Features request: linked images

[laurent]

Hello Coppermine Development Team,

First: Big Bravo to all of you. I have been a Coppermine user for the last 4 years and I keep thinking it is one of the best web gallery application out there, if not the best. No flattering.

I know that one or two of the features I am going to request have already been so in the past, however it will just show that these features could make Coppermine an even better soft. I have already implemented some of them on my own. However I humbly think it should be implemented in the master code of Coppermine...in future releases.

1-Easy one : When linking images to albums with keyword, I strongly believe that it would be better to have an exact match.
For instance today, if I have an album using the keyword montreal and another one using montrealnight, a picture having the keyword montreal will show up in both album. If you use exact match, it will show up in montreal album only. If I want it to appear in both albums, I can attach both keywords to the pictures.
Benefit: more control...or at least the control is more user friendly and less confusing.

2-Harder one : This one has already been mentionned: The difference between linked albums (list is built using keywords => "linked album" ) and master albums (list is built using the hard coded link in the pictures table using aid and pid => "master album" ).
    *Inconvenient 1: If an album has only linked pictures, it cannot have an album thumbnails
    *Inconvenient 2: When you are viewing a linked image in an album and you click on "change description" you are brought to the edit page of that specific picture. Then when you click on view album thumbnails, you are brought to the "master" album of that picture although I am coming from a "linked" album.

The idea behind this is to merge those 2 concepts (linked and master albums) into one:
   The aid column in the picture table is removed and we have another table containing the links "albums-pictures".
   I know this will involve some work in many lines of code....I'll be glad to help.

3-Best one : Once 2 is done, then we can implement the ultimate feature request asked by many already: custom sort of images for albums. I know that this already exist for "master" albums. But having a table with the links album-pictures (the composite key would be aid and pid) we can have a third column being the position column that we remove also from the picture table. Having this we can order pictures in different album independently.



Please let me know what you think. I know that you may have already thought of that and that what we have today in Coppermine is based on a wised and conscious choice. However I see only advantages to these features (more control) without disadvantages (beside the ton of work it will require). I'll be glad to help.


Best Regards,

Laurent
www.teltip.com