PR8 Image Machine Pros & Cons

[SteveG]

Re: PR8 Image Machine Pros & Cons

It justs checks to see if there's a pic in the full size image box, and displays the click message if nothing is there, so if there's an image in the additional image box you would see the click to enlarge message, of course you'd also see the message if there where no images

[skepticwebguy]

Re: PR8 Image Machine Pros & Cons

Beautiful! Works like a charm. Thank you very much for the code snippet!

[lesliekirk]

Re: PR8 Image Machine Pros & Cons

It justs checks to see if there's a pic in the full size image box, and displays the click message if nothing is there, so if there's an image in the additional image box you would see the click to enlarge message, of course you'd also see the message if there where no images

I'm confused - it sounds like it's going to display the message whether there is an image or not. The only time I'd want to display the click to enlarge is if there is an image in the Additional Image(s). I was thinking someone had posted something specific to the Additional Images (that's the only time I would have an image to enlarge).

Leslie

[skepticwebguy]

Re: PR8 Image Machine Pros & Cons

I'm confused - it sounds like it's going to display the message whether there is an image or not. The only time I'd want to display the click to enlarge is if there is an image in the Additional Image(s). I was thinking someone had posted something specific to the Additional Images (that's the only time I would have an image to enlarge).

Leslie, it works perfectly as long as you leave the large legacy image field blank. That field isn't required anyway if you're using the additional images tab. The conditional only checks if the large legacy image field has a value. If that field is left blank, then the conditional text shows up.

[Siamese-Dream.Com]

Re: PR8 Image Machine Pros & Cons

It works perfectly as long as you leave the large legacy image field blank. That field isn't required anyway if you're using the additional images tab.

Maybe it works fine on your store, but leaving the Legacy Images field blank breaks MY store - the image machine won't generate any resized images for a product if I DON'T have a full sized image assigned in the legacy images fields.

Another thing to think about; for people who don't have javascript enabled, they won't see ANY image unless you 1) have an image assigned to the legacy full size image field, and 2) apply the little hack that Brennan gave me in this thread:

http://extranet.mivamerchant.com/for...ipt-Turned-Off

Also, if you want google to index your images (most people do), then you will also have to use the above mentioned hack and make sure you have a full size image assigned.

I think it would be much better to check whether a "closeup" image has been assigned as opposed to whether a legacy full size image has NOT been assigned, because the two are not mutually exclusive.

[skepticwebguy]

Re: PR8 Image Machine Pros & Cons

Maybe it works fine on your store, but leaving the Legacy Images field blank breaks MY store - the image machine won't generate any resized images for a product if I DON'T have a full sized image assigned in the legacy images fields.

I had the same problem. I went through the Miva Merchant User's Guide PR8 template/CSS/page item changes with a fine toothed comb and that solved the problem. Turned out I missed some CSS or template changes or forgot to assign an item to the PROD page. I can't quite recall exactly what part I missed. Sorry I cannot be more specific. But, it was something I had missed.

[skepticwebguy]

Re: PR8 Image Machine Pros & Cons

I think it would be much better to check whether a "closeup" image has been assigned as opposed to whether a legacy full size image has NOT been assigned, because the two are not mutually exclusive.

Good point.

[lesliekirk]

Re: PR8 Image Machine Pros & Cons

Leslie, it works perfectly as long as you leave the large legacy image field blank. That field isn't required anyway if you're using the additional images tab. The conditional only checks if the large legacy image field has a value. If that field is left blank, then the conditional text shows up.

Sounds like it will be great after all the legacy images have been converted over - but the site still has a large number of them. Thanks for the clarification - so I still need to find a better conditional

[Siamese-Dream.Com]

Re: PR8 Image Machine Pros & Cons

...so I still need to find a better conditional...

Isn't there some way to test for a value for the closeup images???

If it exists, it has to be stored in a database somewhere. Does MM not make that available for use in SMT???

Maybe we need to use ToolKit / ToolBelt to look up the field in the database, turn it into a variable that can be evaluated in SMT, and do a "not isnull" conditional...

But you would think it should be available to SMT, shouldn't it???

[papi34]

Re: PR8 Image Machine Pros & Cons

We are using the legacy product thumb and image fields in our store, and have taken a "if it aint broke, don't fix it" view of implementing the image machine. However, we just went mobile and the mobile version uses the image machine (to enlarge the photo) on the product page if you setup and specify path for an additional image. We have set it up for one product as a test and like that feature. However, we have concerns about importing the Full-sized Image path for all our products. I thought I read somewhere in the forums that the image machine creates new images. Since we plan on continuing to use the legacy images for our desktop version and only use the image machine on our mobile version, will our image hard drive storage requirements essentially double in size?

[Mark Hood]

Re: PR8 Image Machine Pros & Cons

We are using the legacy product thumb and image fields in our store, and have taken a "if it aint broke, don't fix it" view of implementing the image machine. However, we just went mobile and the mobile version uses the image machine (to enlarge the photo) on the product page if you setup and specify path for an additional image. We have set it up for one product as a test and like that feature. However, we have concerns about importing the Full-sized Image path for all our products. I thought I read somewhere in the forums that the image machine creates new images. Since we plan on continuing to use the legacy images for our desktop version and only use the image machine on our mobile version, will our image hard drive storage requirements essentially double in size?

In theory if you choose to not constrain the images then it would not need to make copies. In other words it depends on how you actually set up the image machine display settings. If you want to be able to upload a large image and have it automatically re-size it then it creates new images for the smaller ones.

If you do have the image machine set up for the mobile site then it is already creating new images each time a product pages is visited?

[papi34]

Re: PR8 Image Machine Pros & Cons

I am not uploading new images at all. I simply created a new image type and called it "default". Then I uploaded the Full-sized Image path for our legacy image(s) already in place (which are approximately 600px x 675px) to the Additional Images Tab on the Products page in admin. This way the mobile version can utilize it for image enlargement if tapped. We have not enabled any of the imagemachine code or items on the desktop templates.

So I don't know if additional images are being created each time a product page is visited on a mobile device. That's my question. Can someone from Miva chime in? Where would I look to try to find these images that may being created by the mobile version?

[Mark Hood]

Re: PR8 Image Machine Pros & Cons

Can someone from Miva chime in?

Guess I'm not making sense so good luck and I will leave you with a hint.

If you setup image machine to resize the images they would go into the same folder as the original.

[papi34]

Re: PR8 Image Machine Pros & Cons

If you do have the image machine set up for the mobile site then it is already creating new images each time a product pages is visited?

Hi Mark. Thanks for your feedback. I was not dismissing your input, so I appologize if that's how it came off. Your reply ended in a question mark, so I thought you were also uncertain as to the answer to my quesiton. That's why I was asking for Miva's input. Perhaps I need to open a support ticket with them.

[Mark Hood]

Re: PR8 Image Machine Pros & Cons

You can but it really does depend on how the image machine is setup so let me see if I can explain better.

The image machine can take a 100px x 100px image and resize it to 75 x 75 but it will only do that if you have it set up that way.

Go to your PROD page and click on the tab for "Product Display Layout Image Dimension" You might have a different one if someone set up something like Image Dimension (mobile-images) but you will have something similar about image dimension.

On that tab if the radio options are selected for "resize to fit within bounding box" the a image will be created.
Let's say we set the bounding box to be 360x360 if you added 1000px image called abc.jpg When the page is visited for the first time a new image would be created with a name of abc_360x360.jpg and if it wasn't square the size would be a max of 360.

The image machine will put that image in whatever folder the main image was put in, so if you dragged and dropped it then it would be something like graphics/00000001/ but if you gave it a path via import or on the tab then it would put it there.

So like I said it depends on what the settings are on the image dimension tab of the PROD page template are. You can also set it to "no constraints" and then it would not create the re-sized version.

If the mobile version is using the image machine for ctgy or plsts pages then they would also have a tab for image dimensions and yes possibly even creating more. If you begin using the image machine on your site you will want to make sure things like ctgy,srch,plst all have the same sizes for constraints so as not to create even more.