

The (Images) Upload Tab - What Is It, How To Use It?
There seems to be some confusion with regard to the Upload Tab, as opposed to, e.g., attaching images from the options underneath the message editor box, when replying to or creating a new post. The Upload Tab is an alternative to uploading images to FPN, without any personal quota restrictions. The only limit to Upload is the file size, but as that is 1 MB, it means that there are ample possibilities to upload a picture. Any picture with a largest side of around 1000 pixels will easily fit within that 1 MB constraint.The Upload Tab, which we added as an additional service to FPN about a month or so ago, is situated underneath the board header. This appears on every page. See the picture below, Upload Tab circled in red:
So, how to use this?That is not all that difficult. Imagine you are creating or editing a post., f.e, just after starting:
Note that I have circled the Upload Tab in red, it is still there, right at the top of the page.So, let's add some text, until we get to the point where I'd want to insert an image:
As indicated in the picture, I now need to click on the Upload Tab, and a new window or tab opens in the browser (dependent on browser settings. Here it is a new tab, and note that the old tab with the editor window is still there too (circled in red):
Now I can upload an image to FPN. Note that the maximum file size is 1 MB, see red underline and arrow on left (we only have limited file space on FPN). Since that easily caters for a large image (1000 pixels on the largest side easily), that shouldn't be a problem. There are two ways to upload an image, one is by supplying a url, from e.g., your Flickr site, or by direct upload from your hard disk. I want to select a file from from my HD and do that by clicking on the Choose button, see red arrow on right.
Next an Explorer window pops up, and in my case it is pointed already at the correct folder:
Of course, if it isn't, the explorer window allows me to browse to the correct folder anyway.Next I choose a picture:
In this case etruria02.jpg. Of course, next step is to click the Open button, which brings me back to the Upload screen. As you can see, the image name etc. is now displayed in the little Upload from HDD field.
Next of course is to click on the Add Image button, where the red arrow is pointing, after which the image appears in the Upload screen. Since the image is reasonably large, dimension wise, more than the browser window is filled, so I am scrolling down through the window (as displayed here in 2 stages).
Top part of window:
Bottom part of window (scrolling down):
As you can see, the picture is all there now, and I can also add a new picture, if I like. Better to do that one at a time, however.Also note, which is most significant, that there also is a Codes block, in this case with BBCode highlighted/selected. Selection is done by just moving the mouse cursor over those fields.The first code, Direct link, I can use in combination with the Image button in the editor, by copying the url, and pasting that in the Image Url field in the Image Button option. The seond one is direct BB-code, which can be inserted straight into the message. The third option is html code, which we don't really use here on FPN.The easiest really is to use the BBCode, and it also has another advantage, but I'll come to that in a minute.So, I select the BBCode option just by moving my mouse cursor there. Now I have two options in order to copy that code, which I need for my message. I can either press Ctrl-C on the keyboard, or right-click on the code. The latter will give me the following pop-up:
Of course, I click on Copy, as highlighted in the pop-up box.I need to go back to the message editor window now, so I scroll back to the top of this window, and there it is, to the left of the tab with the Upload screen I am looking at now, see red circle and arrow.
Clicking on that tab, brings me back to my message editor window.
Making sure my edit cursor is positioned where I want my image to appear, I now either press Ctrl-V to insert the code I copied from the Upload screen, or I right-click, which will give me the following pop-up window:
So, I click on Paste in this case. Either way, it will give me the following result:
Notice the weird code in my message. That is the BBCode we saw earlier. So, you may ask, what is the advantage of this? Well, it is faster than adding an image via the Add Image button, and it also makes for faster scrolling in the editor box when editing or creating a message.Well, you may say now, but I want to see the image in the text. To which I will reply again: you can. Click the Preview Post button at the bottom of the message editor box, and the message will appear with the image in all its glory.
Here follows the result after clicking on the Preview Post button. The message has appeared. Since the picture is still large, I'll show it here in two parts again, scrolled through the browser window.
Top part of Preview:
And the bottom part of the Preview, obviously with the editor window underneath:
I can continu editing now, add more images too if I like, do more Previews, and once I am happy and done, I can now scroll to the bottom of the page, and click on Post Reply, Post New Topic, etc., depending on what I was doing (creating a reply, a new topic, or maybe doing an edit).
In this case Post New Topic .Of course, once I have clicked Post, the message or topic appears as I created or edited it:
And that's all there is to it!Within Upload there also is the option to manage already uploaded images, including getting the codes again, but I leave you to play with that by yourself for now.
Warm regards, Wim
+20. A great help indeed. So much faster and more convenient than PhotoBucket. Also -- thanks to Wim -- for his answering my PM as to how to make sure that I always get full screen widths of each image and not the dwarfs that PhotoBucket coughs out.
MIke