| Introduction of the Photo Gallery Module | Managing the Photo Gallery Module | Front-End Templates | Back-End Administration | Adding Images |

Introduction of the Photo Gallery Module
The Module, referred to as the Photo Gallery (PG) module, is a module designed to allow many images to be presented to the user in an efficient fashion using categories to define sets of images which can then be browsed. Single images uploaded into the Photo Gallery are automatically converted into sets of images and made available to the user.

Managing the Photo Gallery Module
Clicking the Photo Gallery menu item will bring up the Photo Gallery page, a page template that is part of the site's design and so has the site's look and feel, and within that page is a selection mechanism, images to click on or a drop-down selector box, that allows selection of the various categories available.

Choosing a category will then show the photo-sets/sub-categories available within that category with a chosen image from each set being shown along with a "View" button. Clicking on the View button pops up a window with the first of the images for that sub-category being shown with forward and back buttons available to show other images in that sub-category. As indicated by the text below the image, clicking on the mage will show the original, full-sized image.

If multi-media object(s) have been uploaded into the site and attached to a Photo Gallery image set (by matching their names) then a list of those objects is shown below the image in the pop-up window. The list items are links and clicking on one will then pop up a further window which will present the multi-media.

Front-End Templates
Unlike standard TurnKey modules the PG module has no built-in display template but uses a full page from the site's templates. There is a default template with the needed code to display and select the top-level categories in the Photo Gallery. This template can be modified by the site designer to have the wanted look-and-feel for the site.

Similarly there is a sub-category template which gathers the list of image sets for the selected category and displays them. Again the default template has the base code and html for a workable page and can be edited for the required look-and-feel.

The pop-up windows are also pages available to the designer if changes are needed but are fully functional in their own right.

Back-End Administration
The Photo Gallery module is managed via the administrative interface reached via the TurnKey Administrator. Clicking on the "Photo Gallery" link in the "Available Modules" menu area will bring up the PG management interface. There are two management areas, Image Sizes and Categories.

Image Sizes
The Image Sizes area controls how the uploaded image is manipulated when uploaded, how many images are created in the set and their sizes. These (re)sized images are used by the Photo Gallery itself and are available to any other area of the site via the Object Manager. It can be convenient to create a thumbnail size and others that will suit use in other parts of the website when creating/editing the PG sizes.

There are two default sizes in the manager that cannot be deleted. They are the image sizes used in the Category Listing page and in the pop-up viewer. The sizes can be edited to match the site design but they cannot be otherwise altered.

Clicking on the image in the pop-up viewer shows the original, unresized uploaded image and it is suggested that this image size is chosen to suit the site design and be as large as possible so that the reduced images created from this image are of the best quality.

Categories
The Categories management area controls the categories that can be viewed and used and their sub-categories. The categories and their sub-categories are shown in a tree structure. In the standard configuration a tree structure can be created that is many levels deep but the default templates and their associated code only allow for one level of sub-category below the category.

When first opened the Category Manager shows just the categories at the top level, if any, and a button to add a category. Clicking this button brings up the "Add Category" window where a new category can be created, being given a name and whether the category is active, ie visible in the site.

Once categories exist they are shown in the main Category Manager window. The display is standard TurnKey-style with a "+" icon to open up a category, a folder symbol to indicate that it is a container and the name of the category. A button is available to edit the category's data.

Opening a Category by clicking on its "+" icon will show any (sub)categories within that category and also bring up an extra button to add a new (sub) category to that category. Clicking that button will bring up the "Add category" screen to allow a new sub-category to be added.

Adding Images
Images are added to the Photo Gallery via the Object Manager.

Click here to open the Object Manager user guide, and see how you add images to the phot gallery

Opening the Image area in the Object Manager shows a list of the current conventional images that have been uploaded via either the Object Manager or the Editor and below that list is the Photo Gallery section. Opening the PG section will show a tree structure of the image sets that have been uploaded into the Photo Gallery.

The tree structure has the form of the categories and subcategories that have been defined in the PG and is similar in appearance to the Category section of the PG Manager. Clicking on the Add, "+", button on the right-hand side of a PG category will start an image upload process similar to that of a standard image but with extra selections available for whether the image is to be a standard image, a PG image set, or both.  If "standard" is chosen the image is placed in the images directory of the site in the standard fashion. If "Photo Gallery" is selected the images are processed into set of images of various sizes as per the configuration defined in the PG administrator and placed in the relevant directory for that category. If both are selected both operations take place with the original image being placed in the Images directory as well as the image set being placed in its relevant category.

Many sets of images can be loaded into a (sub)category. One item to notice when uploading an image into the Photo gallery is the "Top Image" checkbox. This controls which image from the various sets is seen in the category display page.