Kind of a strange thing... but help is needed.

[kachurak]

First, thank you to those of you willing to attempt to help me in tackling this issue!

I work for the NYS Dept of Trans IT department and we're trying to get our webcams operational, meaning 6 cameras with images on one page, with date and time of the image that was captured. Now according to the people that supplied our cameras, they are not able to capture the date & time ON the image itself. Therefore, leaving us the daunting task of gettintg that information.

My question is two-fold! First, the images are on a PHP page, where we are currently using a javascript to reload the images in order to refresh them. But according to all sources, javascript cannot obtain file information? I HAVE found document.write(document.LastModified) helpful though. Here's the situation, you tell me any other way that might be better.

On a PHP page, we have 6 images, loaded via javascript, refreshing every 15 seconds. We NEED to have the date/time for each image available and displayed for each file. Currently, we only have the image as I'm not quite sure what the best way to do this is?!

What we DON'T want is to have to reload the ENTIRE page every 15 seconds, only the images and date/time. We've tried having a PHP page with the javascript part INCLUDING the file (another php file) which extracts the date from the images and place them on the page, but cannot get the syntax down I guess as nothing is shown when we complete and no errors?

php page - holds javascript
other php page, referenced in the main page, extracts time/date

How can I get this to show the time/date AND image without problems?

If in the javascript, I tell it to write the php file that extracts the time/date, on the refresh, only THAT section of the script appears after the refresh.

Anyone that can shed ANY light on this would be greatly appreciated. An alternate way, maybe in php, that can refresh images only instead of the whole page would also be appreciated.

Thank you,
Matt Kachurak
NYS Department of Transportation

[The_Chancer]

WHy don't you have a look at the GD functions...

When Javascript refreshes the images - that can stay the same, but instead of it calling the actual image - it called a PHP image.

With the image - you use it to create a copy of the original, find the date and time the image was saved via the camera, and place it at the bottom of the image.

So if the image was 80 wide x 80 high, you create the image to be 80 wide x 100 high, and place the new text at the bottom.

So all the changes that are needed are the way the images are called, and no other....

HTH

[Shrike]

GD can be a bit of a headache...an easier approach would be filemtime() (assuming you know the filepath of each image).

The Chancer's suggestion is defintely more elegant though 🙂

It's impossible to reload part of a page, so your only options are frames and/or iframes, with one frame containing the images and date/time, and a meta refresh tag or something.

[The_Chancer]

Just a little tweaking gives this....

<?php
header("Content-type: image/png");
$orig_image1=$imagenamehere;
$orig_size1=getimagesize($orig_image1);
$im = imagecreatetruecolor(200,200);
$background = imagecolorallocate($im, 255,255,255);
$black = imagecolorallocate ($im, 0, 0, 0);
imagefilledrectangle ( $im, 0,0,200,200,$background);
$oldimage=imagecreatefromjpeg($orig_image1);
imagecopyresampled ( $im, $oldimage, 0,0, 0,0, 200, 160,$orig_size1[0],$orig_size1[1]);
$date=date ("F d Y H:i:s.", filemtime($orig_image1));
imagettftext($im, 10, 0, 1, 180, $black, 'c:/winnt/fonts/tahoma.TTF', "Updated on :\n".$date);
//imagepng($im,"images/left.png"); // this will save the new image as a png with the date and time attached
imagepng($im);
imagedestroy($im);
?>

Just call the image - and replace $imagenamehere - it will resample the image and resize it to 200 x 180 and put the date underneath it - all in a simple image.

Nice huh ?

Oh this required the GD2 extension and the freetype libs.

If you are using it on a windows box, the path to the font has to be in the old 8.3 format if you have spaces, else it won't show. Otherwise no problems.

[kachurak]

I'll give the gd a try and let you know how I make out... thanks for the direction.....!

[kachurak]

I have tried loading now, 2 images and cannot get the php page, using the code above, to show html without causing errors. It apparently doesn't like the code?? I get nothing as a result after about 20 seconds of waiting and only get garbled text.

Here's what I currently have, just so you can see what I've done:

<?php
header("Content-type: image/png");
clearstatcache();

$image1 = 'CCTV/NYTB0401.JPG';
$image2 = 'CCTV/NYTB0402.JPG';

if (file_exists($image1))  
{
    $orig_size=getimagesize($image1);
    $image = imagecreatetruecolor(320,240);
    $background = imagecolorallocate($image, 255,255,255);
    $fontcolor = imagecolorallocate ($image, 255,255,255);
    imagefilledrectangle ( $image, 0,0,320,240,$background);
    $oldimage=imagecreatefromjpeg($image1);
    imagecopyresampled ( $image, $oldimage, 0,0, 0,0, 320, 240,$orig_size[0],$orig_size[1]);
    $date=date ("F dS Y g:i:s a", filemtime($image1));
    imagettftext($image, 12, 0, 30, 200, $fontcolor, 'c:/winnt/fonts/tahoma.TTF', "\n".$date);
    imagepng($image);
    imagedestroy($image);
}

if (file_exists($image2))   
{
    $orig_size=getimagesize($image2);
    $image = imagecreatetruecolor(320,240);
    $background = imagecolorallocate($image, 255,255,255);
    $fontcolor = imagecolorallocate ($image, 255,255,255);
    imagefilledrectangle ( $image, 0,0,320,240,$background);
    $oldimage=imagecreatefromjpeg($image2);
    imagecopyresampled ( $image, $oldimage, 0,0, 0,0, 320, 240,$orig_size[0],$orig_size[1]);
    $date=date ("F dS Y g:i:s a", filemtime($image2));
    imagettftext($image, 12, 0, 30, 200, $fontcolor, 'c:/winnt/fonts/tahoma.TTF', "\n".$date);
    imagepng($image);
    imagedestroy($image);
}

?>

The thing is... it only shows image ONE and not the second? I've tried laying out the images in a table, but it didn't like the way I did it... that's when it started to hang.

Any more information you can direct me on?

In addition - a sidenote actually, anytime I create ANY HTML in this, it seems to cause it to hang... I comment it out and it works fine, but still, only showing only one picture. I'm sure I've got the correct syntax with the html if I attempt to use it. I'd like to have it set in a table, but cannot format the output to the table... any ideas on why this doesn't or WON'T work?

Thanks again in advance!

[agoe]

you're editing a jpeg-image. your http-header says it's a png.

change
header("Content-type: image/png");

to
header("Content-type: image/jpeg");

[The_Chancer]

This is an image file - there are certain rules that you HAVE to abide by.

There can be no normal HTML text in this - as you are producing an image - when it comes out that is all there is...

Is you only use this to create ONE image that will be better.. and refer to the file as follows:

<img src="newimage.php?image=fileimagename">

So the code would be as follows:

<?php
header("Content-type: image/png");
clearstatcache();

$image1 = $_GET['image'];

if (file_exists($image1))
{
$orig_size=getimagesize($image1);
$image = imagecreatetruecolor(320,240);
$background = imagecolorallocate($image, 255,255,255);
$fontcolor = imagecolorallocate ($image, 255,255,255);
imagefilledrectangle ( $image, 0,0,320,240,$background);
$oldimage=imagecreatefromjpeg($image1);
imagecopyresampled ( $image, $oldimage, 0,0, 0,0, 320, 240,$orig_size[0],$orig_size[1]);
$date=date ("F dS Y g:i:s a", filemtime($image1));
imagettftext($image, 12, 0, 30, 200, $fontcolor, 'c:/winnt/fonts/tahoma.TTF', "\n".$date);
imagepng($image);
imagedestroy($image);
} 

And each time you want to make the photo appear - use the same file - but with a different filename at the end.

See
http://guesthouse.ukcorporatesolutions.com/hotelname.php?hotelname=boo
for a sample. - Just change Boo and you can see the difference.

As for editing a jpeg image and the content-type - you will need it to be a PNG as that is the final file type - regardless of the file that is being edited.

[kachurak]

I want to give a huge thank you for the effort and information given to me... also, I learned a new toy and what a great toy GD will be! It's awesome!

I wish I could have you view the pictures, but their on the intranet of the NYS Dept of Trans, but they look great!

Thanks again Chancer! Thumbs up to you!

[The_Chancer]

No worries - glad I could help....

🆒