Hi guys. Wasn’t sure if this should go in pre-sales but feel free to move it if needs be.

I’m working on a site that will allow the user to upload an image, then buy it a version of that image (it makes sense, but full detail isn’t important here!)

I’m pretty sure the simple commerce module will handle that part, but has anyone tried front-end image uploading - is there some way to integrate the EE CP image uploader to the front end (or a plug-in)?

Hi Andy,

Not entirely sure of what you are trying to achieve here with people uploading their image and then purchasing their own image but as you say I’m sure it all makes sense

There are actually quite a few ways to do what you need. If you just want to have people uploading an image and having it sent to you then you can use a multitude of options to get what you need.

First off you can use the EE CP Image Uploader with a Stand-Alone Entry Form but you would need to have the user logged-in to a member group. You could use the LogMeIn plugin which would allow you to automatically log people in under a certain user group which may or may not work for you as you would probably want to be retrieving information pertinent to that person at that moment but if you have custom fields set up for use in your SAEF then you can get them to fill those out and get what you need in that way.

The only problem in using the EE CP Image uploader is that people need to understand how to use it and they also get to see all the other files that have been uploaded which may or may not be something that you want to allow. Without modifying the core ExpressionEngine files then I don’t think there is a way around that.

A nicer and I think easier option would be to use something like Freeform which will then just function as a form where people fill in their details and choose the file to upload and it all gets sent off to you. Using Freeform in the standard way does mean that the information won’t get placed automatically into a weblog entry (not sure if you need that or not or whether you just need to collect the image and information?) but you can make it do it with some clever jiggery-pokery.

I am actually doing this on a site I have created by using Freeform to submit the e-mail to a moblog e-mail address and then the file gets uploaded to the destination I specify and the rest of the textual information gets placed into a weblog entry for me! Nice, simple, effective but extremely powerful.

There are a few other ways of doing this and a few plugins on the forum here to do just this but it would really depend on exactly what you need your system to do? If you could elaborate a bit more then I’m sure other people will probably have some ideas too to help you out with.

Hope some of that is of interest though

Best wishes,

Mark

Thanks for that, Freeform sounds the better option of the two as I won’t want people seeing other peoples images.

It’s a site for my girlfriends company as it goes - I’ve built a site in codeigniter which works, but I’d really like to move it to EE for various reasons if I can.

So basically it needs to replicate what the existing site does but a little less flaky!

Wow! CI eh?

That site looks really good. Yep everything you are doing there should be able to be done with ExpressionEngine. Didn’t want to try out your form as wasn’t too sure what would happen and didn’t want to send you loads of irrelevant junk but I am now just wondering what happens once the file has been uploaded?

Do you get re-directed to a form to place in your details or something?

Anyway you should be able to do all you need with Freeform and the rest of the site can then be handled with ExpressionEngine

If you need any help with anything then just holler across!

Best wishes,

Mark

Basically it uploads the image, autogenerates a thumbnail which it uses as a preview for the next page where the user is able to choose which size canvas they require, with ‘add to basket’ buttons that sends the detail through to PayPal. That aspect I’m pretty sure (though I haven’t done massive research yet) can be handled with simple commerce.

Feel free to give it a try, but use a tiny gif (unless of course you wish to make a purchase).

Hi Andy,

I won’t give it a try just because I don’t want to pester you with uploads that you may not want but I would think that you could possibly handle this with the Simple Commerce Module although you wouldn’t specifically need to in your case I wouldn’t think. The reason I say that is that the Simple Commerce Module is meant for items that you already have stored in your ExpressionEngine database. As this is going to equate to a new item every time someone uploads an image then their product won’t actually exist in the Simple Commerce Module so the only thing you could really use there would be different sizes, types of canvas and so on. This is where it may start to get a little more involved depending on your exact set-up as the Simple Commerce Module uses a one entry / one product type of relationship and so it isn’t that easy to do different sizes or different types of canvas without each one existing as separate items. Can be done but you would possibly start getting a lot of entries although you could use categories or some other system to get them all neat and tidy to work with.

Really all depends on how many types of items they can buy. If only a few then it should be doable.

Just out of interest how do you pass on the name of the file to the form that comes up after someone has uploaded an image. I am guessing that is what you are doing as I didn’t want to test out the form and send you loads of twoddle

Best wishes,

Mark

I do that by using Codeigniters in-built image handling stuff. When the image is uploaded, I grab the content_data array and stuff what I need into the DB, then grab the ID back from the DB and pass it to the next page which uses the ID to run a select.

Previously I was using sessions but I prefer to keep the data. Codeigniter is excellent, there’s a lot to look forward to EE2 for right there.

Aha hadn’t thought of using session variables. That would work for me in the case I am thinking about so thanks for that!!

Will have to start looking into CI I reckon now that 2.0 is going to be built upon it. Don’t want to get left behind in that area!!

Best wishes,

Mark

Did you ever get anywhere with a Freeform/session version in EE? I’m gonna give it a shot in the next couple of weeks.

Hi Andy,

Actually things took a little bit of a back-burner on that project but I have however used Session variables in a multitude of places nowadays. A great start to look at is the Session Variables plugin which allows you to set, retrieve and delete session variables at will.

Using it with Freeform though I’m not too sure how you would capture the name and save it as a session variable though as it would need to be done upon submitting the form. Most of the places where I have used session variables have been fairly easy as the information was already there upon page load or created using a plugin.

I’m sure there must be a fairly easy way of doing it though.

Best wishes,

Mark

Funnily enough, I tried that very plugin and fell into exactly that problem - taking the image name on form submit into a session. Maybe I’ll just write a user login/account/order system in Codeigniter.

Don’t suppose you have a demo of the site you’ve got working with this? I’ve gone back to thinking I’d like to try doing this with EE and the SAEF, but might consider freeform if it’s doable - and doable quickly/easily (not getting paid!)