Unlisted doesn't break navigation at all. And it won't show up on the iPhone.
I think he means it breaks navigation because you have to give people unique urls to unlisted galleries or add them to sharegroups to see them.
Andy - can I just say 'thanks for dealing with this'. Its only now that I have a vested interest in the development of a thread that I appreciate your efforts! Does flattery still work?
I've been reading this thread, and I have to say that if people on here are managing their security by just making the links obscure, (i.e. CSS to hide something), that's just plain silly. I work in IT for a living, and if I did security through obscurity, I wouldn't have a job!
Andy's right. Make it unlisted. That's what I do. My About Me page? Unlisted and linked from the nav bar. Doesn't show up on /iphone. Lots of galleries where I take photos for fun/friends and don't really want it to showcase my skills? Unlisted. Easy to do. Fixes your issues, and if you're already hading out URL's, handing out a different one isn't the end of the world. Otherwise, consider what I do.. I create sharegroups and make the sharegroup into a vanity URL. Easy to use, easy to remember, powerful new tool!
I have no idea - and I don't want to distract our Sorcerers from improving the Cart, working on coupons, packages, etc.
Now, that's not fair Andy! You're teasing her AND me! I *so* want a new cart/coupons/packages/analytics, etc.. Personally, you could take back the slideshow for those improvements instead -- OH, and did I mention metallic paper?
'unlisted doesnt work for the following reason : -
I create categories as follows :
Client 1
Client 2
Client 3
etc etc
I give Clients url links to their Category.
I dump galleries into the client categories as required. My clients can always see the galleries I upload.
If I make them unlisted then the Client CANNOT see the galleries because they only have a link to the Category.
Unlisted galleries are not visible.
My system works fine (each client is not aware of the other's categories and sees only their own stuff), but my system is rendered useless by the iphone interface because Clients can see other Clients stuff.
DrDavid . . are you honestly suggesting that I give each client 100 urls for 100 galleries? When currently I give them just one . . just so that I can accomodate the iphone interface? Please read what i have just said about why unlisted doesnt work for me! And please respect the fact that differnet people use smugmug differnet ways. eg. I wouldnt use right click protection but I respect Christine's choice to do so. If you work in IT you have have a perspective on this which my Client's dont. My Clients dont work in IT and I am not that concerned about them circumventing my CSS but there is no point SMugmug selling us CSS tools for the front door and then leaving the back door open. Its a simple disparity which cannot be disputed. PLEASE tell me who would be disadvantaged if the iphone interface could not see galleries with external links switcched off?
'unlisted doesnt work for the following reason : -
I create categories as follows :
Client 1
Client 2
Client 3
etc etc
I give Clients url links to their Category.
Can I suggest sharegroups? Then, create vanity links to the sharegroup.. Then, make them unlisted. Finally, there's JS around here to fix the breadcrumbs for the sharegroups and make it work correctly for your clients. It's a bit of a work-around, but, it would totally work perfectly for you. And, it wouldn't require a ton of work.
PLEASE tell me who would be disadvantaged if the iphone interface could not see galleries with external links switcched off?
Sorry for replying twice in a row, but, I forgot to address this. It may well be that the code required to hide the galleries that are set as "external links off" is highly complex and difficult to do for SM. But, I could always get an RSS feed for your site and get access to the same information that I can from /iPhone. Or, I can just grab your CSS and see what you're hiding and turn that off in devtools. Or..
Really, if you want it 'secret', don't rely on CSS.
You said it!
My 1 step workflow is : -
1 Upload new gallery to client category.
Repeat every day for 6 months. Client has ONE url and I have an easy upload workflow.
Instead You want me to : -
1 upload the gallery.
2 Close the upload panel and switch to Customize Gallery.
3 Make it unlisted.
4 Switch to Control Panel.
5 Go to Sharegroups and try to find the last uploaded gallery in a sea of ALL my galleries and add it to the Sharegroup.
You obviously dont upload 2 or more galleries a day, every day, every week, every month!
DrDavid you work in IT! My clients dont. they dont know what CSS even means!
You know how they transport diamonds? They send them through regular post . . . . . hidden in plain sight works best.
There is a ton of posts on here telling us how to use CSS. Its so powerful you have to pay extra to get it . . . I know what it does and I know its limitations . . it should be MY choice to use it or not and it should be MY choice whether to have to have the iphone interface running parallel with it.
You said it!
My 1 step workflow is : -
1 Upload new gallery to client category.
Repeat every day for 6 months. Client has ONE url and I have an easy upload workflow.
Instead You want me to : -
1 upload the gallery.
2 Close the upload panel and switch to Customize Gallery.
3 Make it unlisted.
4 Switch to Control Panel.
5 Go to Sharegroups and try to find the last uploaded gallery in a sea of ALL my galleries and add it to the Sharegroup.
You obviously dont upload 2 or more galleries a day, every day, every week, every month!
DrDavid you work in IT! My clients dont. they dont know what CSS even means!
I'm just trying to be helpful... There's no need to get angry at me! I think there's a third (and better) answer to all this. A quicksetting that includes the sharegroup it'll be added to! So, when I create a gallery, I can make it unlisted and part of the ABCD sharegroup with one click total. (In the same way you already choose the settings for the gallery anyways). This, I'd assume, should be easier to implement IMHO.
Not getting angry David (apologies if thats how it came accross)! All is cool. Unfortuneatley you cannot add Sharegroup as a quicksetting, nor can you find Sharegroup in the gallery tools, nor can you choose a custom quick setting to act as a default for your uploads.
Why do think that is easier to implement than forcing iphone pages only to show images with external links activated?
Not getting angry David (apologies if thats how it came accross)! All is cool. Unfortuneatley you cannot add Sharegroup as a quicksetting, nor can you find Sharegroup in the gallery tools, nor can you choose a custom quick setting to act as a default for your uploads.
Why do think that is easier to implement than forcing iphone pages only to show images with external links activated?
I think there's a better cost/benefit ratio to add a sharegroup quicksetting vs. an iphone hide option. So, IMHO, there's more chance of getting SM to implement the quicksetting than the iphone setting. Curious though; if your clients don't have a clue about CSS, etc.. Why would they have iphones where they could spy on other projects? Seems odd to me... Most of my computer clueless clients don't really belly up to the bar for pocket PC's or iphones, etc..
Just out of interest . . philospohically, what exactly is the difference between 'public' and 'unlisted'?
I can give you a url to a public gallery I have.
I can give you a url to an unlisted gallery I have.
The ONLY difference is whether they are allowed to appear on your Smugmug home page . . which can be controlled with CSS.
You will never find my 'public' galleries if you dont know my username, just as you would nevr finf them if I uploaded them to www.mywebsite/my pics
if you dont know what my website is called.
I could see your unlisted galleries if I guessed the url (or had software to guess it). Security levels are a relative concept. I am happy with my galleries being 'public' at www.122hh6hg6hh.smugmug.com and my homepage shielded using CSS because you wont find it. Why do I need to make them unlisted?
Just out of interest . . philospohically, what exactly is the difference between 'public' and 'unlisted'?
I can give you a url to a public gallery I have.
I can give you a url to an unlisted gallery I have.
The ONLY difference is whether they are allowed to appear on your Smugmug home page . . which can be controlled with CSS.
You will never find my 'public' galleries if you dont know my username, just as you would nevr finf them if I uploaded them to www.mywebsite/my pics
if you dont know what my website is called.
I could see your unlisted galleries if I guessed the url (or had software to guess it). Security levels are a relative concept. I am happy with my galleries being 'public' at www.122hh6hg6hh.smugmug.com and my homepage shielded using CSS because you wont find it. Why do I need to make them unlisted?
You don't have to. I'm just saying that we have the options available to make your galleries not seen on the iPhone.
They dont necessarily have iphones. I am not concerned about people with iphones. You can view the iphone stuff using your regular Firefox or IE by typing it in the URL . .thats the weakness that concerns me.
See www.drdavid.smugmug.com/iphone
Just out of interest . . philospohically, what exactly is the difference between 'public' and 'unlisted'?
I can give you a url to a public gallery I have.
I can give you a url to an unlisted gallery I have.
The ONLY difference is whether they are allowed to appear on your Smugmug home page . . which can be controlled with CSS.
You will never find my 'public' galleries if you dont know my username, just as you would nevr finf them if I uploaded them to www.mywebsite/my pics
if you dont know what my website is called.
I could see your unlisted galleries if I guessed the url (or had software to guess it). Security levels are a relative concept. I am happy with my galleries being 'public' at www.122hh6hg6hh.smugmug.com and my homepage shielded using CSS because you wont find it. Why do I need to make them unlisted?
A public gallery is public for all (including RSS readers) to see. I'm pretty sure the iphone interface is using the RSS feeds to do it's job. It'd be silly not to. So, to add the 'no external links' you'd need to reinvent the RSS feeds too. On the other hand, my suggestion works within the framework of SM AND is beneficial for ALL people on SM; not just a few.
They dont necessarily have iphones. I am not concerned about people with iphones. You can view the iphone stuff using your regular Firefox or IE by typing it in the URL . .thats the weakness that concerns me.
See www.drdavid.smugmug.com/iphone
And you think they'll figure out the /iphone link but not how to reveal CSS using the Firefox plugin devtools (available on the firefox site). All you need to do is edit the CSS and delete your 'display:none' lines. voila, all galleries are visible. It took me about 5 seconds to do. And, anyone reading this thread, will now know how to do that too (along with the /iphone link). Link to the tool here: http://chrispederick.com/work/web-developer/ (highly recommended )
we have the options available to make your galleries not seen on the iPhone.
yes you are right, you do. Unlisted or Passworded . . . . . . so my CSS customization homepage is rendered pointless and I need to adopt a more cumbersome workflow just to accomodate the fact that I have no power to opt out of the iphone interface offering up all my 'public' galleries.
Many people have one or more Categories 'hidden' on their homepage using CSS. This will affect more folks than you might think. Its not a security issue . .its about presentation and control.
Perhaps I should ask this question another way.
Exactly why are there countless threads explaining how to hide stuff on your homepage using CSS?
And how long does it take you to find the Firefox temporary internet files cache? And hence all the images which are supposedly right click protected? Yet still it is 'sold' as a feature to Power Users. Most folks arent up to this level of hacking . . you need to take the view of the common man.
yes you are right, you do. Unlisted or Passworded . . . . . . so my CSS customization homepage is rendered pointless and I need to adopt a more cumbersome workflow just to accomodate the fact that I have no power to opt out of the iphone interface offering up all my 'public' galleries.
Many people have one or more Categories 'hidden' on their homepage using CSS. This will affect more folks than you might think. Its not a security issue . .its about presentation and control.
These clients who know nothing about CSS and devtools... Please tell me why you think that they know about /iphone? Besides.. RSS is a easier to use and would do the same thing as the /iphone link.
The threads on hiding things is to make stuff "look" nicer. That's about it. It's just a visual tool to clean up the site. But, it's not a security device. AND, technically, it's a hack; and therefore "unsupported" by SM.
Does the CSS functionailty not have a lengthy FAQ on the SMugmug site telling you how to do 'cool stuff'? Do you not have to pay extra to get to do it? Are you really trying to say its 'unofficial'? My credit card payment to get to use it was certainly official enough.
Does the CSS functionailty not have a lengthy FAQ on the SMugmug site telling you how to do 'cool stuff'? Do you not have to pay extra to get to do it? Are you really trying to say its 'unofficial'? My credit card payment to get to use it was certainly official enough.
I agree with you; but, because you have the ABILITY to customize doesn't mean the customization is guaranteed to always work the same today and in the future.
Look, all I'm saying is that EVEN IF they did what you wanted.. it would only benefit a few people (not that those people aren't important mind you...) BUT, if they did a quicksetting for a sharegroup, that would benefit *everyone* and give you the same outcome--with actual security vs. the hide-and-seek game you're currently playing.
You will also smile when you read these words on the Apple site ". . Smugmug is a popular photo sharing site featuring gorgeous galleries and nearly limitless customization . . " (well in fairness they did say 'nearly'!).
I dont want my Clients finding their stuff that way. They will not enjoy being quite so exposed . . whereas with smugislands activated and an obscure user name (not to mention my CSS 'hacks') they are all but invisible to the outside world via the regular Smugmug site.
I do agree with you about the Sharegroup quicksetting . . but I would go further . . just add a droplist of Sharegroups to the Gallery Tools . . that way . . when i upload I can select a Sharegroup to send the Gallery too. I would happily make all my galleries unlisted and give Clients the sharegroup url. I would be much happier in fact. But the current method for assigning Sharegroups is not good . . plus there is no hierarchy. Currently, my clients get a 'Category' of their own and several sub-categories containing galleries. Sharegroups are a blunt tool offering up one big lump of galleries. There is no structure . .and you need to start hiding breadcrumbs because people start clicking on them and get hopelessly lost. Its just not good . . . . .if I could repeat once again . .i am VERY happy with my current setup . .I just want to be able to 'lock' the iphone door.
I have heard that the Apple website is quite a popular one . . . and links straight to smugmugs 'iphone' pages (all 180 million photos)
You're right.. Apple is popular. But, then your clients are better than you think if they can even type an actual URL in the ADDRESS box vs. searching for the link in google/aol/msn, etc..
I do agree with you about the Sharegroup quicksetting . . but I would go further . . just add a droplist of Sharegroups to the Gallery Tools . . that way . . when i upload I can select a Sharegroup to send the Gallery too. I would happily make all my galleries unlisted and give Clients the sharegroup url. I would be much happier in fact. But the current method for assigning Sharegroups is not good . . plus there is no hierarchy. Currently, my clients get a 'Category' of their own and several sub-categories containing galleries. Sharegroups are a blunt tool offering up one big lump of galleries. There is no structure . .and you need to start hiding breadcrumbs because people start clicking on them and get hopelessly lost. Its not good . . .
I agree. Sharegroups could be improved. But, my suggestion is (I'd guess) fairly easy to do--and would be a GREAT improvement over the current method.
We are in agreement about Sharegroups being flawed. They need to be easier to implement and recognise sub-categories. But I still think there is an issue to be addressed about this iphone thing . . . there is an obvious disparity between the regular Smugmug homepage and the iphone Smugmug optimised 'homepage' I fully understand that the CSS may not run on the iphone due to the limitations of the software, its just frustrating to me that the shortcomings of the phone compromise the way smugmug works for me and I can do nothing about that currently. lets wait and see what the Smugmug techs come up with. It might be a simple tweak. Fingers crossed.
I'm not sure why making them 'unlisted' won't work for you? You can still give them links to their galleries. Then they won't show on the iPhone.
Doesn't this work? What am I missing... I'm all ears and not defensive at all, this is a fine topic. But let's have the facts and make rational decisions
I think he means it breaks navigation because you have to give people unique urls to unlisted galleries or add them to sharegroups to see them.
This is precisely what I mean.
I shoot events (usually kid stuff) and have 20-40 galleries per event stored in a category -> subcategory "location".
If I make them all unlisted then I have to:
1. Provide links to each (very unfriendly and essentially "broken" navigation)
2. Create a sharegroup (not so bad, and a vanity url helps), but navigation is broken.
3. Lock them down with passwords (unfriendly and problematical when lots of customers are involved), navigation works once the password is entered.
Using just the CSS/java hack allows me to use a simple vanity url to link to the category -> subcategory "location", leave the individual galleries "open" and not worry about casual vistors.
A public gallery is public for all (including RSS readers) to see.
Which is why I would also like the option to disable feeds on my site.
I guess this is the fundamental issue it all boils down to...
SmugMug has some very cool features (tweaked iPhone interface, RSS feeds, Hello World, Hello Smuggers, etc) for being "found", which is great.
But, its MY site and I pay SmugMug for the services. I should have control over what content is available (I do for the most part) and how it is made available (not so much on this count).
Maybe its just as simple as someone (stuart I think) suggested. If the "external links" option is turned off for a specific gallery then it should NOT be available from anything but the standard web interface (no iphone, no RSS, not even the API if you're not logged in).
I can't stress enough how happy I am in general with SmugMug. The service is top notch (first hand experience just this past weekend) and the people (workers and users) are always freindly and helpful.
Just out of interest . . philospohically, what exactly is the difference between 'public' and 'unlisted'?
I can give you a url to a public gallery I have.
I can give you a url to an unlisted gallery I have.
The ONLY difference is whether they are allowed to appear on your Smugmug home page . . which can be controlled with CSS.
You will never find my 'public' galleries if you dont know my username, just as you would nevr finf them if I uploaded them to www.mywebsite/my pics
if you dont know what my website is called.
I could see your unlisted galleries if I guessed the url (or had software to guess it). Security levels are a relative concept. I am happy with my galleries being 'public' at www.122hh6hg6hh.smugmug.com and my homepage shielded using CSS because you wont find it. Why do I need to make them unlisted?
The main difference between an unlisted gallery and a public gallery is that there is NO way to discover an unlisted gallery whereas there are many ways to discover a public gallery (home page, page crawler, smugmug APIs, third party tools that list galleries, etc...). You way over-simplify things when you describe the only difference as being visible on your home page. There are many, many more differences than that.
If you don't want it discovered by a random person, then unlisted was designed explicitly for that purpose.
I think you and David are on the right path. If unlisted isn't meeting your needs, then we should understand why it doesn't work for you and attempt to fix that rather than try to make a public gallery have most of the characteristics of an unlisted gallery. It would make a lot more sense to me to understand what you think is missing from unlisted galleries (and perhaps sharegroups) and see if that can be added there. Then public galleries can be public (like they were designed to be) and unlisted galleries can not be public (like they were designed to be).
I'm wondering, for example, what if you could have an unlisted category. It would never show in the home page or any public APIs or browsers. It would not be easily guessable. It could contain unlisted galleries. It could contain sub-categories. When you viewed it because someone gave you the link to it, it would behave like a category and have normal navigation (except probably no way to go up to the home page) so you could go into a gallery in it and then come back up. But, it would never show in any public pages or APIs. For one level of galleries, a sharegroup already is essentially an unlisted category, though not quite as easy to create/maintain. Enhancements are obviously needed to support multiple levels of unlisted.
jfriend . . you may just be some kind of genius! The ability to have unlisted Categories would suit me just fine . . exactly as you describe. Make it for Power and Pro only and Smugmug will see thousands of folks upgrading for that facility!
As long as there can be as many as I need, and I can give out ONE url to it and it can have subcategories then that is the almost perfect answer.
. . it would make a lot more sense to me to understand what you think is missing from unlisted galleries (and perhaps sharegroups . .
As I see it, the Smugmug experience is 'designed' around Public galleries . . the homepage, the slideshow, the customisation tools, the breadcrumb navigation etc. Unlisted and sharegroups seem to me to be 'outwith' that smugmug experience, as if they are ring-fenced off to the side. There is no way to present say 50 unlisted galleries arranged in sub-categories to my client without giving them 50 urls. There is no navigation. Adding galleries to Sharegroups is cumbersome, and again there is no sub categories or navigation. Your unlisted category idea is brilliant but thinking about it . . I cant see how they can acheive it . . technically. Still . . hope springs eternal.
I think the word 'public' gallery is somewhat misleading. There are nearly 200million photos on smugmug are there not?. I defy anyone reading this thread to actually find my so-called 'public' galleries without me giving them the user name for my smugmug sites. My user name could be www.1g4353566HG.smugmug.com (and I can change it as often as I like with a few clicks) so unless I give you the link you are never going to find it. So if I give a client a link to their own 'category' like this www.1g4353566HG.smugmug.com/client13 I am pretty confident that no-one else is ever going to stumble upon it. And by hiding my homepage with a slideshow and hiding other categories by CSS I am happy enough that Client 13 will think that he has a group of sub-categories all to himself. He doesnt know about Client17 or Client05 etc because he cant see them. Of course if he is 'in IT' and feels like prying then thats a risk I am happy to take, but if he has a friend with an iphone and they get chatting about his project and the friend says "hey I think I can get smugmug on my iphone, lets have a look at your project!" then suddenly he is faced with ALL my other client's projects . . . and will quite naturally browse around. Its human nature. Out of sight out of mind. I would just like to have the option to prevent Smugmug displaying ALL my 'public' galleries to the iphone.
Another method would be to hide your galleries/categories box in the control panel. No way to see anything without a direct link and no hacks needed. Each direct link, Client cats/subcats/gallery would work, breadcrumb/navigation preserved, if not hidden, up the line to the homepage with no links there to jump into another category. For your "public" categories create your own link page like this.
Agreed Allen . . there's loads of ways to do it . . but currently no ways to stop them all appearing on the iphone page . . . which kinda devalues the power of the customizations and/or control panel tools . . . thats the problem we are trying to resolve.
I am simply hiding the Categories using the normal CSS tools available to Power/Pro users on the Control Panel : -
So I am not clear on what you mean by 'no hacks needed'.
The links on your sample page dont actually go anywhere . . . . and even if they did, and you had links to 8 galleries but you really had 28 galleries . .then all 28 would appear on the iphone page . . outwith your control.
Agreed Allen . . there's loads of ways to do it . . but currently no ways to stop them all appearing on the iphone page . . . which kinda devalues the power of the customizations and/or control panel tools . . . thats the problem we are trying to resolve. The links on your sample page dont actually go anywhere . . . . and even if they did, and you had links to 8 galleries but you really had 28 galleries . .then all 28 would appear on the iphone page . . outwith your control.
Each of those on that links page would go to the public categories. None of
your client cats/galleries would be seen or discoverable without a direct link.
To keep your client galleries from being discovered or seen by iPhone, add
the same password to all the client galleries, something simple like your
name or theirs. They also have to be public to be seen on the category or
subcat pages.
You could also use the clients last name for their galleries.
Hint: enter your last name (lower case)
I think the word 'public' gallery is somewhat misleading.
Come on stuart, this statement is a little overboard. We're trying to help you here, but taking things to this level is a bit far. The default behavior for a public gallery is that:
it's listed in your home page and thus browsable by anyone
it's available in smugmug search
it's available in search engine search
it's available on "popular photos"
it's available in category specific browsing from the smugmug top level
it's available in the mobile interface
it's available in keyword search without logging in to that account
it's available in a public RSS feed
it's available in the public Smugmug API without logging in to that account
That's a public gallery. Plain and simple.
The default for an unlisted gallery is exactly the opposite. None of the above are true.
Just because you can take steps to obscure or disable or obscure some of the access methods normally available on public galleries doesn't mean that the word "public" is now somehow misleading. The intent of a public gallery is that folks other than those whom you specifically give a coded URL to have ways to find the gallery. If you don't want the public to find them, then they are probably not the right type of gallery for you. That's what unlisted and password protected galleries were made for.
So basically the only way to completely protect our images is by watermarking all of them? I just used the iphone browser and browsed all my images and was able to see the large ones too, yikes!
Comments
I think he means it breaks navigation because you have to give people unique urls to unlisted galleries or add them to sharegroups to see them.
Andy - can I just say 'thanks for dealing with this'. Its only now that I have a vested interest in the development of a thread that I appreciate your efforts! Does flattery still work?
Andy's right. Make it unlisted. That's what I do. My About Me page? Unlisted and linked from the nav bar. Doesn't show up on /iphone. Lots of galleries where I take photos for fun/friends and don't really want it to showcase my skills? Unlisted. Easy to do. Fixes your issues, and if you're already hading out URL's, handing out a different one isn't the end of the world. Otherwise, consider what I do.. I create sharegroups and make the sharegroup into a vanity URL. Easy to use, easy to remember, powerful new tool!
David
Twitter: @WolfSnap
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/WolfSnapDesigns
SmugMug & Wordpress Customization - WolfSnap.com | Custom Domains
David
Twitter: @WolfSnap
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/WolfSnapDesigns
SmugMug & Wordpress Customization - WolfSnap.com | Custom Domains
I create categories as follows :
Client 1
Client 2
Client 3
etc etc
I give Clients url links to their Category.
I dump galleries into the client categories as required. My clients can always see the galleries I upload.
If I make them unlisted then the Client CANNOT see the galleries because they only have a link to the Category.
Unlisted galleries are not visible.
My system works fine (each client is not aware of the other's categories and sees only their own stuff), but my system is rendered useless by the iphone interface because Clients can see other Clients stuff.
DrDavid . . are you honestly suggesting that I give each client 100 urls for 100 galleries? When currently I give them just one . . just so that I can accomodate the iphone interface? Please read what i have just said about why unlisted doesnt work for me! And please respect the fact that differnet people use smugmug differnet ways. eg. I wouldnt use right click protection but I respect Christine's choice to do so. If you work in IT you have have a perspective on this which my Client's dont. My Clients dont work in IT and I am not that concerned about them circumventing my CSS but there is no point SMugmug selling us CSS tools for the front door and then leaving the back door open. Its a simple disparity which cannot be disputed. PLEASE tell me who would be disadvantaged if the iphone interface could not see galleries with external links switcched off?
David
Twitter: @WolfSnap
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/WolfSnapDesigns
SmugMug & Wordpress Customization - WolfSnap.com | Custom Domains
Really, if you want it 'secret', don't rely on CSS.
David
Twitter: @WolfSnap
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/WolfSnapDesigns
SmugMug & Wordpress Customization - WolfSnap.com | Custom Domains
You said it!
My 1 step workflow is : -
1 Upload new gallery to client category.
Repeat every day for 6 months. Client has ONE url and I have an easy upload workflow.
Instead You want me to : -
1 upload the gallery.
2 Close the upload panel and switch to Customize Gallery.
3 Make it unlisted.
4 Switch to Control Panel.
5 Go to Sharegroups and try to find the last uploaded gallery in a sea of ALL my galleries and add it to the Sharegroup.
You obviously dont upload 2 or more galleries a day, every day, every week, every month!
DrDavid you work in IT! My clients dont. they dont know what CSS even means!
You know how they transport diamonds? They send them through regular post . . . . . hidden in plain sight works best.
There is a ton of posts on here telling us how to use CSS. Its so powerful you have to pay extra to get it . . . I know what it does and I know its limitations . . it should be MY choice to use it or not and it should be MY choice whether to have to have the iphone interface running parallel with it.
David
Twitter: @WolfSnap
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/WolfSnapDesigns
SmugMug & Wordpress Customization - WolfSnap.com | Custom Domains
Why do think that is easier to implement than forcing iphone pages only to show images with external links activated?
David
Twitter: @WolfSnap
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/WolfSnapDesigns
SmugMug & Wordpress Customization - WolfSnap.com | Custom Domains
I can give you a url to a public gallery I have.
I can give you a url to an unlisted gallery I have.
The ONLY difference is whether they are allowed to appear on your Smugmug home page . . which can be controlled with CSS.
You will never find my 'public' galleries if you dont know my username, just as you would nevr finf them if I uploaded them to www.mywebsite/my pics
if you dont know what my website is called.
I could see your unlisted galleries if I guessed the url (or had software to guess it). Security levels are a relative concept. I am happy with my galleries being 'public' at www.122hh6hg6hh.smugmug.com and my homepage shielded using CSS because you wont find it. Why do I need to make them unlisted?
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See www.drdavid.smugmug.com/iphone
David
Twitter: @WolfSnap
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/WolfSnapDesigns
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David
Twitter: @WolfSnap
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/WolfSnapDesigns
SmugMug & Wordpress Customization - WolfSnap.com | Custom Domains
yes you are right, you do. Unlisted or Passworded . . . . . . so my CSS customization homepage is rendered pointless and I need to adopt a more cumbersome workflow just to accomodate the fact that I have no power to opt out of the iphone interface offering up all my 'public' galleries.
Many people have one or more Categories 'hidden' on their homepage using CSS. This will affect more folks than you might think. Its not a security issue . .its about presentation and control.
Perhaps I should ask this question another way.
Exactly why are there countless threads explaining how to hide stuff on your homepage using CSS?
And how long does it take you to find the Firefox temporary internet files cache? And hence all the images which are supposedly right click protected? Yet still it is 'sold' as a feature to Power Users. Most folks arent up to this level of hacking . . you need to take the view of the common man.
The threads on hiding things is to make stuff "look" nicer. That's about it. It's just a visual tool to clean up the site. But, it's not a security device. AND, technically, it's a hack; and therefore "unsupported" by SM.
David
Twitter: @WolfSnap
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/WolfSnapDesigns
SmugMug & Wordpress Customization - WolfSnap.com | Custom Domains
Does the CSS functionailty not have a lengthy FAQ on the SMugmug site telling you how to do 'cool stuff'? Do you not have to pay extra to get to do it? Are you really trying to say its 'unofficial'? My credit card payment to get to use it was certainly official enough.
Look, all I'm saying is that EVEN IF they did what you wanted.. it would only benefit a few people (not that those people aren't important mind you...) BUT, if they did a quicksetting for a sharegroup, that would benefit *everyone* and give you the same outcome--with actual security vs. the hide-and-seek game you're currently playing.
David
Twitter: @WolfSnap
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/WolfSnapDesigns
SmugMug & Wordpress Customization - WolfSnap.com | Custom Domains
I have heard that the Apple website is quite a popular one . . . and links straight to smugmugs 'iphone' pages (all 180 million photos)
http://www.smugmug.com/iphone/#_home
stick drdavid in the search box . .
You will also smile when you read these words on the Apple site ". . Smugmug is a popular photo sharing site featuring gorgeous galleries and nearly limitless customization . . " (well in fairness they did say 'nearly'!).
I dont want my Clients finding their stuff that way. They will not enjoy being quite so exposed . . whereas with smugislands activated and an obscure user name (not to mention my CSS 'hacks') they are all but invisible to the outside world via the regular Smugmug site.
I do agree with you about the Sharegroup quicksetting . . but I would go further . . just add a droplist of Sharegroups to the Gallery Tools . . that way . . when i upload I can select a Sharegroup to send the Gallery too. I would happily make all my galleries unlisted and give Clients the sharegroup url. I would be much happier in fact. But the current method for assigning Sharegroups is not good . . plus there is no hierarchy. Currently, my clients get a 'Category' of their own and several sub-categories containing galleries. Sharegroups are a blunt tool offering up one big lump of galleries. There is no structure . .and you need to start hiding breadcrumbs because people start clicking on them and get hopelessly lost. Its just not good . . . . .if I could repeat once again . .i am VERY happy with my current setup . .I just want to be able to 'lock' the iphone door.
David
Twitter: @WolfSnap
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/WolfSnapDesigns
SmugMug & Wordpress Customization - WolfSnap.com | Custom Domains
I shoot events (usually kid stuff) and have 20-40 galleries per event stored in a category -> subcategory "location".
If I make them all unlisted then I have to:
1. Provide links to each (very unfriendly and essentially "broken" navigation)
2. Create a sharegroup (not so bad, and a vanity url helps), but navigation is broken.
3. Lock them down with passwords (unfriendly and problematical when lots of customers are involved), navigation works once the password is entered.
Using just the CSS/java hack allows me to use a simple vanity url to link to the category -> subcategory "location", leave the individual galleries "open" and not worry about casual vistors.
Which is why I would also like the option to disable feeds on my site.
I guess this is the fundamental issue it all boils down to...
SmugMug has some very cool features (tweaked iPhone interface, RSS feeds, Hello World, Hello Smuggers, etc) for being "found", which is great.
But, its MY site and I pay SmugMug for the services. I should have control over what content is available (I do for the most part) and how it is made available (not so much on this count).
Maybe its just as simple as someone (stuart I think) suggested. If the "external links" option is turned off for a specific gallery then it should NOT be available from anything but the standard web interface (no iphone, no RSS, not even the API if you're not logged in).
I can't stress enough how happy I am in general with SmugMug. The service is top notch (first hand experience just this past weekend) and the people (workers and users) are always freindly and helpful.
The main difference between an unlisted gallery and a public gallery is that there is NO way to discover an unlisted gallery whereas there are many ways to discover a public gallery (home page, page crawler, smugmug APIs, third party tools that list galleries, etc...). You way over-simplify things when you describe the only difference as being visible on your home page. There are many, many more differences than that.
If you don't want it discovered by a random person, then unlisted was designed explicitly for that purpose.
I think you and David are on the right path. If unlisted isn't meeting your needs, then we should understand why it doesn't work for you and attempt to fix that rather than try to make a public gallery have most of the characteristics of an unlisted gallery. It would make a lot more sense to me to understand what you think is missing from unlisted galleries (and perhaps sharegroups) and see if that can be added there. Then public galleries can be public (like they were designed to be) and unlisted galleries can not be public (like they were designed to be).
I'm wondering, for example, what if you could have an unlisted category. It would never show in the home page or any public APIs or browsers. It would not be easily guessable. It could contain unlisted galleries. It could contain sub-categories. When you viewed it because someone gave you the link to it, it would behave like a category and have normal navigation (except probably no way to go up to the home page) so you could go into a gallery in it and then come back up. But, it would never show in any public pages or APIs. For one level of galleries, a sharegroup already is essentially an unlisted category, though not quite as easy to create/maintain. Enhancements are obviously needed to support multiple levels of unlisted.
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As long as there can be as many as I need, and I can give out ONE url to it and it can have subcategories then that is the almost perfect answer.
Heres hoping!
Kind Regards
As I see it, the Smugmug experience is 'designed' around Public galleries . . the homepage, the slideshow, the customisation tools, the breadcrumb navigation etc. Unlisted and sharegroups seem to me to be 'outwith' that smugmug experience, as if they are ring-fenced off to the side. There is no way to present say 50 unlisted galleries arranged in sub-categories to my client without giving them 50 urls. There is no navigation. Adding galleries to Sharegroups is cumbersome, and again there is no sub categories or navigation. Your unlisted category idea is brilliant but thinking about it . . I cant see how they can acheive it . . technically. Still . . hope springs eternal.
I think the word 'public' gallery is somewhat misleading. There are nearly 200million photos on smugmug are there not?. I defy anyone reading this thread to actually find my so-called 'public' galleries without me giving them the user name for my smugmug sites. My user name could be www.1g4353566HG.smugmug.com (and I can change it as often as I like with a few clicks) so unless I give you the link you are never going to find it. So if I give a client a link to their own 'category' like this www.1g4353566HG.smugmug.com/client13 I am pretty confident that no-one else is ever going to stumble upon it. And by hiding my homepage with a slideshow and hiding other categories by CSS I am happy enough that Client 13 will think that he has a group of sub-categories all to himself. He doesnt know about Client17 or Client05 etc because he cant see them. Of course if he is 'in IT' and feels like prying then thats a risk I am happy to take, but if he has a friend with an iphone and they get chatting about his project and the friend says "hey I think I can get smugmug on my iphone, lets have a look at your project!" then suddenly he is faced with ALL my other client's projects . . . and will quite naturally browse around. Its human nature. Out of sight out of mind. I would just like to have the option to prevent Smugmug displaying ALL my 'public' galleries to the iphone.
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I am simply hiding the Categories using the normal CSS tools available to Power/Pro users on the Control Panel : -
.homepage #galleriesBox,
.homepage #categoriesBox,
.homepage #featuredBox {
display: none;
So I am not clear on what you mean by 'no hacks needed'.
The links on your sample page dont actually go anywhere . . . . and even if they did, and you had links to 8 galleries but you really had 28 galleries . .then all 28 would appear on the iphone page . . outwith your control.
your client cats/galleries would be seen or discoverable without a direct link.
To keep your client galleries from being discovered or seen by iPhone, add
the same password to all the client galleries, something simple like your
name or theirs. They also have to be public to be seen on the category or
subcat pages.
You could also use the clients last name for their galleries.
Hint: enter your last name (lower case)
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Come on stuart, this statement is a little overboard. We're trying to help you here, but taking things to this level is a bit far. The default behavior for a public gallery is that:
- it's listed in your home page and thus browsable by anyone
- it's available in smugmug search
- it's available in search engine search
- it's available on "popular photos"
- it's available in category specific browsing from the smugmug top level
- it's available in the mobile interface
- it's available in keyword search without logging in to that account
- it's available in a public RSS feed
- it's available in the public Smugmug API without logging in to that account
That's a public gallery. Plain and simple.The default for an unlisted gallery is exactly the opposite. None of the above are true.
Just because you can take steps to obscure or disable or obscure some of the access methods normally available on public galleries doesn't mean that the word "public" is now somehow misleading. The intent of a public gallery is that folks other than those whom you specifically give a coded URL to have ways to find the gallery. If you don't want the public to find them, then they are probably not the right type of gallery for you. That's what unlisted and password protected galleries were made for.
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