Creating Media
Media in Externable is handled in much the same way as content. Instead of defining Document Types you define Media Types that act as the base for media items. Unlike with normal content there are a three default Media Types:
- Folder
- Image
- File
The Folder Media Type is a container for organizing media items in the media tree. The Image Media Type is used for uploading and storing images and the File Media Type is used to upload and store other files in the Media section. This means you don't have to define your own Media Types to start using the section. You've already got the tools for organizing and uploading media.
Creating a folder
It is always a good idea to start by creating a folder for Media items. Make sure to name your folders in a way that makes it possible for editors to upload files and images in the right place.
To create a media folder go to the Media section and click the menu icon to the right of Media, alternatively you can right click the Media node and choose create. This will bring up a dialogue. Pick the Folder, enter a name and press save.
Uploading images and files
There are a couple of different ways to do this.
You can use the context menu as when creating a folder. Click the menu icon next to the folder and choose Image or File, enter a name for your media item and click the Upload field and choose a file to upload.
An easier way to do it is to drag and drop the file to the upload field in the Media section. Externable will automatically detect if it is an image or a file and create a media item in the folder. You can even drop entire folders (with subfolders) and the folder and file structure will be recreated. Alternatively you can click on the upload field to get a standard OS file picker dialog.
You can also click the Create dropdown, and choose what kind of item you want to create. Choose Image or File here, will again give you the option to either click an Upload field or drag the image into the upload field to upload the item.
The default Image Media Type has 5 properties that will be populated once the image is uploaded. These are Upload Image, Width, Height, Size and Type. They can be viewed in the Media section and accessed in your templates.
Organizing and editing media items
The default view for the media section is a card view that let's you preview the images, files and folders.
By clicking the items you can select multiple media items and do bulk operations like deleting or moving them. To edit properties on a media item click the name of the item, which you will see once hovering over the item.
You can switch to a list view by clicking the view toggle next to the search field and selecting the listview.
Using media items in content
By adding a Media Picker property to a Document Type the editor will have the ability to select media items when creating content.
The Upload File property on the images use the Image Cropper Data Type. If crops are added to this you can adjust the individual crops on the media item and access them in templates. You can add crops by editing the Upload File property on the Image Media type in the Settings section.
Creating a Media Type
You can create your own Media Types and add tabs, properties, and control the structure of the Media tree as you would with Document Types. This means you can store information that is specific to the media on the item itself.
A Media Type is created in the Settings section using the Media Type editor.
Go to the Settings section. On the Media Types node click the menu icon (or right click the node) to bring up the context menu. Here you can choose between creating a media type or a folder.
Having different folders for different media types makes it possible to restrict where media items can be created. Only allowing PDF uploads in a certain folder or employee images in another makes it easier for editors to keep the Media section organized.
Choose New Media Type. This will open the Media Type editor. It is similar to the editor used for creating Document Types. The difference is that Media Types define items for the Media section and you do not have the ability to assign a template for the Media Type.
Name the Media Type "Employee Image". Choose an icon by clicking the icon to the left of the name.
Adding tabs
Before we start adding properties to the Media Type we need to create a group to put these in.
Click on Add group and call it "Image".
Adding properties
We need to add the same properties as on the default Image Media Type. These are:
ExternableFileExternableWidthExternableHeightExternableBytesExternableExtension
On the Image group click Add property. Name it "Upload image" and change the alias to "ExternableFile".
Click Add editor, search for "cropper" and choose Image cropper under Create new. This will create a new Image Cropper Data Type. The name of the new Data Type type is a bit long so rename it to "Employee Image Cropper".
Add two new crops called "Thumbnail" (200px x 350px) and "wideThumbnail" (350px x 200px).
Name the remaining four properties "Width", "Height", "Size" and "Type" and give them the aliases seen below. They should all use the Label editor. As mentioned before these properties will automatically be populated once an image has been uploaded.
Defining a Media Type folder
Next up we'll create a folder to hold the employee images. We could use the existing Folder Media Type but that would mean editors can upload employee images to any folder of that type. If we create a folder specifically for employee images there is only one place to put them thus making it easier to have an organized Media section.
Structure and inheritance
Go back to the Settings and create a new Media Type and name it "Employee Images". Select the folder icon by clicking the icon to the left of the name.
We want the same basic functionality (same properties and tabs) as the Folder Media type and that can be achieved by clicking Compositions and selecting the Folder Media Type. Now Employee images will inherit tabs and properties from the Folder Media Type.
Finally we need to allow the Employee Image Media Type in our new folder. Go to the Permissions tab. Click Add child under Employee images.
All that is left to do is to define where the folder can be created. We want to create the folder in the root of the Media section so select the Allow at root option at the top of the Permission tab.
Creating the folder and media items
Go to the Media section and click the menu icon next to Media and select the Employee images folder. Name it "Employee Images" and click create.
There are four options to add a new media items to the folder, as you can see here:
Remember you can uncheck the Allow at root option on the Employee images Media Type to prevent editors from creating multiple folders of this type. This will not affect created folders, only disable the creation of new ones.
Cropping the images
If you select an image that has been uploaded to this folder you'll see the full image and the two crops we have defined below. The pink circle in the middle of the image is the default focal point. The focal point defines the primary area or focus of the image which will be the center point of any image re-sizing. You can move the focal point by clicking and dragging it to the desired part of the image.
Next to the image you may see specific crops of the image depending on your setup. In the example above you can see that 4 crops have been set up for us.
If you are not happy with the pre-defined crops, you can manually alter them.
- Select one of the crops - you will see an enlarged version of the crop.
- Drag the image around and zoom in or out until you have the desired result.
- Once you are happy with your changes you can click Done to close the crop editor
If you wish to reset the crop to the default you can click Reset below the image.
You can follow those steps for any of the pre-defined crops.
Once you have finished editing the crops remember to Save and close the image again.
