C. Use connections to link People and Places to photos
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This is the last of site developments to work on in 2016. We already have a way to note Places that are shown in photos, but that is only available to the person who uploaded the photo. This change makes it available to anyone logged in to Gwulo, and extends the feature to work with Person pages too.
The work is still in progress, so it doesn't look very polished yet, but should be safe to start using.
How it works
When you look at a photo page, eg http://gwulo.com/atom/20896, you'll see the "Add a connection" block is now shown.
In the "Of type:", you can choose from two types of connection, "shows Person" or "shows Place".
After choosing the type of connection, the "To:" appears. Type in a few characters of the Person or Place you can see in the photo, wait for the list of matching pages to appear. Choose the correct entry, then click "Add connection".
The page updates and you'll see your addition shown under "Connections:" below the photo.
The other way around
If you're looking at a Place or a Person page, you also have the option to set up a connection to a photo that shows it. Choose the connection type "appears in".
What's working
The Person page now shows any photos that have been added this way. eg if you look at the page for Harry Blake you'll see a "Photos that show this person" with the first (oldest) three photos, and also a new "Photos" button that shows all photos with Harry in.
Still to do:
On the Person page
- The photos are also shown in the "Connections:" list. Hide them. [COMPLETED]
On the Place page
- Add a "Photos that show this place" block, and "Photos" button
- Hide the photos from the "Connections:" list.
- Migrate all the existing Photo - Place links across to this new approach, then hide the existing links.
Both
- Provide an easier way for users to add these connections when editing a photo / person / place page.
Tip for using it
"Just because you can, doesn't mean you should!"
Use your judgement about which photos deserve a connection: Does this add useful information to the site?
eg if a photo shows a Place, but it is far away in the distance and we already have better views of the Place, there's no need to add the connection.
Please let me have your feedback
Please let me know if you find any bugs or difficulties in using it, or suggestions for improvements.
On the Person page, the
On the Person page, the photos are now only shown in the "Photos that show this person" block. The duplicates no longer appear in the "Connections:" list.
How do I delete superfluous "connections" to my own family?
David
I was trying to tidy up "connections" to a member of my own family, having given some of them duplicate spouses or parents by mistake. It seems I can't delete those duplicates by pressing the edit button, can I? For example Leslie Beal Warren has duplicate entries.
Jill
re: How do I delete superfluous "connections" to my own family?
Hi Jill,
Thanks for using this new feature. The ability to delete wrong connections is part of the "Still to do" list above, but I've gone in and deleted the duplicate on Leslie's page. Let me know if you see any more duplicates.
I've also made a change so that duplicate connections can't be created, which will help minimise the problem in future.
Regards, David
Deleting superfluous family "connections" links
Thanks David. Yes, I'm afraid I've put Arthur Cecil Warren in twice as "child" of my grandfather, Charles Edward Warren. "Still to do" from my side is to add my own father to this list. I feel he's probably still looking over my shoulder!
Jill
Edit Connections from the Person page
When you edit a Person, you can now view / edit all that Person's connections on their page.
Below the "Tags:" you should see a new line: "Add / Edit / Delete connections. This Person ..."
Click that line to open it up and see all the connections.
If you make any changes, remember to click the "Save" button at the bottom of the page to make them permanent.
Place <=> Photo connections
The photos' "Places shown in..." have all been migrated over to the new "connections" approach.
If you just view content on Gwulo, you shouldn't notice any changes in the way it works. (There are still a couple of cosmetic tidy-ups to do, but all the old information should still be shown, and in a similar way to how it used to appear.)
If you upload or edit photos, you add "Places shown" in a very similar way, but on the edit page you'll need to click on the blue "Add / Edit / Delete connections. This photo ..." to open up the section for adding Places. In that section you'll see a new option that also lets you add any Person shown in the photo.
The connection between a Photo and Place works in the other direction too. So now when you edit a Place, you can add any photos that show it.
Finally, even if you didn't upload the Photo or create the Place, you can still add a connection to link them together, using the "Add a connection" block shown on the right of the page.
Let me know if you find anything confusing, or doesn't seem to be working correctly. I think I've moved over all the information and features successfully, but there's always a chance something got broken during the move.
Most visitors to Gwulo won't use this new feature, but if you're a regular visitor I hope you'll take time to use it. It is a powerful new feature that we can use to help make pages on Gwulo more inter-connected, and so make it easier for us all to find what we're looking for.
Places
Hi David,
I just uploaded a couple of images from flickr. When doing so, there still is a field "... shows Place: ". When I add a place there, it is accepted and I continue entering more data. But when I press enter and look onto the new entry, the place is gone. I can only add the place via the new feature. Is that intended?
Regards, Klaus
re: Places
Hi Klaus,
Thanks for trying this. That's a bug. I've hidden it for now, and will put it back again if I can work out how to fix the problem.
Regards, David