Nihonto Club

Dear All,

I'm rolling out a new system for handling images in Nihonto Club. It seemed there was always a bit of confusion for new visitors how to attach files and photos to their topics. I'm hoping that the new development will make it more convenient.

Over last 4 years I was using different solutions for handling images in different parts of the website (boards, galleries, collections etc) trying to find one which is best fit for the purpose. There were few different ideas on the table, but most importantly I needed to know how you use it.

The new system offers treatment of almost every page of certain type (forum topic, collection item, sword record) as a gallery with the possibility of attaching a number of images. Once added, they are available at the bottom of the page. If you click any image, it will bring you to the gallery view where you can browse through images, view their enlarged versions (if available) and leave your comments. You may see examples of attached media on this page.

It also allows to maintain information about ownership, copyright and licensing restrictions. It will help us to be fair to people who share their work, as well as open possibilities of using publically available image repositories such as Wikimedia Commons without breaching their Terms & Conditions. This may not be a concern for a classic style message board, but Nihonto Club is (or hoping to be) more like a research tool and we need to think long term.

Attaching images and files to the topics on Discussion Boards

1. When you are creating a new forum topic, the first page offers you to fill out the Subject, Body of the message, optional tags and other information.

2. If you would like to share some documents (in PDF, Word, text or other formats) or other files which are not images, attach them to the post at this stage. Otherwise you'll have an opportunity to add images in step 4.

3. After you are happy with the way the topic looks using 'Preview' button (all fields can be edited at later stages), click 'Save' to post your topic.

4. The second page offers you to add photos, oshigata or any other images. Either drag & drop your images into the grey box or use 'Add files' button. If you don't wish to share any images, proceed to step 8.

5. After all the files are in the grey box, click 'Start Upload'.

6. When upload is finished, you may (optionally) click 'Manage Images' and assign names and licensing information to each image.

7. If you would like to sort the uploaded images, use 'Sort Images' page.

8. Click 'View' to see the product of your work!

Attaching images and files to the existing topic

1. If you wish to attach an additional non-image materials, click 'Edit' and attach them as files.

2. If you wish to add more images, click 'Upload New Images' and follow steps 4-8 in the section above.

I hope you'll like the new functionality. Please share your feedback here.

Regards,
Stan

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Masamune