Enhance the photo galleries PLEASE......

[jhollington]

Originally Posted by TheJapanese

The workaround with https://user.fm/testpage.fastmail.com/ is quite nice. But I would like to see a native solution.

I agree with that completely, although I suspect this is a bit more complicated for FastMail to implement than it seems at first glance, so I can't imagine it's a huge priority.

In order to provide HTTPS support for your own domain, you'd need to have your own SSL certificate. This would require either that FastMail get into the certificate-issuing business (very unlikely) or that they set up a system and interface whereby you could request your own SSL certificate from your issuer-of-choice and upload and plug it into their systems. The second scenario isn't insurmountable, but it's also not simple to architect on the back-end in a user-friendly and secure way. I agree with what others have said — FastMail isn't a hosting provider, and adding user-space SSL certificates

However, there's also a pretty easy workaround if you want to "front" it with your own domain.... Just use whatever URL you like from your own domain and put in a redirect to the "user.fm" equivalent — so in other words, a link like http://gallery.mydomain.com would automatically redirect to https://user.fm/therealgallery.mydomain.com.

It's not the most elegant solution as it wouldn't preclude the user from hitting your pages over a non HTTP connection if they really wanted to, but we're ultimately talking about friends-and-family sharing here, not unknown end users or hackers who are going to deliberately try to get around using SSL, and it would allow you to hand out a URL for your own domain that would be used as an access point into your galleries or other sharing pages.

This is essentially how "mail.mydomain.com" URLs work as well — you have a URL that represents your domain, but you're ultimately redirected to the SSL-secured FastMail.com page.

[brong]

On the off-topic bit (SSL) we are planning to see how complex it would be to support letsencrypt for the number of domains we're working with. It's a very interesting topic to us, and it looks like the technology and browser support is getting to the point where it might be viable.

In the past we would have had to assign one ipv4 address per customer domain, which was clearly never going to fly! But most of the pieces already exist to do thousands of domains on a single IP now - the main challenge is probably going to be certificate management and distribution across all our frontends.

So far we've just been practicing using letencrypt for a couple of our own personal domains on non-FM hardware to get familiar with how it works.

Regarding nicer photogallery support, yeah - it's on the wishlist Can't give you any timelines of course, but it has already been noted as something which could do with a design refresh.

[rnkn]

Originally Posted by brong

On the off-topic bit (SSL) we are planning to see how complex it would be to support letsencrypt for the number of domains we're working with. It's a very interesting topic to us, and it looks like the technology and browser support is getting to the point where it might be viable.

This is pretty incredible news Bron! So FM is actually looking into using letsencrypt for customers' own domains, not just the domains belonging to FM?

[brong]

Originally Posted by rnkn

This is pretty incredible news Bron! So FM is actually looking into using letsencrypt for customers' own domains, not just the domains belonging to FM?

Totally, if we can make it work sanely, it would be a really nice feature to offer!

[TheJapanese]

Is there a way to download the whole gallery?

If I do share it with friends, I can single view every Image and Download it - but I want it as a image gallery, where my friends can look at - and (if they want) have the chance to download the whole gallery... But it looks like it is not possible?!

[somdcomputerguy]

Originally Posted by TheJapanese

Is there a way to download the whole gallery?

An image gallery is made of two separate things. The pictures, and the script that displays those pictures and so makes up the 'gallery'. The only way to share the whole gallery is to share the link to it. The files (pictures) can be selected and put into a .zip archive file in the Files section of the web UI. This archive file can then be shared with anybody. The 'gallery' script itself is not available for downloading.

- Bruce

[TheJapanese]

So I have to build a ZIP File with all the pictures each time I share a gallery - right?

[somdcomputerguy]

Originally Posted by TheJapanese

So I have to build a ZIP File with all the pictures each time I share a gallery - right?

If you wish to share the picture files themselves, yes. Or the end user could download the picture files individually, from the gallery. It would probably be much more efficient, and easier for everybody involved, to just share a link to the gallery.

- Bruce

[n5bb]

I think I see why you are confused. You must create a website to share a photo gallery link with your friends. If you don't do this, only you can see the images in your Files area. Please try the following steps:

• Log into your account using the beta system at: https://beta.fastmail.com
• Click the big Mail button in the upper left and select Files. You will see the beta version of the Files system, which is nicer than the production version. The My Files and Trash tools in the upper left produce new modern displays, while the other tools (Files Usage, Sharing, Websites, and Access logs) are still in the old format at this time. Eventually they will all be updated to the new style and moved to production (normal login).
• Create a folder you wish to use for the photo gallery. Click on the folder so you can see the files in that folder.
  • You can use the Upload button at the top to add new files or photos from your PC.
  • You can also navigate to any folder and check one or more boxes adjacent to files (or folders) to select them. Then use the Move or Copy buttons at the top to move the selected files (or folders) to any target folder.
• Now that you have the desired photos (or other files) in a folder, note the folder path at the top (My Files > folder > subfolder, for example).
• Click on the Websites tool at the left. In the Create website area at the bottom you will see where you can specify a Website URL. You will see three boxes to the right of http:// where you can enter (from left to right) the following:
  • An optional subdomain part (which might be empty or contain any alphanumeric character string including some special symbols)
  • A required domain part built from your main account address or any of your existing aliases (at Fastmail or personal domains)
  • After a slash /, an optional subdirectory
• So at a minimum you need to select a domain part. I recommend that you also add a subdomain and/or subdirectory part so you can give the photo gallery a name in the URL and allow future additional galleries with different subdomain parts. A typical URL might then be something such as: photos.janecitizen.fastmail.com/mexico2017
• Next you need to choose a Publish as type. There are two Photo gallery types.
• Choose a File Storage Target (the folder where you stored your photos). At this time this tool is hard to use, but I'm sure it will be much better after the Websites page is redesigned.
• You can choose an optional password for this URL. If you add a password, anyone trying to use the URL will need to enter this password. The username entered when reading that URL link is ignored, so can be empty.
• You can add a Title to the photo gallery.
• Finally, you can use IP Throttling to prevent excessive downloads.
• Click Add to create the new website.

You can now email the URL you created (which will show up in the Website column at the top of that page) to anyone. As long as the Active box is checked the URL will be active and will display a photo gallery. If there are subfolders to the folder you used, they will be visible in the photo gallery and a random photo in that subfolder will be displayed. Clicking the folder (whose name is shown) will display the photos inside that subfolder.

Bill

[Terry]

you can also have a password lock on your photos if you require one.