and dropping them on to the upload area, or by clicking the "Choose files" button again, the addition of this button should help add some clarity for users who overlooked these capabilities.

    A new "Add more images" button makes adding additional images easier
    Applying the same details to all of the images you are submitting has been made much simpler. When you begin entering the details for the first image, you can specify a template to use for the caption name leveraging a special replacement "%n". A small help icon next to the caption field label explains how to use this capability. When you are done supplying the details, you can click "Copy details to all images" and your submission will start instantly, using all of the details supplied for the image you are editing. You can quickly set tags, an image description and a caption name template (for instance "Aquarium %n") to all images using this new capability, useful when submitting 50+ images at once. Of course, you can still supply the details for each individual image as well, if you wish.

    Submitting a lot of images at once has been made easier
    In addition to improvements for submitting images, albums have been updated to include many new features, including:
    Commenting Reviews Reactions Messages Featuring Hiding Locking Reporting Searching A new Gallery widget (sidebar block) to show albums anywhere throughout the Community Suite has been added as well.

    Album overview page
    Going along with these changes, we've improved how groups of images that are submitted to an album are handled in searches. If you submit multiple images to an album, you will only see the album listed in activity streams, and similarly if you follow a bunch of images in an album these are grouped as well, making activity streams more useful and easier to follow.

    Activity streams have been updated as well
    The changes to albums and image submissions will simplify your users' interaction with Gallery in 4.2, and make submitting images and new albums, and working with those albums more useful and robust.
  77. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from Charles for a blog entry, New: Statistics   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release
    Statistics can be an important part of monitoring your site and ensuring it grows and responds to your marketing and promotion efforts effectively, and several new statistic tools have been added to the 4.2 Community Suite which we know you will be excited to learn about!
    A simple tool has been added that will allow you to look up and list all member accounts that have last visited the site within a specified time period.

    Look up members who have visited within a set time period
    Additionally, online user (both logged in user and guest) counts are now tracked every 15 minutes and graphed in the AdminCP for you to reference. You can view online user trends over a specified date period, view just guest counts or just member counts (or both), and view the graph in multiple different modes (such as an area chart or as a column chart). By default, the data is retained for 180 days, however you can control how often to prune this statistical data in the AdminCP.

    Online user trends graphed
    You can also view a graph of member activity on the site. Member activity is defined as any "activity" beyond simply browsing, such as submitting a new post, reacting to any content item or comment, or following any content item or node.

    Activity information about your member base
    You will also be able to define keywords that you would like to monitor and then see both a graph of usage of those keywords, as well as a table listing all usages of those keywords. You can use this to track usage of competitor names, find out if hash tags you define are trending, or learn if promotional materials are making an impact on your membership.

    Keyword tracking can help you closely monitor your community
    Along with these additions, we've cleaned up the menu and wording for the rest of the existing statistic options to make their functions more clear.
    We hope these additions help you better track and control your community, making the most of your time and money.
     
    Note for developers: A new chart class has been added which allows you to populate dynamic charts using callbacks, in addition to the standard methods that already exist for pulling data directly from a specified database table.
  78. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from Charles for a blog entry, New: Gallery improvements   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release
    We are happy to introduce several changes to our Gallery application to both refine the existing capabilities and to introduce new useful functionality; particularly for Albums.
    We have clarified how to submit images directly to a category on the first step of the upload form in Gallery.

    Clarification for submitting directly to a category
    When submitting images to the Gallery, a simple "Add more images" button has been added to the wizard. While it has always been possible to add more images by dragging and dropping them on to the upload area, or by clicking the "Choose files" button again, the addition of this button should help add some clarity for users who overlooked these capabilities.

    A new "Add more images" button makes adding additional images easier
    Applying the same details to all of the images you are submitting has been made much simpler. When you begin entering the details for the first image, you can specify a template to use for the caption name leveraging a special replacement "%n". A small help icon next to the caption field label explains how to use this capability. When you are done supplying the details, you can click "Copy details to all images" and your submission will start instantly, using all of the details supplied for the image you are editing. You can quickly set tags, an image description and a caption name template (for instance "Aquarium %n") to all images using this new capability, useful when submitting 50+ images at once. Of course, you can still supply the details for each individual image as well, if you wish.

    Submitting a lot of images at once has been made easier
    In addition to improvements for submitting images, albums have been updated to include many new features, including:
    Commenting Reviews Reactions Messages Featuring Hiding Locking Reporting Searching A new Gallery widget (sidebar block) to show albums anywhere throughout the Community Suite has been added as well.

    Album overview page
    Going along with these changes, we've improved how groups of images that are submitted to an album are handled in searches. If you submit multiple images to an album, you will only see the album listed in activity streams, and similarly if you follow a bunch of images in an album these are grouped as well, making activity streams more useful and easier to follow.

    Activity streams have been updated as well
    The changes to albums and image submissions will simplify your users' interaction with Gallery in 4.2, and make submitting images and new albums, and working with those albums more useful and robust.
  79. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from AlexJ for a blog entry, New: Gallery improvements   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release
    We are happy to introduce several changes to our Gallery application to both refine the existing capabilities and to introduce new useful functionality; particularly for Albums.
    We have clarified how to submit images directly to a category on the first step of the upload form in Gallery.

    Clarification for submitting directly to a category
    When submitting images to the Gallery, a simple "Add more images" button has been added to the wizard. While it has always been possible to add more images by dragging and dropping them on to the upload area, or by clicking the "Choose files" button again, the addition of this button should help add some clarity for users who overlooked these capabilities.

    A new "Add more images" button makes adding additional images easier
    Applying the same details to all of the images you are submitting has been made much simpler. When you begin entering the details for the first image, you can specify a template to use for the caption name leveraging a special replacement "%n". A small help icon next to the caption field label explains how to use this capability. When you are done supplying the details, you can click "Copy details to all images" and your submission will start instantly, using all of the details supplied for the image you are editing. You can quickly set tags, an image description and a caption name template (for instance "Aquarium %n") to all images using this new capability, useful when submitting 50+ images at once. Of course, you can still supply the details for each individual image as well, if you wish.

    Submitting a lot of images at once has been made easier
    In addition to improvements for submitting images, albums have been updated to include many new features, including:
    Commenting Reviews Reactions Messages Featuring Hiding Locking Reporting Searching A new Gallery widget (sidebar block) to show albums anywhere throughout the Community Suite has been added as well.

    Album overview page
    Going along with these changes, we've improved how groups of images that are submitted to an album are handled in searches. If you submit multiple images to an album, you will only see the album listed in activity streams, and similarly if you follow a bunch of images in an album these are grouped as well, making activity streams more useful and easier to follow.

    Activity streams have been updated as well
    The changes to albums and image submissions will simplify your users' interaction with Gallery in 4.2, and make submitting images and new albums, and working with those albums more useful and robust.
  80. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from waccoe.com for a blog entry, New: Statistics   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release
    Statistics can be an important part of monitoring your site and ensuring it grows and responds to your marketing and promotion efforts effectively, and several new statistic tools have been added to the 4.2 Community Suite which we know you will be excited to learn about!
    A simple tool has been added that will allow you to look up and list all member accounts that have last visited the site within a specified time period.

    Look up members who have visited within a set time period
    Additionally, online user (both logged in user and guest) counts are now tracked every 15 minutes and graphed in the AdminCP for you to reference. You can view online user trends over a specified date period, view just guest counts or just member counts (or both), and view the graph in multiple different modes (such as an area chart or as a column chart). By default, the data is retained for 180 days, however you can control how often to prune this statistical data in the AdminCP.

    Online user trends graphed
    You can also view a graph of member activity on the site. Member activity is defined as any "activity" beyond simply browsing, such as submitting a new post, reacting to any content item or comment, or following any content item or node.

    Activity information about your member base
    You will also be able to define keywords that you would like to monitor and then see both a graph of usage of those keywords, as well as a table listing all usages of those keywords. You can use this to track usage of competitor names, find out if hash tags you define are trending, or learn if promotional materials are making an impact on your membership.

    Keyword tracking can help you closely monitor your community
    Along with these additions, we've cleaned up the menu and wording for the rest of the existing statistic options to make their functions more clear.
    We hope these additions help you better track and control your community, making the most of your time and money.
     
    Note for developers: A new chart class has been added which allows you to populate dynamic charts using callbacks, in addition to the standard methods that already exist for pulling data directly from a specified database table.
  81. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from sudo for a blog entry, New: Gallery improvements   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release
    We are happy to introduce several changes to our Gallery application to both refine the existing capabilities and to introduce new useful functionality; particularly for Albums.
    We have clarified how to submit images directly to a category on the first step of the upload form in Gallery.

    Clarification for submitting directly to a category
    When submitting images to the Gallery, a simple "Add more images" button has been added to the wizard. While it has always been possible to add more images by dragging and dropping them on to the upload area, or by clicking the "Choose files" button again, the addition of this button should help add some clarity for users who overlooked these capabilities.

    A new "Add more images" button makes adding additional images easier
    Applying the same details to all of the images you are submitting has been made much simpler. When you begin entering the details for the first image, you can specify a template to use for the caption name leveraging a special replacement "%n". A small help icon next to the caption field label explains how to use this capability. When you are done supplying the details, you can click "Copy details to all images" and your submission will start instantly, using all of the details supplied for the image you are editing. You can quickly set tags, an image description and a caption name template (for instance "Aquarium %n") to all images using this new capability, useful when submitting 50+ images at once. Of course, you can still supply the details for each individual image as well, if you wish.

    Submitting a lot of images at once has been made easier
    In addition to improvements for submitting images, albums have been updated to include many new features, including:
    Commenting Reviews Reactions Messages Featuring Hiding Locking Reporting Searching A new Gallery widget (sidebar block) to show albums anywhere throughout the Community Suite has been added as well.

    Album overview page
    Going along with these changes, we've improved how groups of images that are submitted to an album are handled in searches. If you submit multiple images to an album, you will only see the album listed in activity streams, and similarly if you follow a bunch of images in an album these are grouped as well, making activity streams more useful and easier to follow.

    Activity streams have been updated as well
    The changes to albums and image submissions will simplify your users' interaction with Gallery in 4.2, and make submitting images and new albums, and working with those albums more useful and robust.
  82. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from InsideEdge for a blog entry, New: Statistics   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release
    Statistics can be an important part of monitoring your site and ensuring it grows and responds to your marketing and promotion efforts effectively, and several new statistic tools have been added to the 4.2 Community Suite which we know you will be excited to learn about!
    A simple tool has been added that will allow you to look up and list all member accounts that have last visited the site within a specified time period.

    Look up members who have visited within a set time period
    Additionally, online user (both logged in user and guest) counts are now tracked every 15 minutes and graphed in the AdminCP for you to reference. You can view online user trends over a specified date period, view just guest counts or just member counts (or both), and view the graph in multiple different modes (such as an area chart or as a column chart). By default, the data is retained for 180 days, however you can control how often to prune this statistical data in the AdminCP.

    Online user trends graphed
    You can also view a graph of member activity on the site. Member activity is defined as any "activity" beyond simply browsing, such as submitting a new post, reacting to any content item or comment, or following any content item or node.

    Activity information about your member base
    You will also be able to define keywords that you would like to monitor and then see both a graph of usage of those keywords, as well as a table listing all usages of those keywords. You can use this to track usage of competitor names, find out if hash tags you define are trending, or learn if promotional materials are making an impact on your membership.

    Keyword tracking can help you closely monitor your community
    Along with these additions, we've cleaned up the menu and wording for the rest of the existing statistic options to make their functions more clear.
    We hope these additions help you better track and control your community, making the most of your time and money.
     
    Note for developers: A new chart class has been added which allows you to populate dynamic charts using callbacks, in addition to the standard methods that already exist for pulling data directly from a specified database table.
  83. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from Core4D for a blog entry, New: Gallery improvements   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release
    We are happy to introduce several changes to our Gallery application to both refine the existing capabilities and to introduce new useful functionality; particularly for Albums.
    We have clarified how to submit images directly to a category on the first step of the upload form in Gallery.

    Clarification for submitting directly to a category
    When submitting images to the Gallery, a simple "Add more images" button has been added to the wizard. While it has always been possible to add more images by dragging and dropping them on to the upload area, or by clicking the "Choose files" button again, the addition of this button should help add some clarity for users who overlooked these capabilities.

    A new "Add more images" button makes adding additional images easier
    Applying the same details to all of the images you are submitting has been made much simpler. When you begin entering the details for the first image, you can specify a template to use for the caption name leveraging a special replacement "%n". A small help icon next to the caption field label explains how to use this capability. When you are done supplying the details, you can click "Copy details to all images" and your submission will start instantly, using all of the details supplied for the image you are editing. You can quickly set tags, an image description and a caption name template (for instance "Aquarium %n") to all images using this new capability, useful when submitting 50+ images at once. Of course, you can still supply the details for each individual image as well, if you wish.

    Submitting a lot of images at once has been made easier
    In addition to improvements for submitting images, albums have been updated to include many new features, including:
    Commenting Reviews Reactions Messages Featuring Hiding Locking Reporting Searching A new Gallery widget (sidebar block) to show albums anywhere throughout the Community Suite has been added as well.

    Album overview page
    Going along with these changes, we've improved how groups of images that are submitted to an album are handled in searches. If you submit multiple images to an album, you will only see the album listed in activity streams, and similarly if you follow a bunch of images in an album these are grouped as well, making activity streams more useful and easier to follow.

    Activity streams have been updated as well
    The changes to albums and image submissions will simplify your users' interaction with Gallery in 4.2, and make submitting images and new albums, and working with those albums more useful and robust.
  84. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from McArtemon for a blog entry, New: Gallery improvements   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release
    We are happy to introduce several changes to our Gallery application to both refine the existing capabilities and to introduce new useful functionality; particularly for Albums.
    We have clarified how to submit images directly to a category on the first step of the upload form in Gallery.

    Clarification for submitting directly to a category
    When submitting images to the Gallery, a simple "Add more images" button has been added to the wizard. While it has always been possible to add more images by dragging and dropping them on to the upload area, or by clicking the "Choose files" button again, the addition of this button should help add some clarity for users who overlooked these capabilities.

    A new "Add more images" button makes adding additional images easier
    Applying the same details to all of the images you are submitting has been made much simpler. When you begin entering the details for the first image, you can specify a template to use for the caption name leveraging a special replacement "%n". A small help icon next to the caption field label explains how to use this capability. When you are done supplying the details, you can click "Copy details to all images" and your submission will start instantly, using all of the details supplied for the image you are editing. You can quickly set tags, an image description and a caption name template (for instance "Aquarium %n") to all images using this new capability, useful when submitting 50+ images at once. Of course, you can still supply the details for each individual image as well, if you wish.

    Submitting a lot of images at once has been made easier
    In addition to improvements for submitting images, albums have been updated to include many new features, including:
    Commenting Reviews Reactions Messages Featuring Hiding Locking Reporting Searching A new Gallery widget (sidebar block) to show albums anywhere throughout the Community Suite has been added as well.

    Album overview page
    Going along with these changes, we've improved how groups of images that are submitted to an album are handled in searches. If you submit multiple images to an album, you will only see the album listed in activity streams, and similarly if you follow a bunch of images in an album these are grouped as well, making activity streams more useful and easier to follow.

    Activity streams have been updated as well
    The changes to albums and image submissions will simplify your users' interaction with Gallery in 4.2, and make submitting images and new albums, and working with those albums more useful and robust.
  85. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from LiquidFractal for a blog entry, New: Gallery improvements   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release
    We are happy to introduce several changes to our Gallery application to both refine the existing capabilities and to introduce new useful functionality; particularly for Albums.
    We have clarified how to submit images directly to a category on the first step of the upload form in Gallery.

    Clarification for submitting directly to a category
    When submitting images to the Gallery, a simple "Add more images" button has been added to the wizard. While it has always been possible to add more images by dragging and dropping them on to the upload area, or by clicking the "Choose files" button again, the addition of this button should help add some clarity for users who overlooked these capabilities.

    A new "Add more images" button makes adding additional images easier
    Applying the same details to all of the images you are submitting has been made much simpler. When you begin entering the details for the first image, you can specify a template to use for the caption name leveraging a special replacement "%n". A small help icon next to the caption field label explains how to use this capability. When you are done supplying the details, you can click "Copy details to all images" and your submission will start instantly, using all of the details supplied for the image you are editing. You can quickly set tags, an image description and a caption name template (for instance "Aquarium %n") to all images using this new capability, useful when submitting 50+ images at once. Of course, you can still supply the details for each individual image as well, if you wish.

    Submitting a lot of images at once has been made easier
    In addition to improvements for submitting images, albums have been updated to include many new features, including:
    Commenting Reviews Reactions Messages Featuring Hiding Locking Reporting Searching A new Gallery widget (sidebar block) to show albums anywhere throughout the Community Suite has been added as well.

    Album overview page
    Going along with these changes, we've improved how groups of images that are submitted to an album are handled in searches. If you submit multiple images to an album, you will only see the album listed in activity streams, and similarly if you follow a bunch of images in an album these are grouped as well, making activity streams more useful and easier to follow.

    Activity streams have been updated as well
    The changes to albums and image submissions will simplify your users' interaction with Gallery in 4.2, and make submitting images and new albums, and working with those albums more useful and robust.
  86. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from TLeM4 for a blog entry, New: Gallery improvements   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release
    We are happy to introduce several changes to our Gallery application to both refine the existing capabilities and to introduce new useful functionality; particularly for Albums.
    We have clarified how to submit images directly to a category on the first step of the upload form in Gallery.

    Clarification for submitting directly to a category
    When submitting images to the Gallery, a simple "Add more images" button has been added to the wizard. While it has always been possible to add more images by dragging and dropping them on to the upload area, or by clicking the "Choose files" button again, the addition of this button should help add some clarity for users who overlooked these capabilities.

    A new "Add more images" button makes adding additional images easier
    Applying the same details to all of the images you are submitting has been made much simpler. When you begin entering the details for the first image, you can specify a template to use for the caption name leveraging a special replacement "%n". A small help icon next to the caption field label explains how to use this capability. When you are done supplying the details, you can click "Copy details to all images" and your submission will start instantly, using all of the details supplied for the image you are editing. You can quickly set tags, an image description and a caption name template (for instance "Aquarium %n") to all images using this new capability, useful when submitting 50+ images at once. Of course, you can still supply the details for each individual image as well, if you wish.

    Submitting a lot of images at once has been made easier
    In addition to improvements for submitting images, albums have been updated to include many new features, including:
    Commenting Reviews Reactions Messages Featuring Hiding Locking Reporting Searching A new Gallery widget (sidebar block) to show albums anywhere throughout the Community Suite has been added as well.

    Album overview page
    Going along with these changes, we've improved how groups of images that are submitted to an album are handled in searches. If you submit multiple images to an album, you will only see the album listed in activity streams, and similarly if you follow a bunch of images in an album these are grouped as well, making activity streams more useful and easier to follow.

    Activity streams have been updated as well
    The changes to albums and image submissions will simplify your users' interaction with Gallery in 4.2, and make submitting images and new albums, and working with those albums more useful and robust.
  87. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from The Old Man for a blog entry, New: Gallery improvements   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release
    We are happy to introduce several changes to our Gallery application to both refine the existing capabilities and to introduce new useful functionality; particularly for Albums.
    We have clarified how to submit images directly to a category on the first step of the upload form in Gallery.

    Clarification for submitting directly to a category
    When submitting images to the Gallery, a simple "Add more images" button has been added to the wizard. While it has always been possible to add more images by dragging and dropping them on to the upload area, or by clicking the "Choose files" button again, the addition of this button should help add some clarity for users who overlooked these capabilities.

    A new "Add more images" button makes adding additional images easier
    Applying the same details to all of the images you are submitting has been made much simpler. When you begin entering the details for the first image, you can specify a template to use for the caption name leveraging a special replacement "%n". A small help icon next to the caption field label explains how to use this capability. When you are done supplying the details, you can click "Copy details to all images" and your submission will start instantly, using all of the details supplied for the image you are editing. You can quickly set tags, an image description and a caption name template (for instance "Aquarium %n") to all images using this new capability, useful when submitting 50+ images at once. Of course, you can still supply the details for each individual image as well, if you wish.

    Submitting a lot of images at once has been made easier
    In addition to improvements for submitting images, albums have been updated to include many new features, including:
    Commenting Reviews Reactions Messages Featuring Hiding Locking Reporting Searching A new Gallery widget (sidebar block) to show albums anywhere throughout the Community Suite has been added as well.

    Album overview page
    Going along with these changes, we've improved how groups of images that are submitted to an album are handled in searches. If you submit multiple images to an album, you will only see the album listed in activity streams, and similarly if you follow a bunch of images in an album these are grouped as well, making activity streams more useful and easier to follow.

    Activity streams have been updated as well
    The changes to albums and image submissions will simplify your users' interaction with Gallery in 4.2, and make submitting images and new albums, and working with those albums more useful and robust.
  88. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from Gil Ronen for a blog entry, New: Gallery improvements   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release
    We are happy to introduce several changes to our Gallery application to both refine the existing capabilities and to introduce new useful functionality; particularly for Albums.
    We have clarified how to submit images directly to a category on the first step of the upload form in Gallery.

    Clarification for submitting directly to a category
    When submitting images to the Gallery, a simple "Add more images" button has been added to the wizard. While it has always been possible to add more images by dragging and dropping them on to the upload area, or by clicking the "Choose files" button again, the addition of this button should help add some clarity for users who overlooked these capabilities.

    A new "Add more images" button makes adding additional images easier
    Applying the same details to all of the images you are submitting has been made much simpler. When you begin entering the details for the first image, you can specify a template to use for the caption name leveraging a special replacement "%n". A small help icon next to the caption field label explains how to use this capability. When you are done supplying the details, you can click "Copy details to all images" and your submission will start instantly, using all of the details supplied for the image you are editing. You can quickly set tags, an image description and a caption name template (for instance "Aquarium %n") to all images using this new capability, useful when submitting 50+ images at once. Of course, you can still supply the details for each individual image as well, if you wish.

    Submitting a lot of images at once has been made easier
    In addition to improvements for submitting images, albums have been updated to include many new features, including:
    Commenting Reviews Reactions Messages Featuring Hiding Locking Reporting Searching A new Gallery widget (sidebar block) to show albums anywhere throughout the Community Suite has been added as well.

    Album overview page
    Going along with these changes, we've improved how groups of images that are submitted to an album are handled in searches. If you submit multiple images to an album, you will only see the album listed in activity streams, and similarly if you follow a bunch of images in an album these are grouped as well, making activity streams more useful and easier to follow.

    Activity streams have been updated as well
    The changes to albums and image submissions will simplify your users' interaction with Gallery in 4.2, and make submitting images and new albums, and working with those albums more useful and robust.
  89. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from crmarks for a blog entry, New: Gallery improvements   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release
    We are happy to introduce several changes to our Gallery application to both refine the existing capabilities and to introduce new useful functionality; particularly for Albums.
    We have clarified how to submit images directly to a category on the first step of the upload form in Gallery.

    Clarification for submitting directly to a category
    When submitting images to the Gallery, a simple "Add more images" button has been added to the wizard. While it has always been possible to add more images by dragging and dropping them on to the upload area, or by clicking the "Choose files" button again, the addition of this button should help add some clarity for users who overlooked these capabilities.

    A new "Add more images" button makes adding additional images easier
    Applying the same details to all of the images you are submitting has been made much simpler. When you begin entering the details for the first image, you can specify a template to use for the caption name leveraging a special replacement "%n". A small help icon next to the caption field label explains how to use this capability. When you are done supplying the details, you can click "Copy details to all images" and your submission will start instantly, using all of the details supplied for the image you are editing. You can quickly set tags, an image description and a caption name template (for instance "Aquarium %n") to all images using this new capability, useful when submitting 50+ images at once. Of course, you can still supply the details for each individual image as well, if you wish.

    Submitting a lot of images at once has been made easier
    In addition to improvements for submitting images, albums have been updated to include many new features, including:
    Commenting Reviews Reactions Messages Featuring Hiding Locking Reporting Searching A new Gallery widget (sidebar block) to show albums anywhere throughout the Community Suite has been added as well.

    Album overview page
    Going along with these changes, we've improved how groups of images that are submitted to an album are handled in searches. If you submit multiple images to an album, you will only see the album listed in activity streams, and similarly if you follow a bunch of images in an album these are grouped as well, making activity streams more useful and easier to follow.

    Activity streams have been updated as well
    The changes to albums and image submissions will simplify your users' interaction with Gallery in 4.2, and make submitting images and new albums, and working with those albums more useful and robust.
  90. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from Tomasz Nowak_59903 for a blog entry, New: Gallery improvements   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release
    We are happy to introduce several changes to our Gallery application to both refine the existing capabilities and to introduce new useful functionality; particularly for Albums.
    We have clarified how to submit images directly to a category on the first step of the upload form in Gallery.

    Clarification for submitting directly to a category
    When submitting images to the Gallery, a simple "Add more images" button has been added to the wizard. While it has always been possible to add more images by dragging and dropping them on to the upload area, or by clicking the "Choose files" button again, the addition of this button should help add some clarity for users who overlooked these capabilities.

    A new "Add more images" button makes adding additional images easier
    Applying the same details to all of the images you are submitting has been made much simpler. When you begin entering the details for the first image, you can specify a template to use for the caption name leveraging a special replacement "%n". A small help icon next to the caption field label explains how to use this capability. When you are done supplying the details, you can click "Copy details to all images" and your submission will start instantly, using all of the details supplied for the image you are editing. You can quickly set tags, an image description and a caption name template (for instance "Aquarium %n") to all images using this new capability, useful when submitting 50+ images at once. Of course, you can still supply the details for each individual image as well, if you wish.

    Submitting a lot of images at once has been made easier
    In addition to improvements for submitting images, albums have been updated to include many new features, including:
    Commenting Reviews Reactions Messages Featuring Hiding Locking Reporting Searching A new Gallery widget (sidebar block) to show albums anywhere throughout the Community Suite has been added as well.

    Album overview page
    Going along with these changes, we've improved how groups of images that are submitted to an album are handled in searches. If you submit multiple images to an album, you will only see the album listed in activity streams, and similarly if you follow a bunch of images in an album these are grouped as well, making activity streams more useful and easier to follow.

    Activity streams have been updated as well
    The changes to albums and image submissions will simplify your users' interaction with Gallery in 4.2, and make submitting images and new albums, and working with those albums more useful and robust.
  91. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from Donkerrood for a blog entry, New: Gallery improvements   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release
    We are happy to introduce several changes to our Gallery application to both refine the existing capabilities and to introduce new useful functionality; particularly for Albums.
    We have clarified how to submit images directly to a category on the first step of the upload form in Gallery.

    Clarification for submitting directly to a category
    When submitting images to the Gallery, a simple "Add more images" button has been added to the wizard. While it has always been possible to add more images by dragging and dropping them on to the upload area, or by clicking the "Choose files" button again, the addition of this button should help add some clarity for users who overlooked these capabilities.

    A new "Add more images" button makes adding additional images easier
    Applying the same details to all of the images you are submitting has been made much simpler. When you begin entering the details for the first image, you can specify a template to use for the caption name leveraging a special replacement "%n". A small help icon next to the caption field label explains how to use this capability. When you are done supplying the details, you can click "Copy details to all images" and your submission will start instantly, using all of the details supplied for the image you are editing. You can quickly set tags, an image description and a caption name template (for instance "Aquarium %n") to all images using this new capability, useful when submitting 50+ images at once. Of course, you can still supply the details for each individual image as well, if you wish.

    Submitting a lot of images at once has been made easier
    In addition to improvements for submitting images, albums have been updated to include many new features, including:
    Commenting Reviews Reactions Messages Featuring Hiding Locking Reporting Searching A new Gallery widget (sidebar block) to show albums anywhere throughout the Community Suite has been added as well.

    Album overview page
    Going along with these changes, we've improved how groups of images that are submitted to an album are handled in searches. If you submit multiple images to an album, you will only see the album listed in activity streams, and similarly if you follow a bunch of images in an album these are grouped as well, making activity streams more useful and easier to follow.

    Activity streams have been updated as well
    The changes to albums and image submissions will simplify your users' interaction with Gallery in 4.2, and make submitting images and new albums, and working with those albums more useful and robust.
  92. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from ABGenc for a blog entry, New: Gallery improvements   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release
    We are happy to introduce several changes to our Gallery application to both refine the existing capabilities and to introduce new useful functionality; particularly for Albums.
    We have clarified how to submit images directly to a category on the first step of the upload form in Gallery.

    Clarification for submitting directly to a category
    When submitting images to the Gallery, a simple "Add more images" button has been added to the wizard. While it has always been possible to add more images by dragging and dropping them on to the upload area, or by clicking the "Choose files" button again, the addition of this button should help add some clarity for users who overlooked these capabilities.

    A new "Add more images" button makes adding additional images easier
    Applying the same details to all of the images you are submitting has been made much simpler. When you begin entering the details for the first image, you can specify a template to use for the caption name leveraging a special replacement "%n". A small help icon next to the caption field label explains how to use this capability. When you are done supplying the details, you can click "Copy details to all images" and your submission will start instantly, using all of the details supplied for the image you are editing. You can quickly set tags, an image description and a caption name template (for instance "Aquarium %n") to all images using this new capability, useful when submitting 50+ images at once. Of course, you can still supply the details for each individual image as well, if you wish.

    Submitting a lot of images at once has been made easier
    In addition to improvements for submitting images, albums have been updated to include many new features, including:
    Commenting Reviews Reactions Messages Featuring Hiding Locking Reporting Searching A new Gallery widget (sidebar block) to show albums anywhere throughout the Community Suite has been added as well.

    Album overview page
    Going along with these changes, we've improved how groups of images that are submitted to an album are handled in searches. If you submit multiple images to an album, you will only see the album listed in activity streams, and similarly if you follow a bunch of images in an album these are grouped as well, making activity streams more useful and easier to follow.

    Activity streams have been updated as well
    The changes to albums and image submissions will simplify your users' interaction with Gallery in 4.2, and make submitting images and new albums, and working with those albums more useful and robust.
  93. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from svit for a blog entry, New: Gallery improvements   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release
    We are happy to introduce several changes to our Gallery application to both refine the existing capabilities and to introduce new useful functionality; particularly for Albums.
    We have clarified how to submit images directly to a category on the first step of the upload form in Gallery.

    Clarification for submitting directly to a category
    When submitting images to the Gallery, a simple "Add more images" button has been added to the wizard. While it has always been possible to add more images by dragging and dropping them on to the upload area, or by clicking the "Choose files" button again, the addition of this button should help add some clarity for users who overlooked these capabilities.

    A new "Add more images" button makes adding additional images easier
    Applying the same details to all of the images you are submitting has been made much simpler. When you begin entering the details for the first image, you can specify a template to use for the caption name leveraging a special replacement "%n". A small help icon next to the caption field label explains how to use this capability. When you are done supplying the details, you can click "Copy details to all images" and your submission will start instantly, using all of the details supplied for the image you are editing. You can quickly set tags, an image description and a caption name template (for instance "Aquarium %n") to all images using this new capability, useful when submitting 50+ images at once. Of course, you can still supply the details for each individual image as well, if you wish.

    Submitting a lot of images at once has been made easier
    In addition to improvements for submitting images, albums have been updated to include many new features, including:
    Commenting Reviews Reactions Messages Featuring Hiding Locking Reporting Searching A new Gallery widget (sidebar block) to show albums anywhere throughout the Community Suite has been added as well.

    Album overview page
    Going along with these changes, we've improved how groups of images that are submitted to an album are handled in searches. If you submit multiple images to an album, you will only see the album listed in activity streams, and similarly if you follow a bunch of images in an album these are grouped as well, making activity streams more useful and easier to follow.

    Activity streams have been updated as well
    The changes to albums and image submissions will simplify your users' interaction with Gallery in 4.2, and make submitting images and new albums, and working with those albums more useful and robust.
  94. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from Thomas. for a blog entry, New: Gallery improvements   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release
    We are happy to introduce several changes to our Gallery application to both refine the existing capabilities and to introduce new useful functionality; particularly for Albums.
    We have clarified how to submit images directly to a category on the first step of the upload form in Gallery.

    Clarification for submitting directly to a category
    When submitting images to the Gallery, a simple "Add more images" button has been added to the wizard. While it has always been possible to add more images by dragging and dropping them on to the upload area, or by clicking the "Choose files" button again, the addition of this button should help add some clarity for users who overlooked these capabilities.

    A new "Add more images" button makes adding additional images easier
    Applying the same details to all of the images you are submitting has been made much simpler. When you begin entering the details for the first image, you can specify a template to use for the caption name leveraging a special replacement "%n". A small help icon next to the caption field label explains how to use this capability. When you are done supplying the details, you can click "Copy details to all images" and your submission will start instantly, using all of the details supplied for the image you are editing. You can quickly set tags, an image description and a caption name template (for instance "Aquarium %n") to all images using this new capability, useful when submitting 50+ images at once. Of course, you can still supply the details for each individual image as well, if you wish.

    Submitting a lot of images at once has been made easier
    In addition to improvements for submitting images, albums have been updated to include many new features, including:
    Commenting Reviews Reactions Messages Featuring Hiding Locking Reporting Searching A new Gallery widget (sidebar block) to show albums anywhere throughout the Community Suite has been added as well.

    Album overview page
    Going along with these changes, we've improved how groups of images that are submitted to an album are handled in searches. If you submit multiple images to an album, you will only see the album listed in activity streams, and similarly if you follow a bunch of images in an album these are grouped as well, making activity streams more useful and easier to follow.

    Activity streams have been updated as well
    The changes to albums and image submissions will simplify your users' interaction with Gallery in 4.2, and make submitting images and new albums, and working with those albums more useful and robust.
  95. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from ASTRAPI for a blog entry, New: Gallery improvements   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release
    We are happy to introduce several changes to our Gallery application to both refine the existing capabilities and to introduce new useful functionality; particularly for Albums.
    We have clarified how to submit images directly to a category on the first step of the upload form in Gallery.

    Clarification for submitting directly to a category
    When submitting images to the Gallery, a simple "Add more images" button has been added to the wizard. While it has always been possible to add more images by dragging and dropping them on to the upload area, or by clicking the "Choose files" button again, the addition of this button should help add some clarity for users who overlooked these capabilities.

    A new "Add more images" button makes adding additional images easier
    Applying the same details to all of the images you are submitting has been made much simpler. When you begin entering the details for the first image, you can specify a template to use for the caption name leveraging a special replacement "%n". A small help icon next to the caption field label explains how to use this capability. When you are done supplying the details, you can click "Copy details to all images" and your submission will start instantly, using all of the details supplied for the image you are editing. You can quickly set tags, an image description and a caption name template (for instance "Aquarium %n") to all images using this new capability, useful when submitting 50+ images at once. Of course, you can still supply the details for each individual image as well, if you wish.

    Submitting a lot of images at once has been made easier
    In addition to improvements for submitting images, albums have been updated to include many new features, including:
    Commenting Reviews Reactions Messages Featuring Hiding Locking Reporting Searching A new Gallery widget (sidebar block) to show albums anywhere throughout the Community Suite has been added as well.

    Album overview page
    Going along with these changes, we've improved how groups of images that are submitted to an album are handled in searches. If you submit multiple images to an album, you will only see the album listed in activity streams, and similarly if you follow a bunch of images in an album these are grouped as well, making activity streams more useful and easier to follow.

    Activity streams have been updated as well
    The changes to albums and image submissions will simplify your users' interaction with Gallery in 4.2, and make submitting images and new albums, and working with those albums more useful and robust.
  96. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from SammyS for a blog entry, New: Gallery improvements   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release
    We are happy to introduce several changes to our Gallery application to both refine the existing capabilities and to introduce new useful functionality; particularly for Albums.
    We have clarified how to submit images directly to a category on the first step of the upload form in Gallery.

    Clarification for submitting directly to a category
    When submitting images to the Gallery, a simple "Add more images" button has been added to the wizard. While it has always been possible to add more images by dragging and dropping them on to the upload area, or by clicking the "Choose files" button again, the addition of this button should help add some clarity for users who overlooked these capabilities.

    A new "Add more images" button makes adding additional images easier
    Applying the same details to all of the images you are submitting has been made much simpler. When you begin entering the details for the first image, you can specify a template to use for the caption name leveraging a special replacement "%n". A small help icon next to the caption field label explains how to use this capability. When you are done supplying the details, you can click "Copy details to all images" and your submission will start instantly, using all of the details supplied for the image you are editing. You can quickly set tags, an image description and a caption name template (for instance "Aquarium %n") to all images using this new capability, useful when submitting 50+ images at once. Of course, you can still supply the details for each individual image as well, if you wish.

    Submitting a lot of images at once has been made easier
    In addition to improvements for submitting images, albums have been updated to include many new features, including:
    Commenting Reviews Reactions Messages Featuring Hiding Locking Reporting Searching A new Gallery widget (sidebar block) to show albums anywhere throughout the Community Suite has been added as well.

    Album overview page
    Going along with these changes, we've improved how groups of images that are submitted to an album are handled in searches. If you submit multiple images to an album, you will only see the album listed in activity streams, and similarly if you follow a bunch of images in an album these are grouped as well, making activity streams more useful and easier to follow.

    Activity streams have been updated as well
    The changes to albums and image submissions will simplify your users' interaction with Gallery in 4.2, and make submitting images and new albums, and working with those albums more useful and robust.
  97. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from KentT for a blog entry, New: Gallery improvements   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release
    We are happy to introduce several changes to our Gallery application to both refine the existing capabilities and to introduce new useful functionality; particularly for Albums.
    We have clarified how to submit images directly to a category on the first step of the upload form in Gallery.

    Clarification for submitting directly to a category
    When submitting images to the Gallery, a simple "Add more images" button has been added to the wizard. While it has always been possible to add more images by dragging and dropping them on to the upload area, or by clicking the "Choose files" button again, the addition of this button should help add some clarity for users who overlooked these capabilities.

    A new "Add more images" button makes adding additional images easier
    Applying the same details to all of the images you are submitting has been made much simpler. When you begin entering the details for the first image, you can specify a template to use for the caption name leveraging a special replacement "%n". A small help icon next to the caption field label explains how to use this capability. When you are done supplying the details, you can click "Copy details to all images" and your submission will start instantly, using all of the details supplied for the image you are editing. You can quickly set tags, an image description and a caption name template (for instance "Aquarium %n") to all images using this new capability, useful when submitting 50+ images at once. Of course, you can still supply the details for each individual image as well, if you wish.

    Submitting a lot of images at once has been made easier
    In addition to improvements for submitting images, albums have been updated to include many new features, including:
    Commenting Reviews Reactions Messages Featuring Hiding Locking Reporting Searching A new Gallery widget (sidebar block) to show albums anywhere throughout the Community Suite has been added as well.

    Album overview page
    Going along with these changes, we've improved how groups of images that are submitted to an album are handled in searches. If you submit multiple images to an album, you will only see the album listed in activity streams, and similarly if you follow a bunch of images in an album these are grouped as well, making activity streams more useful and easier to follow.

    Activity streams have been updated as well
    The changes to albums and image submissions will simplify your users' interaction with Gallery in 4.2, and make submitting images and new albums, and working with those albums more useful and robust.
  98. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from BN_IT_Support for a blog entry, New: Gallery improvements   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release
    We are happy to introduce several changes to our Gallery application to both refine the existing capabilities and to introduce new useful functionality; particularly for Albums.
    We have clarified how to submit images directly to a category on the first step of the upload form in Gallery.

    Clarification for submitting directly to a category
    When submitting images to the Gallery, a simple "Add more images" button has been added to the wizard. While it has always been possible to add more images by dragging and dropping them on to the upload area, or by clicking the "Choose files" button again, the addition of this button should help add some clarity for users who overlooked these capabilities.

    A new "Add more images" button makes adding additional images easier
    Applying the same details to all of the images you are submitting has been made much simpler. When you begin entering the details for the first image, you can specify a template to use for the caption name leveraging a special replacement "%n". A small help icon next to the caption field label explains how to use this capability. When you are done supplying the details, you can click "Copy details to all images" and your submission will start instantly, using all of the details supplied for the image you are editing. You can quickly set tags, an image description and a caption name template (for instance "Aquarium %n") to all images using this new capability, useful when submitting 50+ images at once. Of course, you can still supply the details for each individual image as well, if you wish.

    Submitting a lot of images at once has been made easier
    In addition to improvements for submitting images, albums have been updated to include many new features, including:
    Commenting Reviews Reactions Messages Featuring Hiding Locking Reporting Searching A new Gallery widget (sidebar block) to show albums anywhere throughout the Community Suite has been added as well.

    Album overview page
    Going along with these changes, we've improved how groups of images that are submitted to an album are handled in searches. If you submit multiple images to an album, you will only see the album listed in activity streams, and similarly if you follow a bunch of images in an album these are grouped as well, making activity streams more useful and easier to follow.

    Activity streams have been updated as well
    The changes to albums and image submissions will simplify your users' interaction with Gallery in 4.2, and make submitting images and new albums, and working with those albums more useful and robust.
  99. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from media for a blog entry, New: Gallery improvements   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release
    We are happy to introduce several changes to our Gallery application to both refine the existing capabilities and to introduce new useful functionality; particularly for Albums.
    We have clarified how to submit images directly to a category on the first step of the upload form in Gallery.

    Clarification for submitting directly to a category
    When submitting images to the Gallery, a simple "Add more images" button has been added to the wizard. While it has always been possible to add more images by dragging and dropping them on to the upload area, or by clicking the "Choose files" button again, the addition of this button should help add some clarity for users who overlooked these capabilities.

    A new "Add more images" button makes adding additional images easier
    Applying the same details to all of the images you are submitting has been made much simpler. When you begin entering the details for the first image, you can specify a template to use for the caption name leveraging a special replacement "%n". A small help icon next to the caption field label explains how to use this capability. When you are done supplying the details, you can click "Copy details to all images" and your submission will start instantly, using all of the details supplied for the image you are editing. You can quickly set tags, an image description and a caption name template (for instance "Aquarium %n") to all images using this new capability, useful when submitting 50+ images at once. Of course, you can still supply the details for each individual image as well, if you wish.

    Submitting a lot of images at once has been made easier
    In addition to improvements for submitting images, albums have been updated to include many new features, including:
    Commenting Reviews Reactions Messages Featuring Hiding Locking Reporting Searching A new Gallery widget (sidebar block) to show albums anywhere throughout the Community Suite has been added as well.

    Album overview page
    Going along with these changes, we've improved how groups of images that are submitted to an album are handled in searches. If you submit multiple images to an album, you will only see the album listed in activity streams, and similarly if you follow a bunch of images in an album these are grouped as well, making activity streams more useful and easier to follow.

    Activity streams have been updated as well
    The changes to albums and image submissions will simplify your users' interaction with Gallery in 4.2, and make submitting images and new albums, and working with those albums more useful and robust.
  100. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from Adriano Faria for a blog entry, New: Gallery improvements   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release
    We are happy to introduce several changes to our Gallery application to both refine the existing capabilities and to introduce new useful functionality; particularly for Albums.
    We have clarified how to submit images directly to a category on the first step of the upload form in Gallery.

    Clarification for submitting directly to a category
    When submitting images to the Gallery, a simple "Add more images" button has been added to the wizard. While it has always been possible to add more images by dragging and dropping them on to the upload area, or by clicking the "Choose files" button again, the addition of this button should help add some clarity for users who overlooked these capabilities.

    A new "Add more images" button makes adding additional images easier
    Applying the same details to all of the images you are submitting has been made much simpler. When you begin entering the details for the first image, you can specify a template to use for the caption name leveraging a special replacement "%n". A small help icon next to the caption field label explains how to use this capability. When you are done supplying the details, you can click "Copy details to all images" and your submission will start instantly, using all of the details supplied for the image you are editing. You can quickly set tags, an image description and a caption name template (for instance "Aquarium %n") to all images using this new capability, useful when submitting 50+ images at once. Of course, you can still supply the details for each individual image as well, if you wish.

    Submitting a lot of images at once has been made easier
    In addition to improvements for submitting images, albums have been updated to include many new features, including:
    Commenting Reviews Reactions Messages Featuring Hiding Locking Reporting Searching A new Gallery widget (sidebar block) to show albums anywhere throughout the Community Suite has been added as well.

    Album overview page
    Going along with these changes, we've improved how groups of images that are submitted to an album are handled in searches. If you submit multiple images to an album, you will only see the album listed in activity streams, and similarly if you follow a bunch of images in an album these are grouped as well, making activity streams more useful and easier to follow.

    Activity streams have been updated as well
    The changes to albums and image submissions will simplify your users' interaction with Gallery in 4.2, and make submitting images and new albums, and working with those albums more useful and robust.
  101. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from Aaron M for a blog entry, New: Gallery improvements   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release
    We are happy to introduce several changes to our Gallery application to both refine the existing capabilities and to introduce new useful functionality; particularly for Albums.
    We have clarified how to submit images directly to a category on the first step of the upload form in Gallery.

    Clarification for submitting directly to a category
    When submitting images to the Gallery, a simple "Add more images" button has been added to the wizard. While it has always been possible to add more images by dragging and dropping them on to the upload area, or by clicking the "Choose files" button again, the addition of this button should help add some clarity for users who overlooked these capabilities.

    A new "Add more images" button makes adding additional images easier
    Applying the same details to all of the images you are submitting has been made much simpler. When you begin entering the details for the first image, you can specify a template to use for the caption name leveraging a special replacement "%n". A small help icon next to the caption field label explains how to use this capability. When you are done supplying the details, you can click "Copy details to all images" and your submission will start instantly, using all of the details supplied for the image you are editing. You can quickly set tags, an image description and a caption name template (for instance "Aquarium %n") to all images using this new capability, useful when submitting 50+ images at once. Of course, you can still supply the details for each individual image as well, if you wish.

    Submitting a lot of images at once has been made easier
    In addition to improvements for submitting images, albums have been updated to include many new features, including:
    Commenting Reviews Reactions Messages Featuring Hiding Locking Reporting Searching A new Gallery widget (sidebar block) to show albums anywhere throughout the Community Suite has been added as well.

    Album overview page
    Going along with these changes, we've improved how groups of images that are submitted to an album are handled in searches. If you submit multiple images to an album, you will only see the album listed in activity streams, and similarly if you follow a bunch of images in an album these are grouped as well, making activity streams more useful and easier to follow.

    Activity streams have been updated as well
    The changes to albums and image submissions will simplify your users' interaction with Gallery in 4.2, and make submitting images and new albums, and working with those albums more useful and robust.
  102. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from Simon Woods for a blog entry, New: Gallery improvements   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release
    We are happy to introduce several changes to our Gallery application to both refine the existing capabilities and to introduce new useful functionality; particularly for Albums.
    We have clarified how to submit images directly to a category on the first step of the upload form in Gallery.

    Clarification for submitting directly to a category
    When submitting images to the Gallery, a simple "Add more images" button has been added to the wizard. While it has always been possible to add more images by dragging and dropping them on to the upload area, or by clicking the "Choose files" button again, the addition of this button should help add some clarity for users who overlooked these capabilities.

    A new "Add more images" button makes adding additional images easier
    Applying the same details to all of the images you are submitting has been made much simpler. When you begin entering the details for the first image, you can specify a template to use for the caption name leveraging a special replacement "%n". A small help icon next to the caption field label explains how to use this capability. When you are done supplying the details, you can click "Copy details to all images" and your submission will start instantly, using all of the details supplied for the image you are editing. You can quickly set tags, an image description and a caption name template (for instance "Aquarium %n") to all images using this new capability, useful when submitting 50+ images at once. Of course, you can still supply the details for each individual image as well, if you wish.

    Submitting a lot of images at once has been made easier
    In addition to improvements for submitting images, albums have been updated to include many new features, including:
    Commenting Reviews Reactions Messages Featuring Hiding Locking Reporting Searching A new Gallery widget (sidebar block) to show albums anywhere throughout the Community Suite has been added as well.

    Album overview page
    Going along with these changes, we've improved how groups of images that are submitted to an album are handled in searches. If you submit multiple images to an album, you will only see the album listed in activity streams, and similarly if you follow a bunch of images in an album these are grouped as well, making activity streams more useful and easier to follow.

    Activity streams have been updated as well
    The changes to albums and image submissions will simplify your users' interaction with Gallery in 4.2, and make submitting images and new albums, and working with those albums more useful and robust.
  103. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from Joel R for a blog entry, New: Gallery improvements   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release
    We are happy to introduce several changes to our Gallery application to both refine the existing capabilities and to introduce new useful functionality; particularly for Albums.
    We have clarified how to submit images directly to a category on the first step of the upload form in Gallery.

    Clarification for submitting directly to a category
    When submitting images to the Gallery, a simple "Add more images" button has been added to the wizard. While it has always been possible to add more images by dragging and dropping them on to the upload area, or by clicking the "Choose files" button again, the addition of this button should help add some clarity for users who overlooked these capabilities.

    A new "Add more images" button makes adding additional images easier
    Applying the same details to all of the images you are submitting has been made much simpler. When you begin entering the details for the first image, you can specify a template to use for the caption name leveraging a special replacement "%n". A small help icon next to the caption field label explains how to use this capability. When you are done supplying the details, you can click "Copy details to all images" and your submission will start instantly, using all of the details supplied for the image you are editing. You can quickly set tags, an image description and a caption name template (for instance "Aquarium %n") to all images using this new capability, useful when submitting 50+ images at once. Of course, you can still supply the details for each individual image as well, if you wish.

    Submitting a lot of images at once has been made easier
    In addition to improvements for submitting images, albums have been updated to include many new features, including:
    Commenting Reviews Reactions Messages Featuring Hiding Locking Reporting Searching A new Gallery widget (sidebar block) to show albums anywhere throughout the Community Suite has been added as well.

    Album overview page
    Going along with these changes, we've improved how groups of images that are submitted to an album are handled in searches. If you submit multiple images to an album, you will only see the album listed in activity streams, and similarly if you follow a bunch of images in an album these are grouped as well, making activity streams more useful and easier to follow.

    Activity streams have been updated as well
    The changes to albums and image submissions will simplify your users' interaction with Gallery in 4.2, and make submitting images and new albums, and working with those albums more useful and robust.
  104. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from O9C4 for a blog entry, New: Gallery improvements   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release
    We are happy to introduce several changes to our Gallery application to both refine the existing capabilities and to introduce new useful functionality; particularly for Albums.
    We have clarified how to submit images directly to a category on the first step of the upload form in Gallery.

    Clarification for submitting directly to a category
    When submitting images to the Gallery, a simple "Add more images" button has been added to the wizard. While it has always been possible to add more images by dragging and dropping them on to the upload area, or by clicking the "Choose files" button again, the addition of this button should help add some clarity for users who overlooked these capabilities.

    A new "Add more images" button makes adding additional images easier
    Applying the same details to all of the images you are submitting has been made much simpler. When you begin entering the details for the first image, you can specify a template to use for the caption name leveraging a special replacement "%n". A small help icon next to the caption field label explains how to use this capability. When you are done supplying the details, you can click "Copy details to all images" and your submission will start instantly, using all of the details supplied for the image you are editing. You can quickly set tags, an image description and a caption name template (for instance "Aquarium %n") to all images using this new capability, useful when submitting 50+ images at once. Of course, you can still supply the details for each individual image as well, if you wish.

    Submitting a lot of images at once has been made easier
    In addition to improvements for submitting images, albums have been updated to include many new features, including:
    Commenting Reviews Reactions Messages Featuring Hiding Locking Reporting Searching A new Gallery widget (sidebar block) to show albums anywhere throughout the Community Suite has been added as well.

    Album overview page
    Going along with these changes, we've improved how groups of images that are submitted to an album are handled in searches. If you submit multiple images to an album, you will only see the album listed in activity streams, and similarly if you follow a bunch of images in an album these are grouped as well, making activity streams more useful and easier to follow.

    Activity streams have been updated as well
    The changes to albums and image submissions will simplify your users' interaction with Gallery in 4.2, and make submitting images and new albums, and working with those albums more useful and robust.
  105. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from TheSonic for a blog entry, New: Gallery improvements   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release
    We are happy to introduce several changes to our Gallery application to both refine the existing capabilities and to introduce new useful functionality; particularly for Albums.
    We have clarified how to submit images directly to a category on the first step of the upload form in Gallery.

    Clarification for submitting directly to a category
    When submitting images to the Gallery, a simple "Add more images" button has been added to the wizard. While it has always been possible to add more images by dragging and dropping them on to the upload area, or by clicking the "Choose files" button again, the addition of this button should help add some clarity for users who overlooked these capabilities.

    A new "Add more images" button makes adding additional images easier
    Applying the same details to all of the images you are submitting has been made much simpler. When you begin entering the details for the first image, you can specify a template to use for the caption name leveraging a special replacement "%n". A small help icon next to the caption field label explains how to use this capability. When you are done supplying the details, you can click "Copy details to all images" and your submission will start instantly, using all of the details supplied for the image you are editing. You can quickly set tags, an image description and a caption name template (for instance "Aquarium %n") to all images using this new capability, useful when submitting 50+ images at once. Of course, you can still supply the details for each individual image as well, if you wish.

    Submitting a lot of images at once has been made easier
    In addition to improvements for submitting images, albums have been updated to include many new features, including:
    Commenting Reviews Reactions Messages Featuring Hiding Locking Reporting Searching A new Gallery widget (sidebar block) to show albums anywhere throughout the Community Suite has been added as well.

    Album overview page
    Going along with these changes, we've improved how groups of images that are submitted to an album are handled in searches. If you submit multiple images to an album, you will only see the album listed in activity streams, and similarly if you follow a bunch of images in an album these are grouped as well, making activity streams more useful and easier to follow.

    Activity streams have been updated as well
    The changes to albums and image submissions will simplify your users' interaction with Gallery in 4.2, and make submitting images and new albums, and working with those albums more useful and robust.
  106. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from PrettyPixels for a blog entry, New: Gallery improvements   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release
    We are happy to introduce several changes to our Gallery application to both refine the existing capabilities and to introduce new useful functionality; particularly for Albums.
    We have clarified how to submit images directly to a category on the first step of the upload form in Gallery.

    Clarification for submitting directly to a category
    When submitting images to the Gallery, a simple "Add more images" button has been added to the wizard. While it has always been possible to add more images by dragging and dropping them on to the upload area, or by clicking the "Choose files" button again, the addition of this button should help add some clarity for users who overlooked these capabilities.

    A new "Add more images" button makes adding additional images easier
    Applying the same details to all of the images you are submitting has been made much simpler. When you begin entering the details for the first image, you can specify a template to use for the caption name leveraging a special replacement "%n". A small help icon next to the caption field label explains how to use this capability. When you are done supplying the details, you can click "Copy details to all images" and your submission will start instantly, using all of the details supplied for the image you are editing. You can quickly set tags, an image description and a caption name template (for instance "Aquarium %n") to all images using this new capability, useful when submitting 50+ images at once. Of course, you can still supply the details for each individual image as well, if you wish.

    Submitting a lot of images at once has been made easier
    In addition to improvements for submitting images, albums have been updated to include many new features, including:
    Commenting Reviews Reactions Messages Featuring Hiding Locking Reporting Searching A new Gallery widget (sidebar block) to show albums anywhere throughout the Community Suite has been added as well.

    Album overview page
    Going along with these changes, we've improved how groups of images that are submitted to an album are handled in searches. If you submit multiple images to an album, you will only see the album listed in activity streams, and similarly if you follow a bunch of images in an album these are grouped as well, making activity streams more useful and easier to follow.

    Activity streams have been updated as well
    The changes to albums and image submissions will simplify your users' interaction with Gallery in 4.2, and make submitting images and new albums, and working with those albums more useful and robust.
  107. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from The Old Man for a blog entry, New: Statistics   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release
    Statistics can be an important part of monitoring your site and ensuring it grows and responds to your marketing and promotion efforts effectively, and several new statistic tools have been added to the 4.2 Community Suite which we know you will be excited to learn about!
    A simple tool has been added that will allow you to look up and list all member accounts that have last visited the site within a specified time period.

    Look up members who have visited within a set time period
    Additionally, online user (both logged in user and guest) counts are now tracked every 15 minutes and graphed in the AdminCP for you to reference. You can view online user trends over a specified date period, view just guest counts or just member counts (or both), and view the graph in multiple different modes (such as an area chart or as a column chart). By default, the data is retained for 180 days, however you can control how often to prune this statistical data in the AdminCP.

    Online user trends graphed
    You can also view a graph of member activity on the site. Member activity is defined as any "activity" beyond simply browsing, such as submitting a new post, reacting to any content item or comment, or following any content item or node.

    Activity information about your member base
    You will also be able to define keywords that you would like to monitor and then see both a graph of usage of those keywords, as well as a table listing all usages of those keywords. You can use this to track usage of competitor names, find out if hash tags you define are trending, or learn if promotional materials are making an impact on your membership.

    Keyword tracking can help you closely monitor your community
    Along with these additions, we've cleaned up the menu and wording for the rest of the existing statistic options to make their functions more clear.
    We hope these additions help you better track and control your community, making the most of your time and money.
     
    Note for developers: A new chart class has been added which allows you to populate dynamic charts using callbacks, in addition to the standard methods that already exist for pulling data directly from a specified database table.
  108. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from Faqole for a blog entry, New: Statistics   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release
    Statistics can be an important part of monitoring your site and ensuring it grows and responds to your marketing and promotion efforts effectively, and several new statistic tools have been added to the 4.2 Community Suite which we know you will be excited to learn about!
    A simple tool has been added that will allow you to look up and list all member accounts that have last visited the site within a specified time period.

    Look up members who have visited within a set time period
    Additionally, online user (both logged in user and guest) counts are now tracked every 15 minutes and graphed in the AdminCP for you to reference. You can view online user trends over a specified date period, view just guest counts or just member counts (or both), and view the graph in multiple different modes (such as an area chart or as a column chart). By default, the data is retained for 180 days, however you can control how often to prune this statistical data in the AdminCP.

    Online user trends graphed
    You can also view a graph of member activity on the site. Member activity is defined as any "activity" beyond simply browsing, such as submitting a new post, reacting to any content item or comment, or following any content item or node.

    Activity information about your member base
    You will also be able to define keywords that you would like to monitor and then see both a graph of usage of those keywords, as well as a table listing all usages of those keywords. You can use this to track usage of competitor names, find out if hash tags you define are trending, or learn if promotional materials are making an impact on your membership.

    Keyword tracking can help you closely monitor your community
    Along with these additions, we've cleaned up the menu and wording for the rest of the existing statistic options to make their functions more clear.
    We hope these additions help you better track and control your community, making the most of your time and money.
     
    Note for developers: A new chart class has been added which allows you to populate dynamic charts using callbacks, in addition to the standard methods that already exist for pulling data directly from a specified database table.
  109. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from Daddy for a blog entry, New: Statistics   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release
    Statistics can be an important part of monitoring your site and ensuring it grows and responds to your marketing and promotion efforts effectively, and several new statistic tools have been added to the 4.2 Community Suite which we know you will be excited to learn about!
    A simple tool has been added that will allow you to look up and list all member accounts that have last visited the site within a specified time period.

    Look up members who have visited within a set time period
    Additionally, online user (both logged in user and guest) counts are now tracked every 15 minutes and graphed in the AdminCP for you to reference. You can view online user trends over a specified date period, view just guest counts or just member counts (or both), and view the graph in multiple different modes (such as an area chart or as a column chart). By default, the data is retained for 180 days, however you can control how often to prune this statistical data in the AdminCP.

    Online user trends graphed
    You can also view a graph of member activity on the site. Member activity is defined as any "activity" beyond simply browsing, such as submitting a new post, reacting to any content item or comment, or following any content item or node.

    Activity information about your member base
    You will also be able to define keywords that you would like to monitor and then see both a graph of usage of those keywords, as well as a table listing all usages of those keywords. You can use this to track usage of competitor names, find out if hash tags you define are trending, or learn if promotional materials are making an impact on your membership.

    Keyword tracking can help you closely monitor your community
    Along with these additions, we've cleaned up the menu and wording for the rest of the existing statistic options to make their functions more clear.
    We hope these additions help you better track and control your community, making the most of your time and money.
     
    Note for developers: A new chart class has been added which allows you to populate dynamic charts using callbacks, in addition to the standard methods that already exist for pulling data directly from a specified database table.
  110. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from Insydius for a blog entry, New: Statistics   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release
    Statistics can be an important part of monitoring your site and ensuring it grows and responds to your marketing and promotion efforts effectively, and several new statistic tools have been added to the 4.2 Community Suite which we know you will be excited to learn about!
    A simple tool has been added that will allow you to look up and list all member accounts that have last visited the site within a specified time period.

    Look up members who have visited within a set time period
    Additionally, online user (both logged in user and guest) counts are now tracked every 15 minutes and graphed in the AdminCP for you to reference. You can view online user trends over a specified date period, view just guest counts or just member counts (or both), and view the graph in multiple different modes (such as an area chart or as a column chart). By default, the data is retained for 180 days, however you can control how often to prune this statistical data in the AdminCP.

    Online user trends graphed
    You can also view a graph of member activity on the site. Member activity is defined as any "activity" beyond simply browsing, such as submitting a new post, reacting to any content item or comment, or following any content item or node.

    Activity information about your member base
    You will also be able to define keywords that you would like to monitor and then see both a graph of usage of those keywords, as well as a table listing all usages of those keywords. You can use this to track usage of competitor names, find out if hash tags you define are trending, or learn if promotional materials are making an impact on your membership.

    Keyword tracking can help you closely monitor your community
    Along with these additions, we've cleaned up the menu and wording for the rest of the existing statistic options to make their functions more clear.
    We hope these additions help you better track and control your community, making the most of your time and money.
     
    Note for developers: A new chart class has been added which allows you to populate dynamic charts using callbacks, in addition to the standard methods that already exist for pulling data directly from a specified database table.
  111. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from LiquidFractal for a blog entry, New: Statistics   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release
    Statistics can be an important part of monitoring your site and ensuring it grows and responds to your marketing and promotion efforts effectively, and several new statistic tools have been added to the 4.2 Community Suite which we know you will be excited to learn about!
    A simple tool has been added that will allow you to look up and list all member accounts that have last visited the site within a specified time period.

    Look up members who have visited within a set time period
    Additionally, online user (both logged in user and guest) counts are now tracked every 15 minutes and graphed in the AdminCP for you to reference. You can view online user trends over a specified date period, view just guest counts or just member counts (or both), and view the graph in multiple different modes (such as an area chart or as a column chart). By default, the data is retained for 180 days, however you can control how often to prune this statistical data in the AdminCP.

    Online user trends graphed
    You can also view a graph of member activity on the site. Member activity is defined as any "activity" beyond simply browsing, such as submitting a new post, reacting to any content item or comment, or following any content item or node.

    Activity information about your member base
    You will also be able to define keywords that you would like to monitor and then see both a graph of usage of those keywords, as well as a table listing all usages of those keywords. You can use this to track usage of competitor names, find out if hash tags you define are trending, or learn if promotional materials are making an impact on your membership.

    Keyword tracking can help you closely monitor your community
    Along with these additions, we've cleaned up the menu and wording for the rest of the existing statistic options to make their functions more clear.
    We hope these additions help you better track and control your community, making the most of your time and money.
     
    Note for developers: A new chart class has been added which allows you to populate dynamic charts using callbacks, in addition to the standard methods that already exist for pulling data directly from a specified database table.
  112. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from sobrenome for a blog entry, New: Statistics   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release
    Statistics can be an important part of monitoring your site and ensuring it grows and responds to your marketing and promotion efforts effectively, and several new statistic tools have been added to the 4.2 Community Suite which we know you will be excited to learn about!
    A simple tool has been added that will allow you to look up and list all member accounts that have last visited the site within a specified time period.

    Look up members who have visited within a set time period
    Additionally, online user (both logged in user and guest) counts are now tracked every 15 minutes and graphed in the AdminCP for you to reference. You can view online user trends over a specified date period, view just guest counts or just member counts (or both), and view the graph in multiple different modes (such as an area chart or as a column chart). By default, the data is retained for 180 days, however you can control how often to prune this statistical data in the AdminCP.

    Online user trends graphed
    You can also view a graph of member activity on the site. Member activity is defined as any "activity" beyond simply browsing, such as submitting a new post, reacting to any content item or comment, or following any content item or node.

    Activity information about your member base
    You will also be able to define keywords that you would like to monitor and then see both a graph of usage of those keywords, as well as a table listing all usages of those keywords. You can use this to track usage of competitor names, find out if hash tags you define are trending, or learn if promotional materials are making an impact on your membership.

    Keyword tracking can help you closely monitor your community
    Along with these additions, we've cleaned up the menu and wording for the rest of the existing statistic options to make their functions more clear.
    We hope these additions help you better track and control your community, making the most of your time and money.
     
    Note for developers: A new chart class has been added which allows you to populate dynamic charts using callbacks, in addition to the standard methods that already exist for pulling data directly from a specified database table.
  113. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from uA_Y_C_A for a blog entry, New: Statistics   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release
    Statistics can be an important part of monitoring your site and ensuring it grows and responds to your marketing and promotion efforts effectively, and several new statistic tools have been added to the 4.2 Community Suite which we know you will be excited to learn about!
    A simple tool has been added that will allow you to look up and list all member accounts that have last visited the site within a specified time period.

    Look up members who have visited within a set time period
    Additionally, online user (both logged in user and guest) counts are now tracked every 15 minutes and graphed in the AdminCP for you to reference. You can view online user trends over a specified date period, view just guest counts or just member counts (or both), and view the graph in multiple different modes (such as an area chart or as a column chart). By default, the data is retained for 180 days, however you can control how often to prune this statistical data in the AdminCP.

    Online user trends graphed
    You can also view a graph of member activity on the site. Member activity is defined as any "activity" beyond simply browsing, such as submitting a new post, reacting to any content item or comment, or following any content item or node.

    Activity information about your member base
    You will also be able to define keywords that you would like to monitor and then see both a graph of usage of those keywords, as well as a table listing all usages of those keywords. You can use this to track usage of competitor names, find out if hash tags you define are trending, or learn if promotional materials are making an impact on your membership.

    Keyword tracking can help you closely monitor your community
    Along with these additions, we've cleaned up the menu and wording for the rest of the existing statistic options to make their functions more clear.
    We hope these additions help you better track and control your community, making the most of your time and money.
     
    Note for developers: A new chart class has been added which allows you to populate dynamic charts using callbacks, in addition to the standard methods that already exist for pulling data directly from a specified database table.
  114. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from Tomasz Nowak_59903 for a blog entry, New: Statistics   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release
    Statistics can be an important part of monitoring your site and ensuring it grows and responds to your marketing and promotion efforts effectively, and several new statistic tools have been added to the 4.2 Community Suite which we know you will be excited to learn about!
    A simple tool has been added that will allow you to look up and list all member accounts that have last visited the site within a specified time period.

    Look up members who have visited within a set time period
    Additionally, online user (both logged in user and guest) counts are now tracked every 15 minutes and graphed in the AdminCP for you to reference. You can view online user trends over a specified date period, view just guest counts or just member counts (or both), and view the graph in multiple different modes (such as an area chart or as a column chart). By default, the data is retained for 180 days, however you can control how often to prune this statistical data in the AdminCP.

    Online user trends graphed
    You can also view a graph of member activity on the site. Member activity is defined as any "activity" beyond simply browsing, such as submitting a new post, reacting to any content item or comment, or following any content item or node.

    Activity information about your member base
    You will also be able to define keywords that you would like to monitor and then see both a graph of usage of those keywords, as well as a table listing all usages of those keywords. You can use this to track usage of competitor names, find out if hash tags you define are trending, or learn if promotional materials are making an impact on your membership.

    Keyword tracking can help you closely monitor your community
    Along with these additions, we've cleaned up the menu and wording for the rest of the existing statistic options to make their functions more clear.
    We hope these additions help you better track and control your community, making the most of your time and money.
     
    Note for developers: A new chart class has been added which allows you to populate dynamic charts using callbacks, in addition to the standard methods that already exist for pulling data directly from a specified database table.
  115. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from mark007 for a blog entry, New: Statistics   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release
    Statistics can be an important part of monitoring your site and ensuring it grows and responds to your marketing and promotion efforts effectively, and several new statistic tools have been added to the 4.2 Community Suite which we know you will be excited to learn about!
    A simple tool has been added that will allow you to look up and list all member accounts that have last visited the site within a specified time period.

    Look up members who have visited within a set time period
    Additionally, online user (both logged in user and guest) counts are now tracked every 15 minutes and graphed in the AdminCP for you to reference. You can view online user trends over a specified date period, view just guest counts or just member counts (or both), and view the graph in multiple different modes (such as an area chart or as a column chart). By default, the data is retained for 180 days, however you can control how often to prune this statistical data in the AdminCP.

    Online user trends graphed
    You can also view a graph of member activity on the site. Member activity is defined as any "activity" beyond simply browsing, such as submitting a new post, reacting to any content item or comment, or following any content item or node.

    Activity information about your member base
    You will also be able to define keywords that you would like to monitor and then see both a graph of usage of those keywords, as well as a table listing all usages of those keywords. You can use this to track usage of competitor names, find out if hash tags you define are trending, or learn if promotional materials are making an impact on your membership.

    Keyword tracking can help you closely monitor your community
    Along with these additions, we've cleaned up the menu and wording for the rest of the existing statistic options to make their functions more clear.
    We hope these additions help you better track and control your community, making the most of your time and money.
     
    Note for developers: A new chart class has been added which allows you to populate dynamic charts using callbacks, in addition to the standard methods that already exist for pulling data directly from a specified database table.
  116. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from Netherlord for a blog entry, New: Statistics   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release
    Statistics can be an important part of monitoring your site and ensuring it grows and responds to your marketing and promotion efforts effectively, and several new statistic tools have been added to the 4.2 Community Suite which we know you will be excited to learn about!
    A simple tool has been added that will allow you to look up and list all member accounts that have last visited the site within a specified time period.

    Look up members who have visited within a set time period
    Additionally, online user (both logged in user and guest) counts are now tracked every 15 minutes and graphed in the AdminCP for you to reference. You can view online user trends over a specified date period, view just guest counts or just member counts (or both), and view the graph in multiple different modes (such as an area chart or as a column chart). By default, the data is retained for 180 days, however you can control how often to prune this statistical data in the AdminCP.

    Online user trends graphed
    You can also view a graph of member activity on the site. Member activity is defined as any "activity" beyond simply browsing, such as submitting a new post, reacting to any content item or comment, or following any content item or node.

    Activity information about your member base
    You will also be able to define keywords that you would like to monitor and then see both a graph of usage of those keywords, as well as a table listing all usages of those keywords. You can use this to track usage of competitor names, find out if hash tags you define are trending, or learn if promotional materials are making an impact on your membership.

    Keyword tracking can help you closely monitor your community
    Along with these additions, we've cleaned up the menu and wording for the rest of the existing statistic options to make their functions more clear.
    We hope these additions help you better track and control your community, making the most of your time and money.
     
    Note for developers: A new chart class has been added which allows you to populate dynamic charts using callbacks, in addition to the standard methods that already exist for pulling data directly from a specified database table.
  117. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from BariatricPal for a blog entry, New: Statistics   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release
    Statistics can be an important part of monitoring your site and ensuring it grows and responds to your marketing and promotion efforts effectively, and several new statistic tools have been added to the 4.2 Community Suite which we know you will be excited to learn about!
    A simple tool has been added that will allow you to look up and list all member accounts that have last visited the site within a specified time period.

    Look up members who have visited within a set time period
    Additionally, online user (both logged in user and guest) counts are now tracked every 15 minutes and graphed in the AdminCP for you to reference. You can view online user trends over a specified date period, view just guest counts or just member counts (or both), and view the graph in multiple different modes (such as an area chart or as a column chart). By default, the data is retained for 180 days, however you can control how often to prune this statistical data in the AdminCP.

    Online user trends graphed
    You can also view a graph of member activity on the site. Member activity is defined as any "activity" beyond simply browsing, such as submitting a new post, reacting to any content item or comment, or following any content item or node.

    Activity information about your member base
    You will also be able to define keywords that you would like to monitor and then see both a graph of usage of those keywords, as well as a table listing all usages of those keywords. You can use this to track usage of competitor names, find out if hash tags you define are trending, or learn if promotional materials are making an impact on your membership.

    Keyword tracking can help you closely monitor your community
    Along with these additions, we've cleaned up the menu and wording for the rest of the existing statistic options to make their functions more clear.
    We hope these additions help you better track and control your community, making the most of your time and money.
     
    Note for developers: A new chart class has been added which allows you to populate dynamic charts using callbacks, in addition to the standard methods that already exist for pulling data directly from a specified database table.
  118. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from SeNioR- for a blog entry, New: Statistics   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release
    Statistics can be an important part of monitoring your site and ensuring it grows and responds to your marketing and promotion efforts effectively, and several new statistic tools have been added to the 4.2 Community Suite which we know you will be excited to learn about!
    A simple tool has been added that will allow you to look up and list all member accounts that have last visited the site within a specified time period.

    Look up members who have visited within a set time period
    Additionally, online user (both logged in user and guest) counts are now tracked every 15 minutes and graphed in the AdminCP for you to reference. You can view online user trends over a specified date period, view just guest counts or just member counts (or both), and view the graph in multiple different modes (such as an area chart or as a column chart). By default, the data is retained for 180 days, however you can control how often to prune this statistical data in the AdminCP.

    Online user trends graphed
    You can also view a graph of member activity on the site. Member activity is defined as any "activity" beyond simply browsing, such as submitting a new post, reacting to any content item or comment, or following any content item or node.

    Activity information about your member base
    You will also be able to define keywords that you would like to monitor and then see both a graph of usage of those keywords, as well as a table listing all usages of those keywords. You can use this to track usage of competitor names, find out if hash tags you define are trending, or learn if promotional materials are making an impact on your membership.

    Keyword tracking can help you closely monitor your community
    Along with these additions, we've cleaned up the menu and wording for the rest of the existing statistic options to make their functions more clear.
    We hope these additions help you better track and control your community, making the most of your time and money.
     
    Note for developers: A new chart class has been added which allows you to populate dynamic charts using callbacks, in addition to the standard methods that already exist for pulling data directly from a specified database table.
  119. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from dean84 for a blog entry, New: Statistics   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release
    Statistics can be an important part of monitoring your site and ensuring it grows and responds to your marketing and promotion efforts effectively, and several new statistic tools have been added to the 4.2 Community Suite which we know you will be excited to learn about!
    A simple tool has been added that will allow you to look up and list all member accounts that have last visited the site within a specified time period.

    Look up members who have visited within a set time period
    Additionally, online user (both logged in user and guest) counts are now tracked every 15 minutes and graphed in the AdminCP for you to reference. You can view online user trends over a specified date period, view just guest counts or just member counts (or both), and view the graph in multiple different modes (such as an area chart or as a column chart). By default, the data is retained for 180 days, however you can control how often to prune this statistical data in the AdminCP.

    Online user trends graphed
    You can also view a graph of member activity on the site. Member activity is defined as any "activity" beyond simply browsing, such as submitting a new post, reacting to any content item or comment, or following any content item or node.

    Activity information about your member base
    You will also be able to define keywords that you would like to monitor and then see both a graph of usage of those keywords, as well as a table listing all usages of those keywords. You can use this to track usage of competitor names, find out if hash tags you define are trending, or learn if promotional materials are making an impact on your membership.

    Keyword tracking can help you closely monitor your community
    Along with these additions, we've cleaned up the menu and wording for the rest of the existing statistic options to make their functions more clear.
    We hope these additions help you better track and control your community, making the most of your time and money.
     
    Note for developers: A new chart class has been added which allows you to populate dynamic charts using callbacks, in addition to the standard methods that already exist for pulling data directly from a specified database table.
  120. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from TAMAN for a blog entry, New: Statistics   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release
    Statistics can be an important part of monitoring your site and ensuring it grows and responds to your marketing and promotion efforts effectively, and several new statistic tools have been added to the 4.2 Community Suite which we know you will be excited to learn about!
    A simple tool has been added that will allow you to look up and list all member accounts that have last visited the site within a specified time period.

    Look up members who have visited within a set time period
    Additionally, online user (both logged in user and guest) counts are now tracked every 15 minutes and graphed in the AdminCP for you to reference. You can view online user trends over a specified date period, view just guest counts or just member counts (or both), and view the graph in multiple different modes (such as an area chart or as a column chart). By default, the data is retained for 180 days, however you can control how often to prune this statistical data in the AdminCP.

    Online user trends graphed
    You can also view a graph of member activity on the site. Member activity is defined as any "activity" beyond simply browsing, such as submitting a new post, reacting to any content item or comment, or following any content item or node.

    Activity information about your member base
    You will also be able to define keywords that you would like to monitor and then see both a graph of usage of those keywords, as well as a table listing all usages of those keywords. You can use this to track usage of competitor names, find out if hash tags you define are trending, or learn if promotional materials are making an impact on your membership.

    Keyword tracking can help you closely monitor your community
    Along with these additions, we've cleaned up the menu and wording for the rest of the existing statistic options to make their functions more clear.
    We hope these additions help you better track and control your community, making the most of your time and money.
     
    Note for developers: A new chart class has been added which allows you to populate dynamic charts using callbacks, in addition to the standard methods that already exist for pulling data directly from a specified database table.
  121. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from Gil Ronen for a blog entry, New: Statistics   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release
    Statistics can be an important part of monitoring your site and ensuring it grows and responds to your marketing and promotion efforts effectively, and several new statistic tools have been added to the 4.2 Community Suite which we know you will be excited to learn about!
    A simple tool has been added that will allow you to look up and list all member accounts that have last visited the site within a specified time period.

    Look up members who have visited within a set time period
    Additionally, online user (both logged in user and guest) counts are now tracked every 15 minutes and graphed in the AdminCP for you to reference. You can view online user trends over a specified date period, view just guest counts or just member counts (or both), and view the graph in multiple different modes (such as an area chart or as a column chart). By default, the data is retained for 180 days, however you can control how often to prune this statistical data in the AdminCP.

    Online user trends graphed
    You can also view a graph of member activity on the site. Member activity is defined as any "activity" beyond simply browsing, such as submitting a new post, reacting to any content item or comment, or following any content item or node.

    Activity information about your member base
    You will also be able to define keywords that you would like to monitor and then see both a graph of usage of those keywords, as well as a table listing all usages of those keywords. You can use this to track usage of competitor names, find out if hash tags you define are trending, or learn if promotional materials are making an impact on your membership.

    Keyword tracking can help you closely monitor your community
    Along with these additions, we've cleaned up the menu and wording for the rest of the existing statistic options to make their functions more clear.
    We hope these additions help you better track and control your community, making the most of your time and money.
     
    Note for developers: A new chart class has been added which allows you to populate dynamic charts using callbacks, in addition to the standard methods that already exist for pulling data directly from a specified database table.
  122. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from Markus Jung for a blog entry, New: Statistics   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release
    Statistics can be an important part of monitoring your site and ensuring it grows and responds to your marketing and promotion efforts effectively, and several new statistic tools have been added to the 4.2 Community Suite which we know you will be excited to learn about!
    A simple tool has been added that will allow you to look up and list all member accounts that have last visited the site within a specified time period.

    Look up members who have visited within a set time period
    Additionally, online user (both logged in user and guest) counts are now tracked every 15 minutes and graphed in the AdminCP for you to reference. You can view online user trends over a specified date period, view just guest counts or just member counts (or both), and view the graph in multiple different modes (such as an area chart or as a column chart). By default, the data is retained for 180 days, however you can control how often to prune this statistical data in the AdminCP.

    Online user trends graphed
    You can also view a graph of member activity on the site. Member activity is defined as any "activity" beyond simply browsing, such as submitting a new post, reacting to any content item or comment, or following any content item or node.

    Activity information about your member base
    You will also be able to define keywords that you would like to monitor and then see both a graph of usage of those keywords, as well as a table listing all usages of those keywords. You can use this to track usage of competitor names, find out if hash tags you define are trending, or learn if promotional materials are making an impact on your membership.

    Keyword tracking can help you closely monitor your community
    Along with these additions, we've cleaned up the menu and wording for the rest of the existing statistic options to make their functions more clear.
    We hope these additions help you better track and control your community, making the most of your time and money.
     
    Note for developers: A new chart class has been added which allows you to populate dynamic charts using callbacks, in addition to the standard methods that already exist for pulling data directly from a specified database table.
  123. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from O9C4 for a blog entry, New: Statistics   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release
    Statistics can be an important part of monitoring your site and ensuring it grows and responds to your marketing and promotion efforts effectively, and several new statistic tools have been added to the 4.2 Community Suite which we know you will be excited to learn about!
    A simple tool has been added that will allow you to look up and list all member accounts that have last visited the site within a specified time period.

    Look up members who have visited within a set time period
    Additionally, online user (both logged in user and guest) counts are now tracked every 15 minutes and graphed in the AdminCP for you to reference. You can view online user trends over a specified date period, view just guest counts or just member counts (or both), and view the graph in multiple different modes (such as an area chart or as a column chart). By default, the data is retained for 180 days, however you can control how often to prune this statistical data in the AdminCP.

    Online user trends graphed
    You can also view a graph of member activity on the site. Member activity is defined as any "activity" beyond simply browsing, such as submitting a new post, reacting to any content item or comment, or following any content item or node.

    Activity information about your member base
    You will also be able to define keywords that you would like to monitor and then see both a graph of usage of those keywords, as well as a table listing all usages of those keywords. You can use this to track usage of competitor names, find out if hash tags you define are trending, or learn if promotional materials are making an impact on your membership.

    Keyword tracking can help you closely monitor your community
    Along with these additions, we've cleaned up the menu and wording for the rest of the existing statistic options to make their functions more clear.
    We hope these additions help you better track and control your community, making the most of your time and money.
     
    Note for developers: A new chart class has been added which allows you to populate dynamic charts using callbacks, in addition to the standard methods that already exist for pulling data directly from a specified database table.
  124. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from BomAle for a blog entry, New: Statistics   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release
    Statistics can be an important part of monitoring your site and ensuring it grows and responds to your marketing and promotion efforts effectively, and several new statistic tools have been added to the 4.2 Community Suite which we know you will be excited to learn about!
    A simple tool has been added that will allow you to look up and list all member accounts that have last visited the site within a specified time period.

    Look up members who have visited within a set time period
    Additionally, online user (both logged in user and guest) counts are now tracked every 15 minutes and graphed in the AdminCP for you to reference. You can view online user trends over a specified date period, view just guest counts or just member counts (or both), and view the graph in multiple different modes (such as an area chart or as a column chart). By default, the data is retained for 180 days, however you can control how often to prune this statistical data in the AdminCP.

    Online user trends graphed
    You can also view a graph of member activity on the site. Member activity is defined as any "activity" beyond simply browsing, such as submitting a new post, reacting to any content item or comment, or following any content item or node.

    Activity information about your member base
    You will also be able to define keywords that you would like to monitor and then see both a graph of usage of those keywords, as well as a table listing all usages of those keywords. You can use this to track usage of competitor names, find out if hash tags you define are trending, or learn if promotional materials are making an impact on your membership.

    Keyword tracking can help you closely monitor your community
    Along with these additions, we've cleaned up the menu and wording for the rest of the existing statistic options to make their functions more clear.
    We hope these additions help you better track and control your community, making the most of your time and money.
     
    Note for developers: A new chart class has been added which allows you to populate dynamic charts using callbacks, in addition to the standard methods that already exist for pulling data directly from a specified database table.
  125. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from IPB3 for a blog entry, New: Statistics   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release
    Statistics can be an important part of monitoring your site and ensuring it grows and responds to your marketing and promotion efforts effectively, and several new statistic tools have been added to the 4.2 Community Suite which we know you will be excited to learn about!
    A simple tool has been added that will allow you to look up and list all member accounts that have last visited the site within a specified time period.

    Look up members who have visited within a set time period
    Additionally, online user (both logged in user and guest) counts are now tracked every 15 minutes and graphed in the AdminCP for you to reference. You can view online user trends over a specified date period, view just guest counts or just member counts (or both), and view the graph in multiple different modes (such as an area chart or as a column chart). By default, the data is retained for 180 days, however you can control how often to prune this statistical data in the AdminCP.

    Online user trends graphed
    You can also view a graph of member activity on the site. Member activity is defined as any "activity" beyond simply browsing, such as submitting a new post, reacting to any content item or comment, or following any content item or node.

    Activity information about your member base
    You will also be able to define keywords that you would like to monitor and then see both a graph of usage of those keywords, as well as a table listing all usages of those keywords. You can use this to track usage of competitor names, find out if hash tags you define are trending, or learn if promotional materials are making an impact on your membership.

    Keyword tracking can help you closely monitor your community
    Along with these additions, we've cleaned up the menu and wording for the rest of the existing statistic options to make their functions more clear.
    We hope these additions help you better track and control your community, making the most of your time and money.
     
    Note for developers: A new chart class has been added which allows you to populate dynamic charts using callbacks, in addition to the standard methods that already exist for pulling data directly from a specified database table.
  126. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from Kaio Macedo for a blog entry, New: Statistics   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release
    Statistics can be an important part of monitoring your site and ensuring it grows and responds to your marketing and promotion efforts effectively, and several new statistic tools have been added to the 4.2 Community Suite which we know you will be excited to learn about!
    A simple tool has been added that will allow you to look up and list all member accounts that have last visited the site within a specified time period.

    Look up members who have visited within a set time period
    Additionally, online user (both logged in user and guest) counts are now tracked every 15 minutes and graphed in the AdminCP for you to reference. You can view online user trends over a specified date period, view just guest counts or just member counts (or both), and view the graph in multiple different modes (such as an area chart or as a column chart). By default, the data is retained for 180 days, however you can control how often to prune this statistical data in the AdminCP.

    Online user trends graphed
    You can also view a graph of member activity on the site. Member activity is defined as any "activity" beyond simply browsing, such as submitting a new post, reacting to any content item or comment, or following any content item or node.

    Activity information about your member base
    You will also be able to define keywords that you would like to monitor and then see both a graph of usage of those keywords, as well as a table listing all usages of those keywords. You can use this to track usage of competitor names, find out if hash tags you define are trending, or learn if promotional materials are making an impact on your membership.

    Keyword tracking can help you closely monitor your community
    Along with these additions, we've cleaned up the menu and wording for the rest of the existing statistic options to make their functions more clear.
    We hope these additions help you better track and control your community, making the most of your time and money.
     
    Note for developers: A new chart class has been added which allows you to populate dynamic charts using callbacks, in addition to the standard methods that already exist for pulling data directly from a specified database table.
  127. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from ASTRAPI for a blog entry, New: Statistics   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release
    Statistics can be an important part of monitoring your site and ensuring it grows and responds to your marketing and promotion efforts effectively, and several new statistic tools have been added to the 4.2 Community Suite which we know you will be excited to learn about!
    A simple tool has been added that will allow you to look up and list all member accounts that have last visited the site within a specified time period.

    Look up members who have visited within a set time period
    Additionally, online user (both logged in user and guest) counts are now tracked every 15 minutes and graphed in the AdminCP for you to reference. You can view online user trends over a specified date period, view just guest counts or just member counts (or both), and view the graph in multiple different modes (such as an area chart or as a column chart). By default, the data is retained for 180 days, however you can control how often to prune this statistical data in the AdminCP.

    Online user trends graphed
    You can also view a graph of member activity on the site. Member activity is defined as any "activity" beyond simply browsing, such as submitting a new post, reacting to any content item or comment, or following any content item or node.

    Activity information about your member base
    You will also be able to define keywords that you would like to monitor and then see both a graph of usage of those keywords, as well as a table listing all usages of those keywords. You can use this to track usage of competitor names, find out if hash tags you define are trending, or learn if promotional materials are making an impact on your membership.

    Keyword tracking can help you closely monitor your community
    Along with these additions, we've cleaned up the menu and wording for the rest of the existing statistic options to make their functions more clear.
    We hope these additions help you better track and control your community, making the most of your time and money.
     
    Note for developers: A new chart class has been added which allows you to populate dynamic charts using callbacks, in addition to the standard methods that already exist for pulling data directly from a specified database table.
  128. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from Farook for a blog entry, New: Statistics   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release
    Statistics can be an important part of monitoring your site and ensuring it grows and responds to your marketing and promotion efforts effectively, and several new statistic tools have been added to the 4.2 Community Suite which we know you will be excited to learn about!
    A simple tool has been added that will allow you to look up and list all member accounts that have last visited the site within a specified time period.

    Look up members who have visited within a set time period
    Additionally, online user (both logged in user and guest) counts are now tracked every 15 minutes and graphed in the AdminCP for you to reference. You can view online user trends over a specified date period, view just guest counts or just member counts (or both), and view the graph in multiple different modes (such as an area chart or as a column chart). By default, the data is retained for 180 days, however you can control how often to prune this statistical data in the AdminCP.

    Online user trends graphed
    You can also view a graph of member activity on the site. Member activity is defined as any "activity" beyond simply browsing, such as submitting a new post, reacting to any content item or comment, or following any content item or node.

    Activity information about your member base
    You will also be able to define keywords that you would like to monitor and then see both a graph of usage of those keywords, as well as a table listing all usages of those keywords. You can use this to track usage of competitor names, find out if hash tags you define are trending, or learn if promotional materials are making an impact on your membership.

    Keyword tracking can help you closely monitor your community
    Along with these additions, we've cleaned up the menu and wording for the rest of the existing statistic options to make their functions more clear.
    We hope these additions help you better track and control your community, making the most of your time and money.
     
    Note for developers: A new chart class has been added which allows you to populate dynamic charts using callbacks, in addition to the standard methods that already exist for pulling data directly from a specified database table.
  129. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from PrettyPixels for a blog entry, New: Statistics   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release
    Statistics can be an important part of monitoring your site and ensuring it grows and responds to your marketing and promotion efforts effectively, and several new statistic tools have been added to the 4.2 Community Suite which we know you will be excited to learn about!
    A simple tool has been added that will allow you to look up and list all member accounts that have last visited the site within a specified time period.

    Look up members who have visited within a set time period
    Additionally, online user (both logged in user and guest) counts are now tracked every 15 minutes and graphed in the AdminCP for you to reference. You can view online user trends over a specified date period, view just guest counts or just member counts (or both), and view the graph in multiple different modes (such as an area chart or as a column chart). By default, the data is retained for 180 days, however you can control how often to prune this statistical data in the AdminCP.

    Online user trends graphed
    You can also view a graph of member activity on the site. Member activity is defined as any "activity" beyond simply browsing, such as submitting a new post, reacting to any content item or comment, or following any content item or node.

    Activity information about your member base
    You will also be able to define keywords that you would like to monitor and then see both a graph of usage of those keywords, as well as a table listing all usages of those keywords. You can use this to track usage of competitor names, find out if hash tags you define are trending, or learn if promotional materials are making an impact on your membership.

    Keyword tracking can help you closely monitor your community
    Along with these additions, we've cleaned up the menu and wording for the rest of the existing statistic options to make their functions more clear.
    We hope these additions help you better track and control your community, making the most of your time and money.
     
    Note for developers: A new chart class has been added which allows you to populate dynamic charts using callbacks, in addition to the standard methods that already exist for pulling data directly from a specified database table.
  130. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from MadMaxMangos for a blog entry, New: Statistics   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release
    Statistics can be an important part of monitoring your site and ensuring it grows and responds to your marketing and promotion efforts effectively, and several new statistic tools have been added to the 4.2 Community Suite which we know you will be excited to learn about!
    A simple tool has been added that will allow you to look up and list all member accounts that have last visited the site within a specified time period.

    Look up members who have visited within a set time period
    Additionally, online user (both logged in user and guest) counts are now tracked every 15 minutes and graphed in the AdminCP for you to reference. You can view online user trends over a specified date period, view just guest counts or just member counts (or both), and view the graph in multiple different modes (such as an area chart or as a column chart). By default, the data is retained for 180 days, however you can control how often to prune this statistical data in the AdminCP.

    Online user trends graphed
    You can also view a graph of member activity on the site. Member activity is defined as any "activity" beyond simply browsing, such as submitting a new post, reacting to any content item or comment, or following any content item or node.

    Activity information about your member base
    You will also be able to define keywords that you would like to monitor and then see both a graph of usage of those keywords, as well as a table listing all usages of those keywords. You can use this to track usage of competitor names, find out if hash tags you define are trending, or learn if promotional materials are making an impact on your membership.

    Keyword tracking can help you closely monitor your community
    Along with these additions, we've cleaned up the menu and wording for the rest of the existing statistic options to make their functions more clear.
    We hope these additions help you better track and control your community, making the most of your time and money.
     
    Note for developers: A new chart class has been added which allows you to populate dynamic charts using callbacks, in addition to the standard methods that already exist for pulling data directly from a specified database table.
  131. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from Thomas. for a blog entry, New: Statistics   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release
    Statistics can be an important part of monitoring your site and ensuring it grows and responds to your marketing and promotion efforts effectively, and several new statistic tools have been added to the 4.2 Community Suite which we know you will be excited to learn about!
    A simple tool has been added that will allow you to look up and list all member accounts that have last visited the site within a specified time period.

    Look up members who have visited within a set time period
    Additionally, online user (both logged in user and guest) counts are now tracked every 15 minutes and graphed in the AdminCP for you to reference. You can view online user trends over a specified date period, view just guest counts or just member counts (or both), and view the graph in multiple different modes (such as an area chart or as a column chart). By default, the data is retained for 180 days, however you can control how often to prune this statistical data in the AdminCP.

    Online user trends graphed
    You can also view a graph of member activity on the site. Member activity is defined as any "activity" beyond simply browsing, such as submitting a new post, reacting to any content item or comment, or following any content item or node.

    Activity information about your member base
    You will also be able to define keywords that you would like to monitor and then see both a graph of usage of those keywords, as well as a table listing all usages of those keywords. You can use this to track usage of competitor names, find out if hash tags you define are trending, or learn if promotional materials are making an impact on your membership.

    Keyword tracking can help you closely monitor your community
    Along with these additions, we've cleaned up the menu and wording for the rest of the existing statistic options to make their functions more clear.
    We hope these additions help you better track and control your community, making the most of your time and money.
     
    Note for developers: A new chart class has been added which allows you to populate dynamic charts using callbacks, in addition to the standard methods that already exist for pulling data directly from a specified database table.
  132. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from Simon Woods for a blog entry, New: Statistics   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release
    Statistics can be an important part of monitoring your site and ensuring it grows and responds to your marketing and promotion efforts effectively, and several new statistic tools have been added to the 4.2 Community Suite which we know you will be excited to learn about!
    A simple tool has been added that will allow you to look up and list all member accounts that have last visited the site within a specified time period.

    Look up members who have visited within a set time period
    Additionally, online user (both logged in user and guest) counts are now tracked every 15 minutes and graphed in the AdminCP for you to reference. You can view online user trends over a specified date period, view just guest counts or just member counts (or both), and view the graph in multiple different modes (such as an area chart or as a column chart). By default, the data is retained for 180 days, however you can control how often to prune this statistical data in the AdminCP.

    Online user trends graphed
    You can also view a graph of member activity on the site. Member activity is defined as any "activity" beyond simply browsing, such as submitting a new post, reacting to any content item or comment, or following any content item or node.

    Activity information about your member base
    You will also be able to define keywords that you would like to monitor and then see both a graph of usage of those keywords, as well as a table listing all usages of those keywords. You can use this to track usage of competitor names, find out if hash tags you define are trending, or learn if promotional materials are making an impact on your membership.

    Keyword tracking can help you closely monitor your community
    Along with these additions, we've cleaned up the menu and wording for the rest of the existing statistic options to make their functions more clear.
    We hope these additions help you better track and control your community, making the most of your time and money.
     
    Note for developers: A new chart class has been added which allows you to populate dynamic charts using callbacks, in addition to the standard methods that already exist for pulling data directly from a specified database table.
  133. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from Kirill Gromov for a blog entry, New: Statistics   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release
    Statistics can be an important part of monitoring your site and ensuring it grows and responds to your marketing and promotion efforts effectively, and several new statistic tools have been added to the 4.2 Community Suite which we know you will be excited to learn about!
    A simple tool has been added that will allow you to look up and list all member accounts that have last visited the site within a specified time period.

    Look up members who have visited within a set time period
    Additionally, online user (both logged in user and guest) counts are now tracked every 15 minutes and graphed in the AdminCP for you to reference. You can view online user trends over a specified date period, view just guest counts or just member counts (or both), and view the graph in multiple different modes (such as an area chart or as a column chart). By default, the data is retained for 180 days, however you can control how often to prune this statistical data in the AdminCP.

    Online user trends graphed
    You can also view a graph of member activity on the site. Member activity is defined as any "activity" beyond simply browsing, such as submitting a new post, reacting to any content item or comment, or following any content item or node.

    Activity information about your member base
    You will also be able to define keywords that you would like to monitor and then see both a graph of usage of those keywords, as well as a table listing all usages of those keywords. You can use this to track usage of competitor names, find out if hash tags you define are trending, or learn if promotional materials are making an impact on your membership.

    Keyword tracking can help you closely monitor your community
    Along with these additions, we've cleaned up the menu and wording for the rest of the existing statistic options to make their functions more clear.
    We hope these additions help you better track and control your community, making the most of your time and money.
     
    Note for developers: A new chart class has been added which allows you to populate dynamic charts using callbacks, in addition to the standard methods that already exist for pulling data directly from a specified database table.
  134. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from McArtemon for a blog entry, New: Statistics   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release
    Statistics can be an important part of monitoring your site and ensuring it grows and responds to your marketing and promotion efforts effectively, and several new statistic tools have been added to the 4.2 Community Suite which we know you will be excited to learn about!
    A simple tool has been added that will allow you to look up and list all member accounts that have last visited the site within a specified time period.

    Look up members who have visited within a set time period
    Additionally, online user (both logged in user and guest) counts are now tracked every 15 minutes and graphed in the AdminCP for you to reference. You can view online user trends over a specified date period, view just guest counts or just member counts (or both), and view the graph in multiple different modes (such as an area chart or as a column chart). By default, the data is retained for 180 days, however you can control how often to prune this statistical data in the AdminCP.

    Online user trends graphed
    You can also view a graph of member activity on the site. Member activity is defined as any "activity" beyond simply browsing, such as submitting a new post, reacting to any content item or comment, or following any content item or node.

    Activity information about your member base
    You will also be able to define keywords that you would like to monitor and then see both a graph of usage of those keywords, as well as a table listing all usages of those keywords. You can use this to track usage of competitor names, find out if hash tags you define are trending, or learn if promotional materials are making an impact on your membership.

    Keyword tracking can help you closely monitor your community
    Along with these additions, we've cleaned up the menu and wording for the rest of the existing statistic options to make their functions more clear.
    We hope these additions help you better track and control your community, making the most of your time and money.
     
    Note for developers: A new chart class has been added which allows you to populate dynamic charts using callbacks, in addition to the standard methods that already exist for pulling data directly from a specified database table.
  135. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from Wonster for a blog entry, New: Statistics   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release
    Statistics can be an important part of monitoring your site and ensuring it grows and responds to your marketing and promotion efforts effectively, and several new statistic tools have been added to the 4.2 Community Suite which we know you will be excited to learn about!
    A simple tool has been added that will allow you to look up and list all member accounts that have last visited the site within a specified time period.

    Look up members who have visited within a set time period
    Additionally, online user (both logged in user and guest) counts are now tracked every 15 minutes and graphed in the AdminCP for you to reference. You can view online user trends over a specified date period, view just guest counts or just member counts (or both), and view the graph in multiple different modes (such as an area chart or as a column chart). By default, the data is retained for 180 days, however you can control how often to prune this statistical data in the AdminCP.

    Online user trends graphed
    You can also view a graph of member activity on the site. Member activity is defined as any "activity" beyond simply browsing, such as submitting a new post, reacting to any content item or comment, or following any content item or node.

    Activity information about your member base
    You will also be able to define keywords that you would like to monitor and then see both a graph of usage of those keywords, as well as a table listing all usages of those keywords. You can use this to track usage of competitor names, find out if hash tags you define are trending, or learn if promotional materials are making an impact on your membership.

    Keyword tracking can help you closely monitor your community
    Along with these additions, we've cleaned up the menu and wording for the rest of the existing statistic options to make their functions more clear.
    We hope these additions help you better track and control your community, making the most of your time and money.
     
    Note for developers: A new chart class has been added which allows you to populate dynamic charts using callbacks, in addition to the standard methods that already exist for pulling data directly from a specified database table.
  136. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from SammyS for a blog entry, New: Statistics   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release
    Statistics can be an important part of monitoring your site and ensuring it grows and responds to your marketing and promotion efforts effectively, and several new statistic tools have been added to the 4.2 Community Suite which we know you will be excited to learn about!
    A simple tool has been added that will allow you to look up and list all member accounts that have last visited the site within a specified time period.

    Look up members who have visited within a set time period
    Additionally, online user (both logged in user and guest) counts are now tracked every 15 minutes and graphed in the AdminCP for you to reference. You can view online user trends over a specified date period, view just guest counts or just member counts (or both), and view the graph in multiple different modes (such as an area chart or as a column chart). By default, the data is retained for 180 days, however you can control how often to prune this statistical data in the AdminCP.

    Online user trends graphed
    You can also view a graph of member activity on the site. Member activity is defined as any "activity" beyond simply browsing, such as submitting a new post, reacting to any content item or comment, or following any content item or node.

    Activity information about your member base
    You will also be able to define keywords that you would like to monitor and then see both a graph of usage of those keywords, as well as a table listing all usages of those keywords. You can use this to track usage of competitor names, find out if hash tags you define are trending, or learn if promotional materials are making an impact on your membership.

    Keyword tracking can help you closely monitor your community
    Along with these additions, we've cleaned up the menu and wording for the rest of the existing statistic options to make their functions more clear.
    We hope these additions help you better track and control your community, making the most of your time and money.
     
    Note for developers: A new chart class has been added which allows you to populate dynamic charts using callbacks, in addition to the standard methods that already exist for pulling data directly from a specified database table.
  137. Like
    bfarber got a reaction from sound for a blog entry, New: Statistics   
    This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release
    Statistics can be an important part of monitoring your site and ensuring it grows and responds to your marketing and promotion efforts effectively, and several new statistic tools have been added to the 4.2 Community Suite which we know you will be excited to learn about!
    A simple tool has been added that will allow you to look up and list all member accounts that have last visited the site within a specified time period.

    Look up members who have visited within a set time period
    Additionally, online user (both logged in user and guest) counts are now tracked every 15 minutes and graphed in the AdminCP for you to reference. You can view online user trends over a specified date period, view just guest counts or just member counts (or both), and view the graph in multiple different modes (such as an area chart or as a column chart). By default, the data is retained for 180 days, however you can control how often to prune this statistical data in the AdminCP.

    Online user trends graphed
    You can also view a graph of member activity on the site. Member activity is defined as any "activity" beyond simply browsing, such as submitting a new post, reacting to any content item or comment, or following any content item or node.

    Activity information about your member base
    You will also be able to define keywords that you would like to monitor and then see both a graph of usage of those keywords, as well as a table listing all usages of those keywords. You can use this to track usage of competitor names, find out if hash tags you define are trending, or learn if promotional materials are making an impact on your membership.

    Keyword tracking can help you closely monitor your community
    Along with these additions, we've cleaned up the menu and wording for the rest of the existing statistic options to make their functions more clear.
    We hope these additions help you better track and control your community, making the most of your time and money.
     
    Note for developers: A new chart class has been added which allows you to populate dynamic charts using callbacks, in addition to the standard methods that already exist for pulling data directly from a specified database table.
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