Requesting assistance for board issues

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ALCOSTEAM
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Re: Requesting assistance for board issues

Post by ALCOSTEAM »

the best way I have found for a good general computer cleaning is to download ccleaner. I have apps on this computer trying to block as much of the adds as well as blocking most cookies from sites and there is still a bunch of junk that collects in just a week or two so its good to run ccleaner regularly.

piriform.com/ccleaner

It is a free ( or you can buy a better version of it) piece of software that does a good job of keeping the computer junk to a minimum. It will also allow you to do a register sweep and repair as well as other things.
Glenn Brooks
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Re: Requesting assistance for board issues

Post by Glenn Brooks »

Last few months I have not been able to post photos to my entries, without first mailing them to my self and saving in my photo folder. This forum software pops up an error message stating the photo file size is too large.

I haven’t altered my cell phone image size setting in years. However, suddenly, over the last few months, nearly ever photo I take, and try to post on
Chaski, is not accepted by the software.

Very puzzling and counterproductive. Any thoughts on how the forum can be made to work like it used to be?

Glenn
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Harold_V
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Re: Requesting assistance for board issues

Post by Harold_V »

Glenn Brooks wrote: Mon Jul 17, 2023 10:13 am Very puzzling and counterproductive. Any thoughts on how the forum can be made to work like it used to be?
Glenn
The critical question is how large are the photos? If they're huge in either file size or pixel size, the software is doing exactly what it should be doing, and that's preventing individuals from posting oversized images. Your comment "nearly ever photo I take" sends up a red flag for me. I suspect your images are, indeed, too large, with the odd exception, which is likely borderline.

The solution may be something as simple as you changing the file sizes on your phone (assuming that's possible, I don't know). You didn't mention if anything changes when they are saved to your photo folder.

It is important that those who share the board with the owner understand that it is a service to them provided free of charge. When the overall size of the board increases (due to unnecessarily large storage capacity), he must pay more. It would be unreasonable for any of us to expect him to do so.

H
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dorin
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Re: Requesting assistance for board issues

Post by dorin »

What kind of phone do you have?
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Glenn Brooks
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Re: Requesting assistance for board issues

Post by Glenn Brooks »

Phone is an iPhone 11 Pro. It uses Apple’s new HEIF high density format with the standard 12 Megapixel camera. Each image size apparently is between 1.8 and 2.8 MB, depending on what aspect ratio the camera uses. I haven’t found a way to convert HEIF to jpeg, or resize image files, although I know such software exists in the wild.

I don’t know what the current max file size is for the Chaski forum software. It used to be 1024 pixels, which is now an earlier generation file size and significantly outdated these days….

Iam guessing the current image size and camera formats I am using are incompatible with our file storage limits.

Maybe Harold can answer: does the Chaski forum software allow for automatically resizing images and formats to some moderator established limit?

If yes, configuring this feature in the software would allow users to post current imagery and have them automatically resized and stored in a very small file size…

curious if any one else in the forum is having this same issue?? If so, how are you resolving it?
Glenn
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jcfx
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Re: Requesting assistance for board issues

Post by jcfx »

Hi Glenn

You would have to take the HEIF ( older ) or HEIC ( newer ) image into a photo editing program and export as a JPG in order to upload
to this forum, HEIF/HEIC isn't that widely supported outside the Apple ecosphere, less so on the web, it's usually
JPG and PNG ( Portable network graphics ).

You can set your iPhone to to take just JPG images in the Camera's setting on your phone, choose - Most Compatible.

Posting pictures on this forum I've always limited the long side to 1000 pixels and always as JPG.
Something might have changed on the Chaski side, or maybe the apps you use in your workflow has changed ( like a software update )
that broke a setting that generated JPGs.

Jim
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Harold_V
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Re: Requesting assistance for board issues

Post by Harold_V »

Glenn Brooks wrote: Mon Jul 17, 2023 8:35 pm
Maybe Harold can answer: does the Chaski forum software allow for automatically resizing images and formats to some moderator established limit?
First, moderators do not establish limits. They are determined by either the owner, or the board administrator. They have access to the operational side of the board software, while almost no one else does.

As for file manipulation, it's already in use. If you right click on a posted image you'll discover that it opens in the size that was uploaded. Still, the board limits size that can be uploaded because some folks simply don't try to comply.

I can't help but think that the problem you're having is due to the file type. I suspect that the board does NOT accept them, and most likely that won't change. The comments provided by Jim (jcfx) are most likely spot on. Give his advice a try and see how things shake out.

H
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Glenn Brooks
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Re: Requesting assistance for board issues

Post by Glenn Brooks »

Thanks Jim, I’ll try the JPEG approach.
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Steggy
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Re: Requesting assistance for board issues

Post by Steggy »

phpBB forum software doesn’t understand any of the proprietary Apple formats and as far as I know, there is no option to support them. You need to use an industry-standard format, which on this board, is JPEG or PNG.
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dorin
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Re: Requesting assistance for board issues

Post by dorin »

In the past, there was a utility (plugin) that would resize images.
The maintainer of plugin did not update for the new releases of phpbb, so had to be removed.
That was too bad, as it was super handy!
We did increase the size of allowed photos, but we don't have unlimited space on the virtual server we use, so still need to be careful.

I believe Steggy is correct, the proprietary apple formats are not supported yet.
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Glenn Brooks
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Re: Requesting assistance for board issues

Post by Glenn Brooks »

As followup, I switched my settings on the phone and saved a series of photos using the jpeg format. File sized jumped from the 2.8 MB Apple format to 4.8MB for legacy jpegs for each photo. Almost a 100% increase in file size. So far as I can tell, the three aspect ratios programmmed into the Apple phone app do not allow 1028 pixel image size. Not good results…

The Apple image format is widely comparable with everything else I do regarding social media, so not sure what to do from here on out.

It would be ideal if the forum software could somehow make use of an image resampling app. This would automatically adjust all user submissions to the size limit and format type set by the site admin. There is a widely used app that does this for email attachments, but I don’t know any of the details.

BTW, I would be more than happy to contribute to the cost of maintaining the site with your ISP. Iam guessing other members would contribute also. On line community support is a widely adopted practice in the non profit world. Might work well here on Chaski.

Glenn
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Ahaha, Retirement: the good life - drifting endlessly on a Sea of projects....
jcbrock
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Re: Requesting assistance for board issues

Post by jcbrock »

Glenn Brooks wrote: Fri Jul 21, 2023 4:20 pm As followup, I switched my settings on the phone and saved a series of photos using the jpeg format. File sized jumped from the 2.8 MB Apple format to 4.8MB for legacy jpegs for each photo. Almost a 100% increase in file size. So far as I can tell, the three aspect ratios programmmed into the Apple phone app do not allow 1028 pixel image size. Not good results…
Apple has no motivation to make jpgs work well, they want everyone to use their proprietary format. So what you need to do is add a step to your workflow, where you run it through an app like irfanview64 (I have no financial interest and also it is available for iOS) to resize and compress the jpg. I also use a proprietary format and here's my workflow as an example, with another step because I use a camera:

1. Import photo to computer
2. Open photo, edit as desired, export as jpg (sounds like your phone handles this and the first step)
3. Open jpg with irfanview64, resize to 800x600 or whatever, save to a file designated for low-res images with the max file size set to 200kb or 500kb if I'm being expansive. If you want to set a bunch of jpg compression modifiers you can, but personally I don't.
4. Import the jpg to your Chaski thread

Just one way to do it, plenty of others I'm sure. You can fiddle endlessly with just the resolution and then the compression to get a look that is satisfactory. It's kind of like machining, there's a certain perverse pleasure in figuring out how to do a job with what's available. I should also say irfan64 has a macro capability so you can run batches of photos through your process, I think this is pretty common in all photo editors.
John Brock
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