TPN User Guide

Updated May 9, 2011

The instructions on this page will help you learn how to use the TPN website. While we strive to make using the site as simple and enjoyable as possible, we expect you will have questions about how to do certain things. If you are unable to find an answer to your "how do I" question on this page, we encourage you to post the question in the forums. We will actively update this page as questions arise. If you have a question about how to do something, other's probably do too.

How is the site organized?

TPN is organized into several major sections. The menubar across the top of the page will take you directly from one section to another.

• Home - takes you to the monthly cover page.
• Photography - takes you to the photographs – Image Critique, Weekly Challenge, Article Images and Member Images.
• Weekly Challenge - takes you to the list of current weekly challenge themes and an archive of past themes.
• Forums - takes you to the member discussion board where we socialize and converse.
• Articles - provides a drop-down list of article categories – each item links to a page of articles in that category.
• Links - takes you to a page of links to useful resources and workshops found elsewhere on the Internet.
• Search - provides you an advanced search form to help you find exactly what you are looking for on TPN.
• Submit an Article - takes you to a composition page where you can submit articles for publication on TPN.
• Help - provides a drop-down list of helpful documents about TPN – About Us, Posting Guidelines, Terms of Use, Staff Directory, User Guide.

The Basics - Posting Images and Comments

The first thing you will want to know is how to participate in TPN. Here are tips for the most common things you will do on the site.

How do I recover my password if I forgot it?

• Click the Login link in the top right corner of the page.
• Click the "Did you forget your password?" link at the bottom of the login form.
• Enter your TPN login ID and e-mail address, then press the "eMail Password" button.
• If you cannot remember your login ID or e-mail address, e-mail editor@travelphotographers.net and we will help you.

What is the best resolution for my images on TPN?

• Thumbnails are displayed at 180 pixels on the long side.
• Images are displayed in a 900 horizontal by 600 vertical pixel box.
• You may upload images up to 1500 horizontal by 1000 vertical pixels.
• Logged in users can view larger images by clicking the 900x600 image.
• Limit the file size of each image to 500 kilobytes.

How do I post a photograph to TPN?

• Click the Photography link at the menu bar.
• Navigate to the album where you want to post a photo.
• Select "Add Media" from the "Options" drop-down menu.
• Select album where you want post your images.
• Select the tab for the method you want to use to for upload images.
• Follow the instructions on the page to select and post your images.

How do I post a comment to an image?

When viewing an image you can use the "Post a Comment" button at the bottom of the page. You will go to a new page where you can type in your comment and post it. We are working on an enhancement to provide the comment form on the same page as the image.

How do I delete a photograph I posted?

You can only delete photographs yourself from your member portfolio albums.

• Navigate to your personal album containing the image you want to delete.
• Select "Manage Media" from the Options drop-down menu.
• Click the left checkbox in the left column on the row displaying the image you wish to delete.
• Scroll to the bottom of the page and click the "Delete" button.

If you posted an image in a weekly challenge contest album or one of the critique albums and wish to have it deleted, send a link to the image to one of the moderators and they will delete it for you.

How to I post a new forum topic?

Navigate to a specific Forum where you want to start a new topic and press the "Post Topic" button.

How do I reply to a forum post?

At the top and bottom of each topic is a button "Post Reply" that takes you to a new page where you can type in your reply. You will go to a new page where you can type in your response and post it. The other comments in the thread will appear in a scrollable text area below the comment entry form allowing you to see the other comments as you type.

How do I change my password and other information in my profile?

Click the "Account Settings" link in the top right corner of any page. There you will see several tabs. You can change your password, username and e-mail address on the "Username & Password" tab. Other tabs allow you to change other information in your profile like signature, website links, privacy settings, and contact and location information. Make sure you press the "Save Information" button to save your changes.

Deeper Questions about Photographs

TPN has several galleries where members can post images for sharing and for critique from other members. Each member also has a "Member Album" where they can post a portfolio of their images. Below are tips on how to post images, how to provide comments to other's images, etc.

How do I see a large version of a photograph?

Album index (thumbnail) pages are displayed at 180 pixels. Photographs are displayed at 900 horizontal by 600 vertical pixels. The site allows you to upload up to 1500x1000 pixel images. Click the thumbnail to see the 900x600 version. If the photographer posted a larger size, logged-in users can click the 900x600 version to see the larger uploaded version. Clicking the larger version takes you back to the 900x600 version.

How do I get my image into the TPN Editor's Picks?

The Editor's Picks gallery is viewable to the public and is reserved solely for photographs chosen each week by the site moderators as "best of the week" for each photography category. Only administrators and moderators can move photographs into that gallery. For your photograph to appear in the Editor's Picks gallery, you first must submit it to one of the other photography categories in the photographs gallery. If it is chosen as a "best of the week" for the week it is submitted, a moderator will then move it to the Editor's Picks gallery and apply the gold ribbon watermark to it.

How do I go directly from one photography album to another?

Go directly to another gallery by selecting it from the "Jump to" drop-down menu in the bottom right of any photography gallery page.

How do I change the sort order of pictures in my albums?

By default all albums are sorted in descending order of upload time (newest to older). Use the "Sort by" drop-down menu at the bottom right corner of any album thumbnail page to choose a different order in which to sort the images you are viewing. You can choose ascending or descending order by capture time, title, rating, or number of views.

How do I manually set the order of images in my personal albums?

There are two ways to set the order that your images are sorted in your personal albums.

Automatically Sort Your Images

Use the following steps to have the site automatically keep your images sorted by upload time, capture time, title, rating or number of views.

1. Enter the album you where you want to change the sort order.
2. Select the "Static Sort Media" option from the Media Gallery drop-down menu.
3. Select what attribute and order you want your images to be sorted by.
4. Click the "Save" button at the bottom of the page.

Manually Sort Your Images

Manually sorting an album requires two steps. First you have to tell the website to turn off automatic sorting.

1. Enter the album you wish to manually sort.
2. Select "Edit Album" from the "Options" menu.
3. Scroll down to the Default Album Sort Order from "upload time, descend" to "No Automatic Sorting".
4. Scroll to the bottom of the page and press the "Save" button.

Now you have to manually set the order in which you want your images to appear.

1. Select the "Manage Media" item from the "Options" menu.
2. Use the number in the "Order" column to set the order of your images.
3. Images will appear in descending order of the value in the "Order" column.
4. After setting the "Order" values, press the "Save" button at the bottom of the page.

Your images should now appear in the order you selected.

How do I create separate albums inside my member album area?

You can create separate albums in your personal gallery. In fact you can create nested albums. To create a new album in your personal gallery:

1. Visit your personal photo album where you wish to add a new sub-album.
2. Select the "Create Album" option from the Media Gallery drop-down menu.
3. Select the options you want configured for your album.
4. Click the "Save" button at the bottom of the page.

How do I change the border around album covers, thumbnails and images in my Member Album?

Navigate to your member album and select "Edit Album" from the "Options" drop-down menu. The default border throughout the site for album covers, thumbnails and images is "Halo". There are several other choices. If you wish to upload your images with borders of your own already applied, select "None" for thumbnails and images.

How do I change information on images I already posted?

There are three ways to edit titles, captions, keywords and other information about photographs and personal albums you have uploaded to the site.

• Single Photograph - To edit the information for a single photograph, navigate to that photograph in the photography gallery. Then click the "Edit" link that appears below the photograph.
• Multiple Photographs - To edit the information for multiple photographs in one of your personal albums, navigate to the thumbnails page for that album. The select the "Manage Media" option from the Media Gallery drop-down menu. On the following page you can select which photograph to use as the cover photo for the album. You can also change the title, description and keywords for each picture in the album. You can also check specific pictures in the left column and move them to other albums.
• Batch Caption - You can also choose "Batch Caption" from the Media Gallery drop-down menu on a personal album thumbnails page and edit just the Title and Description for the photographs in that album.

How do I include a photograph in a photo comment or forum post?

This will provide you the syntax for how to use the "media" autotag on TPN to display a photograph in a comment to another photograph or in a forum post.

1. Upload the photo to an album on TPN (any appropriate album - I have a "repost" album inside my member album).
2. View the uploaded picture and copy the ID number below and left of the image - it is a long string of digits that uniquely identifies the image in our database.
3. Go to the photo or forum where you want to include the photo you uploaded and create a new comment or forum post.
4. Use the "media" autotag to include your image into the post using the following format.
   • [media:ID width:NNN border:0 link:1 src:disp]
5. The square brackets must encapsulate the autotag fields for the site to properly process it.

For a complete guide to autotags, please read the "glFusion autotags" documentation on the glFusion website. For autotags specific to photographs, see the "media gallery integration" documentation on the glFusion website.

Deeper Questions about Forums

These are helpful notes on how to use the forums. Click here for an offsite link to the complete guide to glFusion forums.

How do I insert an image in my forum comment?

First you need to click the "Post Reply" button to take you to the comment page. Then you need to attached the images you wish include to your post. You can leave them as attachments or you can display them in your comment. To display an image in your comment, use the following syntax in the text area of the comment window:

[file]1[/file]

where 1 denotes which attachment to use. You alternatively can make the image appear in a pop-up lightbox by adding the "lightbox" qualifier as follows:

[file lightbox=1]1[/file]

This applies only to forum comments.

How can I go directly from one forum category to another?

On any page in the forums you will find a drop-down menu at the top where you can select any forum category and go directly do it.

How can I see a list of new topics since I last visited, the latest posts, or which topics are popular?

Navigate to the Forums section. On this page there will be tabs across the top where you can click the link "New Posts", "Latest Posts" or "Popular Topics".

Deeper Questions about Account Settings

The site software offers several personal preferences you can configure. To access all of these options, select "Account Settings" from the "My Account" menu in the navigation bar. On the Account Settings page, you will see several tabs permitting you to customize the appearance of the site to your taste and to provide personal information about yourself to others.

User Name & Password

Use this tab to change your password, the full name displayed to others, your e-mail address, and the amount of time for the site to remember you without having to log in again.

About You

Use this tab to upload a personal profile picture, customize your signature, provide a link to your personal or professional website, and provide any biographical information you wish others to know about you.

Layout & Language

Use this tab to select which theme to use when you visit the site, whether to show icons representing article categories, whether to show the left and right sidebars (blocks), set how many articles (stories) to display per page, what timezone you prefer times to be displayed, what date format you wish to see dates displayed, the format of search results, and the display mode and order in which to display comments to postings.

We have created four themes (color schemes) from which you can choose.

• Light Ash - As the site default, this is a very light background with dark text, with all links and headlines displayed in blue.
• White - Similar to Lightash, except with a solid white background.
• Charcoal - This is a dark gray background with light text, with all links and headlines displayed in blue.

Each of these themes uses a 10pt font. If you prefer, there are also 12pt versions of these themes you also can select from the Themes drop-down.

Privacy

Use this tab to configure whether you will permit administrators and other members to send you e-mail messages, whether or not to show that you are currently logged into the site, whether or not you will accept private messages from others using the site's private messaging system, and whether you wish to see private message notifications.

Forum Preferences

Use this tab to configure how many topics and posts to display per page, how many views a topic must have to be considered "popular", how many search results to show per page, how many members to list per page, and several other options for the forums.

Custom Profile

Use this tab to provide additional personal information such as birth year, address, continent, and other website and blog links.

Last Updated Sunday, October 16 2011 @ 06:19 PM EDT|2,783 Hits

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