I made a mockup for improving Drupal's image support. See the attached image file.

My idea is to implement an image form type that allows the user to select any given amount of images and attach them to a node. This is for example useful for creating a slideshow or simply for inserting images into the node's content.

User Interface

  • A thumbnail of the image is displayed at the left hand side.
  • The image links to the actual image node.
  • On the right are basic form elements to modify the image node on-the-fly.
    • Title of the image.
    • Description of the image (collapsed).
    • Taxonomies of the image (collapsed).
    • Buttons for reordering the images (for more than one image).
    • Button for removing the image either completely from the site or just from the list.
  • After the last image element in the control, a file upload form is displayed that allows the user to create a new image node.
  • For users who have enabled JavaScript, the submission of this file upload field is redirected to an Iframe (as in upload.module) so that the user doesn't need to refresh the page and can continue editing the node or the image nodes listed in the image form type.
  • Note that already uploaded image nodes remain visible during uploading. Optionally, another upload form can be displayed while uploading an image so that the user can upload multiple images simultaneously.

Functionality

  • This should basically serve as jack of all trades and can be used by any module. It would also be particularly useful for CCK.
  • There will be a function that inserts an img tag with the image url. The user can choose in which size he wants to insert the image and if it links to the actual image node (if existant)
  • The from can be either set so that it creates image nodes of every uploaded image or that it appends images as file attachments so that they are only available for the current node. This can be useful for inserting illustratory images.
  • There will be an image browser that lets the user search for images to append to the current list of images.

Please post your opinion and suggestions.

CommentFileSizeAuthor
drupal-image.png76.69 KBkkaefer

Comments

Bèr Kessels’s picture

Bèr Kessels commented

Nice, but hardcore.

Certainly not part of anything in core. It is FAR too complex for core. It is even far too complex for image modukle. Things like slideshows and on-the-fly-node-generation are so specific that they should be developed in smaller contribtuions. I would suggest, but that is rather a personal opinion, thta you try to smear your ideas over several modules.
* Reordering is part of node_weight.module (why should ordering be image-specific?)
* uploading mutliple files: there are several modules that do this. please try to integrate thelm instead of developing a fiith module with that functionality.

Etc.

I would suggest you team up with some of the more advanced image projects in contrib to get your ideas rolling. And to hang uot with the developers crew for a while to learn how Drupal does things.

Bèr

dries’s picture

dries commented

Looks nice. I suggest you split this in smaller subtasks (prioritized) and that you provide a simplified mockup of what step #1 would look like. We'll have to implement this in incremental steps.

Stefan Nagtegaal’s picture

Stefan Nagtegaal commented

I agree with Dries, that this needs to be done in small, very small steps.. But, I have too admit it's quite sexy..
Is this a working example, or just a s(i|a)mple HTML-page?

You should talk to Walkah too, because he is preparing todo great things with image.module either.. And, I heared it should be done (when nothing holds him) this week.. :-)

coupet’s picture

coupet commented

Excellent idea as described. this module will extend image functionality to all nodes and particularly CCK would be a welcomed feature option. Also, very creative approach to image management in nodes!

Refactoring image module: proof of concept
http://lists.drupal.org/archives/development/2004-02/msg00574.html

The refactoring image module thread includes great discussion on future plan of image module.

nodeapi image concept (request for feedback)
http://lists.drupal.org/archives/development/2006-04/msg00012.html

The nodeapi image concept thread includes interesting comments by Boris Mann, Darrel O'Pry and others in reference to existing modules functionality.

bxy’s picture

bxy commented

I took a look at your screenshot, that would increase the user experience so much.

How is the progress?

kkaefer’s picture

kkaefer commented

The progress is about approximately zero percent.

keizo’s picture

keizo commented

I'm doing research for a SOC proposal, this has many of the things I have in mind. added to my tracked pages.

cosmicdreams’s picture

cosmicdreams commented

I understand that there are a few modules for Drupal 5.x that provide slideshow features. Personally I use the Views Slideshow module that requires the Image module and its decedents. I suggest you try it out.

It's pretty clear that the core developers of Drupal want to keep the core of drupal as basic as they can. That said, I seem to remember that image and file handling is going to be revisited in Drupal 7. Am I right about that gang?

cosmicdreams’s picture

cosmicdreams commented
Status: Active » Needs review
elv’s picture

elv commented

The new kid on the block seems to be the Pictures module.

Anonymous’s picture

Anonymous (not verified) commented
Project: » Drupal core
Version: » 7.x-dev

The user experience project is closing so this issue is being moved to the usability component under the Drupal project

catch’s picture

catch
he/him
Primary language English
commented
Status: Needs review » Closed (duplicate)

Since this is very old, and much of it is in imagefield to some extent. Marking as duplicate.