Thumbnail Images

[Derek]

I am building a photographic library and I am importing the data from my master cataloguing system to Actinic Catalogue v7. I have successfully imported the Path and Filename for the 'Image Filename' field in Actinic and also imported the Path and Filename for the 'Extended info Image' field also (having placed the image files in an appropriate subdirectory in 'Site 1'.

I have successfully amended the Templates for 'Laying Out Your Products in Multiple Columns' (page 16 of the Advanced User Guide) and by amending the 'View | Search Settings' the images (per 'Image Filename' field) appear in the search results.

I would like to include an image of each product selected in the Shopping Cart and have amended the code per Advanced User Guide page 25, but that is to put the 'Thumbnail' field image in the shopping cart - not the 'Image Filename' field, so it does not work if there is no 'Thumbnail' present.

My questions are:-

1) What is the Thumbnail Field for and how is it used. If I try to use the 'Thumbnail' field instead of the 'Image Filename' field, the thumnail image does not appear in the product displays, even although I have given the correct path to the 'Thumbnail'. Does Actincic do some processing to create a thumbnail?

2) How can I amend the template to show the 'Image Filename' image in the shopping cart.

[Nadeem]

Hi Derek

1) What is the Thumbnail Field for and how is it used. If I try to use the 'Thumbnail' field instead of the 'Image Filename' field, the thumnail image does not appear in the product displays, even although I have given the correct path to the 'Thumbnail'. Does Actincic do some processing to create a thumbnail?

The Thumbnail field is used for showing an image on the search results. If you go to "View | Search Settings | Results", you can see here for "Display Option", "Product Image". If you tick this, then the thumbnail will be shown on search results.

2) How can I amend the template to show the 'Image Filename' image in the shopping cart.

The only way i have seen this, is by Norman script change. See his site here. Have a look for "Displaying images in the checkout phase.".
Please bear in mind that his scripts are Donationware.

Kind Regards

[Derek]

Thumbnail more

Thanks for your reply.

1) My web site is working well, and displaying the 'thumbnail' image for search results as you described.

2) Regarding your suggestion about third party solution to display the 'Image Filename' image on the Shopping Cart, I have looked at it and seems extremely complex. It appears to be applying some form of thumbnail processing to the 'Image Filename'. The Actinic advance guide p25 'Including Thumbnail Images in the Shopping Cart' involves adding only 3 lines of code. It works very well if I add the 'Thumbnail' field as a duplicate of the 'Image Filename' field. With a potential of eventually having 10,000 images on the product listing, it seems a lot of duplication to add a 'Thumbnail' field (which is a duplicate of the 'Image Filename' field) just to display the original image 'Image Filename' in the shopping cart. Much better if you could supply addition code to 'Including Image Filename Images in the Shopping Cart'.

3) Additionally, I am still not 100% clear about the use of 'Thumbnail' field in the import flat file format. Actinic appears to internally generate a 'Thumbnail' when using the search facility (and the size can be specified), therefore there would be no reason to import the 'Thumbnail' field. The only other time that a thumbnail appears to be used is when wishing to display in the shopping cart (per p25 of Advanced User Guide). It does not seem logical to have to create another field and image to import, just to display a Thumbnail in the shopping Cart. Are there any other times when the Thumbnail field is used? Per 2) above, I simply would like to display the 'Image Filename' image in the shopping cart, with no resizing required.

[Nadeem]

Hi Derek

The only thing i could suggest it trying to copy the fields in the database. For this you would need Access 2000. If you do have access 2000, then please try the following

1. Close down Actinic and go to your site1 folder (C:\Program Files\Actinic v7\Sites\Site1)
2. Find "ActinicCatalog.mdb" and back this up onto your desktop or zip it up
3. Open the "ActinicCatalog.mdb" in the Site1 folder
4. Go to the [Product Table]
5. Find the "Image FileName" column. Click on the column so it highlight the column, then go to "Edit | Copy".
6. Find "sThumbnailImage", again click on the column, so it highlight the column, and then go to "Edit | Paste".
7. Access will say are you sure you want to paste XX (number of records) into this field. Click "Yes".
8. Close down the database and Open Actinic
9. All imagefields will have the thumbnails filled in

This is the only way I'm afraid which is the easiest way.

Kind Regards

[Derek]

Thumbnail Field

Hi Again and thanks for your reply.

The creation of data in the 'Thumbnail' field which is a duplicate of the data in the 'Image Filename' field is not a problem to me. I simply provide the 'Thumbnail' field (which is a duplicate of the 'Image Filename' field) in the file that I import to Actinic. My point is that this means there are up to 10,000 pieces of duplicate data which seems inefficient and unnecessary.

All I am looking for is a simple piece of code similar to the 3 lines of code that is detailed in the Actinic advance guide p25 'Including Thumbnail Images in the Shopping Cart', but which will display the 'Image Filename' image in the Shopping Cart. By doing this, I will avoid have up to 10,000 pieces of duplicate data in Actinic.

Look forward to your reply.

[Nadeem]

Hi Derek,

I'm afraid it is not that easy to do in the current build of Actinic. I will add your comments to our wishlist for including product images in the checkout.

Kind Regards

[Derek]

Hi Nadeem

In fact, I only wished to display the 'Image Filename' image in the checkout because Thumbnail processing was not available. My preference would be to display Actinic generated Thumbnail images in the shopping cart (similar to the Search Facility where Actinic generates user defined sizes of thumbnails).

Thanks
Derek