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Videos don't open to lightbox - very very broken

ChancyRatChancyRat Registered Users Posts: 2,141 Major grins
edited August 15, 2014 in Bug Reporting
I've seen this described in a few places but feel it's been lost as to significance.

Right now in a gallery of videos only (and this is for Smugmug style - I think there are bigger restrictions in other gallery styles but I haven't scoped them out):
1. Double-clicking a video on the right side fails to open the video into lightbox.
2. This is the equivalent of: there is no way for someone to open a video into lightbox mode using current SM functionality.
3. Anyone who comes to Smugmug new, where videos are a central part of their site, should and would be dismayed to see this behavior so broken.

In a gallery with images and videos:
1. If you open one image into lightbox, it is possible to arrow to the videos and view them in lightbox.
2. No viewer will ever invest in the problem-solving to figure that out (and should not have to).
3. One side-effect of this is that if a viewer's first lightbox effort is on a video, which will fail, s/he likely won't even try to view any image in lightbox. Why? Behavior logic follows that if it doesn't work on this, it won't work on this.
4. The rule for lightbox should work equally on all file types.

Allen's work-around to set up a link to lightbox mode in the photo description?
1. is extremely time-consuming to set up.
2. To anticipate any gallery/folder reorganization, one should use the code URL only - and to do that easily requires using Nicholas' Chrome extension. Such added work. :(
3. In addition putting a link to lightbox in the description looks horrible.
4. Then whatever language you use to help the viewer get there, in the description, is then also viewed again in lightbox mode. Redundant and misleading because when the instruction shows up a 2nd time in lightbox mode, the viewer thinks there is yet another option to click to view the video differently.
5. Also there is nothing to direct the viewer's attention to seeing a lightbox link below the video.
6. The normal behavior of "double-click" controls the eye/human behavior from the outset, and so once one video fails, the viewer (rightly) assumes there is no other view option.

Expecting the only way to view a larger image is via full-screen, is terrible. Lightbox offers great flexibility in video size that only this mode can achieve - and viewers deserve it.

Right now on my site I feel the video functionality is really broken. I can't believe broken lightbox for videos is viewed by Smugmug as "okay" or "normal"; I would like to see a patch put through to get videos back to the quality of behavior that Legacy had.

Comments

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    TeachTeach Registered Users Posts: 320 Major grins
    edited August 15, 2014
    Have you seen this help page about the keyboard shortcuts that can be used to get to the Lightbox view?

    http://help.smugmug.com/customer/portal/articles/84540-are-there-keyboard-shortcuts-for-smugmug
    Heather
    SmugMug Support Hero
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    ChancyRatChancyRat Registered Users Posts: 2,141 Major grins
    edited August 15, 2014
    Teach wrote: »
    Have you seen this help page about the keyboard shortcuts that can be used to get to the Lightbox view?

    http://help.smugmug.com/customer/portal/articles/84540-are-there-keyboard-shortcuts-for-smugmug

    Very nice to see keyboard shortcuts, thanks.
    However viewers/visitors are not going to use them. Nor do they resolve the inherent conflict between one system of double-clicking that works against when it doesn't work, and the confusion that sets up.

    Teach - ? - you didn't address any of my points. :cry
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    TeachTeach Registered Users Posts: 320 Major grins
    edited August 15, 2014
    I am sorry I did not address all of your points. We are very sorry that videos are causing you so much grief right now. We have noticed that videos never play if play button is pressed too quickly after opening the video in lightbox. This appears to be happening in collage and thumbnail galleries from what we can tell. We are looking into it and hope to have a solution for this soon.
    Heather
    SmugMug Support Hero
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    ChancyRatChancyRat Registered Users Posts: 2,141 Major grins
    edited August 15, 2014
    Teach wrote: »
    I am sorry I did not address all of your points. We are very sorry that videos are causing you so much grief right now. We have noticed that videos never play if play button is pressed too quickly after opening the video in lightbox. This appears to be happening in collage and thumbnail galleries from what we can tell. We are looking into it and hope to have a solution for this soon.

    Thank you Teach.
    Just to note, none of what you mention here is relevant to the problems I described.
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    TeachTeach Registered Users Posts: 320 Major grins
    edited August 15, 2014
    The way the video is by design for SmugMug gallery style. Videos either play in the gallery or full screen. Lightbox can only be opened by the keyboard shortcut in SmugMug gallery style as far as I know.

    Thank you for your feedback about the video display. Feel free to request changes or features via uservoice

    http://feedback.smugmug.com/forums/17723-smugmug
    Heather
    SmugMug Support Hero
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    ChancyRatChancyRat Registered Users Posts: 2,141 Major grins
    edited August 15, 2014
    Teach wrote: »
    The way the video is by design for SmugMug gallery style. Videos either play in the gallery or full screen. Lightbox can only be opened by the keyboard shortcut in SmugMug gallery style as far as I know.

    Thank you for your feedback about the video display. Feel free to request changes or features via uservoice

    http://feedback.smugmug.com/forums/17723-smugmug

    It can't be by design, Teach. Legacy did not work that way.
    There are 2 conflicting methods for the user - not a design anyone would design on purpose.
    One of the methods is not anything a user would ever know or be able to do.

    When a system was working flawlessly, and then broke down, this is not by design.
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    TeachTeach Registered Users Posts: 320 Major grins
    edited August 15, 2014
    Videos used to play like that in Legacy/Old SmugMug but that was multiple video player revisions ago and not longer works that way. It was changed when we added support for videos playing inline in the browser and that was released around September of 2012.

    This is a design choice we made back then, and it still applies to the SmugMug gallery style in New SmugMug, if you want videos in Lightbox, there are lots of options. Here are a few you can use:

    - different gallery styles
    - keyboard shortcut
    - get a link > Lightbox > open image in Lightbox and then move to a video
    Heather
    SmugMug Support Hero
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    AllenAllen Registered Users Posts: 10,011 Major grins
    edited August 15, 2014
    I actually have two versions in the caption. They are needed depending if you're in the smart
    (keyword) gallery or the source gallery to return to that type of gallery. I use CSS to hide the
    appropriate one. http://www.photosbyat.com/MyKeywords/Bird-Videos/i-6rLs232 
    Turner's Mill spring 
<br><br>
<span class="noShowSmart">
<a href="/MyKeywords/Bird-Videos/n-gF9bt/i-6rLs232/A">
Click here to open video in lightbox</a>
</span>

<span class="noShowGallery">
<a href="/Birds/2014-Birding/Birding-2014-June/2014-06-02-Southern-Missouri/i-6rLs232/A">
Click here to open video in lightbox</a>
</span>
    Al - Just a volunteer here having fun
    My Website index | My Blog
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