not sure how to start this

abda53

i have a image hosting site, and i want to allow the users to share the pictures if they want, www.upixs.com where you they assign a username and password to the "guest" to log in and view the pictures.

im not sure really on where to start on this, and was wondering if anyone had any ideas. basically the log in page to view the albums will be on the front main page, with a user/name form to sign in, and once they are in, it will show a picture page that grabs the pictures from the database doing a query on the user/pass and if they person has chosen to share the image.

im just kinda lost on where i can begin on this if anyone can give me some ideas thatd be great.

rachel2004

Since you'll be storing references to images (or maybe you'll store images as BLOB, who knows), you should first consider designing your database. Start with that before you get too deep into your PHP coding. Have you tried looking at any online tutorials yet? If not, here is a good one:

http://www.sitepoint.com/article/driven-website-php-amp-mysql

abda53

no i have my database. if you checked my link you would have seen. its a funcional site already, database, no blobs, links in the database point to actual files, logons, everything..

i was just asking for some ideas on how to do this other part of the site

rachel2004

Actually I did visit your site after your first post, but just because I see your web page doesn't mean I can see your database or know for sure that you have one. Maybe I could have "registered" a username to test it, but is that necessary for me to help, though? If I'm wrong, then please correct me or show me what I missed on your page. Anyway, I didn't suggest that you start with db design to in any way irk you, but merely because you were asking for some suggestions and that is where I felt this should start.

Anyway, what are you using for flags to indicate that someone wants to share a picture for online viewing? If you set a column in a table to indicate maybe "yes" or "no" to indicate that the user is willing to share a picture, then you queries would do a check of that flag.

So if Bob (who has userID of 10) has pictures that he wants to share and Mary wants to do a search for Bob's pictures, the query could be:

$query = "SELECT i.image
          FROM Images AS i,
               Users AS u
          WHERE i.userID = u.userID
          AND i.imageFlag = 'yes'
          AND u.userID = '10'";

abda53

thanks.. i do have columns Y and N for the image_id to show the shared image, i also have one to turn the sharing on and off, and then i have a user/pass to view the shared files..

rachel2004

You have your database, you have flags to indicate sharing... what kind of suggestions are you looking for in particular? Or better... can you explain maybe upfront what you've done so far (besides just providing the URL of your site)? Else, this can turn into someone posting a suggestion, you say you've already got that going, they suggest the next step, you say you've been-there-done-that, etc.

abda53

ok..

well its a image hosting site, you pay $ a month for unlimited image hosting. you can log in, upload pictures, delete them, change captions, edit them, etc..

but right now there is no way to share the images unless you make a webpage and link to the images.

i started to create a little photo gallery, but as the site is a private image hosting site (noone can see your pics unless you give out the link), i wanted the images that would be shown in the gallery to be secure, so that the owner can select which images they want to be shown, give a user/pass for someone to see them, and for the owner to have the option to allow/disallow sharing completely.

i have the database set up for sharing, and i have the codes set up so that you can manage the sharing. www.upixs.com log in with demo as user and pass if you would like to see.

now on the front page i want to show where a user can enter the name/password so they can view the members gallery either on the site itself, or as a popup gallery it doesnt really matter.

i was trying to figure out a way that i can do this, either coding or a general idea to get started. im not really sure on where to start.

rachel2004

This is normally done by using a PHP script embedded in the link to the photo. Rather than write it out, I actually saw a post yesterday by someone who had already done it:

http://www.phpbuilder.com/board/showthread.php?s=&threadid=10278982

His questions was about caching, but his background explanation is what I'm suggesting you follow.

abda53

thanks for the reply.. thats not really what im lookin for though. thanks for the help