(Okay ... having now read Al-The Mayor-Bowen's post, below ... when I wrote the following novel about hotlinking I had NOT noticed that The Roadfood Forum provided the option of hosting the photo right here on the Roadfood forum's server ... that's pretty generous! Hosting photos takes storage space and that takes $$$.
In light of this, the following is a tutorial for how to hotlink from other websites or photo hosting sites.
Also, note that these methods will also work using the "quick reply" feature, provided you know the URL of the photo you want to use.)
In any case ... FIRST read Al's post just below this one ;-) Hi Ellen,
To insert a photo into your post in the forums there are two basic methods and they are both known as "hotlinking".
Hotlinking is where, rather than actually uploading the photo from your computer to the Roadfood forum ... you instead type the URL (internet address) of a photo which you've found at some other website into your message post ... and with some extra characters typed at the beginning and end of the URL/address ... voila, the photo appears in your post.
Of the two methods one is pretty simple ... the other is a bit more complicated.
First the simple one:
Say you have found a photo of a beautiful pastrami sandwich you'd like to include in your message post. And let's say the photo is on a website you visited.
At that website You would copy the URL/Internet-address for that photo (let me know if you need instructions on how to find a photo's URL at a website) .... as an example say the URL text of that photograph is:
http://www.sangabrielvalleymenus.com/reviews/images/3_24_02psc/pastrami.jpg To get that actual photo into your forum post ... you would type-in (or copy and paste), the above URl into the text of your post ...
AND THEN at the beginning and end of the address add the characters which I've made RED in the following example ...
Please note that in this example ...
you are to use the two areas of text in RED, and the URL of your photo in between them, ONLY. (ie. disregard the other text there such as "URL=http ... imageshack" etc etc)
... also note that there is a forward slash (/) before the letters "img" in the red text at the
end of the example.
That's it ... this will cause the photo on that other website to show in your forum post here.
(one final note ... if you are trying to hotlink to a photo which is at a website that you had to type in a password to get into; or had to choose a password when you joined the website as a member ... you might not be able to hotlink to that photo.
When that is the case, and you really want to use that photo ... the way to use that photo is to save a copy of that photo on to your computer, and then use the second method which I outline in the following paragraphs.) NOW ...
The second, more complicated method is important to know also.
This method involves using a website such as the free photo-hosting website "Imageshack" to upload your photo from your computer to ... and THEN you put the URL into your post ... again with some extra text at the beginning and end ... to make it appear here at the forum.
This is how you do it when the photo you want to show only exists stored on your computer and is not yet available elsewhere on the Intenet.
The link to Imageshack is:
http://imageshack.us/ Some basic instructions to use the site are:
1) go to the imageshack site
2) click the "browse" button there
3) in the resulting screen, find the photo you want to upload on your computer
4) click "host it"
5) the result will be an Imageshack screen with a number of different pre-formatted lines of text from which you simply select one ... and copy and paste it into your post at the Roadfood forum.
Which line of text to use?? ... well, I suggest using the selection titled
"Hotlink for forums (1)"
Like I say ... you just copy that link (making sure you copy it completely from end to end) ... and past it into the post you are writing back here at the roadfood forum.
One final note.
Figuring out how to do things on computers, and online, is most often a factor of one thing ... the amount of time you spend poking at it relentlessly.
The Imageshack site might seem confusing at first but if you stick with it and keep trying it, you will get it ... and once you know the sequence of how to do it ... then it will seem simple.
Good Luck Ellen!
