uploading images and a wysiwyg

**GOLGO-13** · Oct 17, 2008 20:27

hello,
i have a client that has a design, but needs the css/xhtml coded and needs a simple way to upload images to the site. i've used Drupal and the YUI editor (a wysiwyg) to do this for more complex sites - but in this case, Drupal is definitely overkill. the only content the client needs to update on their own are a few images in a portfolio section. i'm familiar with php and javascript, but they are not big strengths.. (i usually know just about enough to modify free apps/code i find online.)

so my question is, what is the best (easiest - for me and the client) way to implement image uploading for a really simple xhtml/css site? FYI, unless Adobe Contribute has seriously improved over the years, i'm really trying to avoid it!

i started to look into the YUI library, but couldnt find any beginners tutorials...

thanks for any input!!

**Tailslide** · Oct 18, 2008 01:00

Personally, if the client just wanted to add photos to a portfolio page and nothing else (e.g no captions - no messing around with which photo goes where) then I'd use PHP to display all the contents of a particular folder on the web server and then give them AceFTP!

Obviously the styling of the gallery would already be done with a stylesheet so all they'd have to do is upload photos to the correct folder!

The downside of this approach would be that they'd have to ensure the photos were the right size before uploading.

If they needed anything more complex - such as photo resizing then you could do a little mini-cms where they had a passworded area and an upload form and then add in a PHP script which would resize/rename the photos as they were uploaded. You could get it to resize the photo twice so that you could have a thumbnail and a larger version when clicked on.

There are also various photo gallery scripts (such as coppermine etc) which you could integrate into the site and they use that interface to upload photos.

**molona** · Oct 18, 2008 01:26

I think that Tailslide's got it right... I would be my own approach to it!

**GOLGO-13** · Oct 20, 2008 16:59

I'd never heard of AceFTP!. Downloaded and gave it a quick look - perhaps too quick of a look as it seamed too complicated for quick and easy set-up & use.

I think I'm going to go with Cushy CMS which i recently read about in another forum. On the bright side, set-up appears to be a breeze - quick and easy. The downside is that I didnt see any way to re-brand Cushy CMS.

I have to admit I havent yet taken a particularly indepth look at AceFTP! or Cushy CMS, so perhaps AceFTP! is easier to use than my first impression and *hopefully* Cushy CMS can be rebranded. For this paticular client tho, if Cushy cant be rebranded, its not a deal breaker.

thanks for both your replies!!!

**Tailslide** · Oct 21, 2008 01:07

Ace FTP is just an FTP client which allows them to upload files to the web server. You literally just drag and drop the photos from the left pane to the right pane - you (rather than the client) set it up initially to ensure it's connected to the web server. After that they literally just press "connect" and then drag and drop - easy!

AceFTP is just one of many many free FTP clients (it's just the one I use) - here's a link: http://www.google.co.uk/search?hl=en...e+Search&meta=

CushyCMS is a remotely hosted content managment system - so a lot more complex. Plus it doesn't produce nice code (in my view). It uses breaks instead of paragraphs for example.

Depending on the application I'd say there's a lot more opportunity for them to mess stuff up with a cms.

**molona** · Oct 21, 2008 08:22

I use Filezilla and Firefox FTP extension because that's enough for me. I think that you did look at them too quickly. It takes about 15 min. to understand how it works (including configuration) provided that you have the right data.

Normally, if clients are computer illiterate, I would suggest and go ahead with CMS because they tend to get confused and mess up with the backend, but in this case it may be appropiate the use of a FTP client.

Using a FTP client has another advantage: file transferring is much faster.