PICTURE POSTING TUTORIAL

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Uploading Picture Files to Internet Before you are able to post pictures on the McRocks message board, you must upload your picture files to a image hosting site on the internet. There are free services for this on the web. One free image hosting site is: picasa.google.com. You need to make sure that no password is required to access your pictures or you will get the dreaded red x in a box instead of a picture. The easiest way to upload your picture files to web space provided to you as part of your internet package by your Internet Service Provider (ISP) is to use an FTP program. An excellent FTP program called AceFTP 3 can be downloaded from the internet and used for FREE by clicking on the following link: You would do well by learning how to use an FTP program and the web space provided by your ISP to host your pictures; this will allow you to easily post pictures anywhere on the NET and it is simpler than you may think! You already pay for the web space, you might just as well use it! Posting Pictures on the McRocks Message Board After uploading your picture files to a web-hosting site or your ISP web space, there are two ways to post them on the McRocksNet message board: 1) Image Button ( at top of message posting box) 2) HTML Code (entered by you in message posting box). 1) Image Button Using the Image Button will produce an image (picture) in your message wherever you want it. To post a picture using the Image Button, you have to make sure that your picture hosting site is public (does not require a password to get in). If the site is not public, your image will either show up as an x in a box or you will get a dead link. The easiest way to insert your image's address into the graphic box is to cut and paste it. To obtain the address of the image, right click on your image, and then left click on Properties, you will get a box that shows the address of the image. For example, if you right click on the following picture and then left click on Properties, you will see that its address is: http://www.mcrocks.com/images/AgatizedCoralHoneyMoon-2Thumb.jpg Cut and paste your picture's address into the box that comes up when you click on the image button. To cut and paste your picture's address, first scroll over the address while holding down the left click button - this will highlight the address. Then, right click and choose copy. You should know that your computer will remember that last thing that you copied even if go from one internet site to another or in and out of different programs. To paste the address, left click on the image button in McRocksNet and then right click and choose Paste. Your picture address will be pasted in the box. Make sure that your address is correct. If your picture address is not PERFECT, you will get an x in a box instead of a picture. 2) HTML Code You can use html code to post a picture within the text of your message . I have done this to enter the following picture. As you can see, I have included the actual html code in the above picture. I did this for illustration purposes only (you don't have to have your html code in your picture). When typed in the message, the html code that you can see in the picture, produced the above picture. For thumbnail images, all you have to do is employ some simple html code. The following is an example of a thumbnail image. Click on the above image to enlarge The html code for the above example is as follows: For the above example: http://www.mcrocks.com/ftr08/StreeterMarionMarch08-Specimen-1.jpg is the address for the larger picture http://www.mcrocks.com/ftr08/StreeterMarionMarch08-Specimen-1Thumb.jpg is the address for the thumbnail picture Manage Attachments Link If uploading your picture files to the internet or using html seems too difficult, you may employ the Manage Attachments link at the bottom of the message posting box to upload pictures directly from your hard drive to the message board. This process will automatically create thumbnail pictures that appear at the bottom of your message. The simple procedure for this is as follows: Once you have typed your message, click on Manage Attachments. After clicking on Manage Attachments, you will get a new box in a separate window (you must disengage any pop-up blockers to see the separate window). Click on the 'Browse' button to find and highlight the file you want to upload from your hard drive. Click on the file that you want to upload to highlight it and then click the 'Open' button. In the following example, I have highlighted "actinolite-1.jpg" to upload. The image file that you chose will appear in one of the five boxes. You can upload up to five image files per session. If you have more than five, you can repeat the process. After clicking on the upload button, you will be returned to the message posting box and the file(s) that you have chosen to upload into your message will be listed at the bottom (see example below). All file sizes must be less than 61 KB - if a file size is greater than 61 KB, you will get a 'File Size Exceeds Limit' message as illustrated below for 'BerylCochranMine.jpg'. If you use the Manage Attachments feature, it is always a good idea to inform everyone in your message that the pictures that appear are thumbnails and they should click on each to enlarge. Picture File Size Please limit the image files sizes of your pictures to around 60 kb and the maximum width to around 450 pixels. Too many large pics could bog down the message board making it download too slowly. This is especially important to those of you with phone modems. You can use just about any editing program to resize your images or there are free web based programs on the NET such as at www.picresize.com (Version 2.0 is the easiest). Another good free photo editing program is irfanview.com In Closing . . . Some of the above directions may seem complicated at first, but they are all really quite simple once you have done them a few times. Please feel free to test away on the message board if you prefer - we won't mind. Whatever you do, keep posting your pictures!

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