As a member of Pennock's Fiero Forum for the last 8 and a half years, I have come to truly appreciate the sheer wealth of information that is available here on the forum.

First and foremost: Thank you to Cliff for providing what I consider to be the greatest online car community to ever exist..

Over the last few years, I have seen forum threads with lots of usable information become utterly useless due to the loss of photo documentation.
Many "free" photo hosting sites will only host your images as long as you maintain an account with them indefinitely. In some cases, they will even set a time limit to how long you can host images, regardless of your account status.

Cliff Pennock has kindly provided server space for images that can be used by Forum members. While this can be used for any type of image, to help save on bandwidth costs for Cliff, I would suggest keeping all images uploaded to his server Fiero specific (General Fiero Chat, or Tech Discussion).

Below, you will find my definitive guide to using the new Pennock's Image Poster software, available at the bottom of this page, or by clicking here:

Pennock's Image Poster is a spectacular utility that will allow a user to upload images one by one to Pennock's, and simply paste the link into your new post.
It uses the FTP (File Transfer Protocol) to transfer files from your PC to the image server. This "language" for communicating is in use all across the internet, and unless you have software or hardware that specifically blocks the FTP transfer, PIP will work for you. Other PC related issues can prevent it from working, so please verify your system is in proper working order if you have issues with any of the following guide.

This is a part of the Fight the Red X campaign

Begin by downloading PIP at the link I posted above, or by clicking the image at the very bottom of every Forum page.
Save the file to a location on your hard drive where it can be found easily. When it finishes downloading, simply double click on it.

A window will appear, as such:


Follow the setup through each page. I suggest leaving everything set to default.






When the installer finishes, leave the box checked to launch PIP, and click Finish.


Pennock's Image Poster will launch.



When the program has launched, click on Profiles on the top left, and then New Profile.


A new window will appear. Insert the following URL into the top box labeled Automatic Configuration: https://www.fiero.nl/fieroforum.pip and then click Get.


Click OK when the dialog box opens.


The window will close, and bring you back here...


Click "Browse" on the top right corner and then browse to the folder where your images are stored.. Double click the image you would like to upload.


You will be back at the main program window with a miniature preview of the image to be posted. Click "Post It" on the right side.


When the image has uploaded, you will get the following confirmation:


Simply go into your Forum Post, right click, and click "Paste". The image link, along with the [img] tags will be pasted, ready to post.



If you use a Mac or Linux, PIP will not work for you without utilizing other software, such as WINE and a Windows Environment, or Parallels.

There are other image hosting sites that members have set up to help with the server load, and provide for alternatives to PIP. If you know of one, please feel free to post below.

Let's try to keep this thread on topic, and related specifically to image posting.

Thanks!

My perspective on image hosting has changed since my company's IT department locked down access to the most common image hosting sites, videos, social media and auctions/classifieds. So now all too often all I see from work are Red X's...

I have been one of "those guys" for years with over 3000 fiero pics for my build threads hosted on photobucket, but now will be need to me hosting them elsewhere.

quote Originally posted by fieroguru: My perspective on image hosting has changed since my company's IT department locked down access to the most common image hosting sites, videos, social media and auctions/classifieds. So now all too often all I see from work are Red X's... I have been one of "those guys" for years with over 3000 fiero pics for my build threads hosted on photobucket, but now will be need to me hosting them elsewhere.

There are several "fiero" specific solutions that members have set up. I myself have unlimited space and bandwidth in which to host, so if you need a spot, let me know and I'll get you started.

need to write an alternative for macs. But useing ftp is more of a pain then what its worth...just use dropbox. no red X, its free, much easier and don't have to touch Dos.

Im my PIP history I have PIP images that have disappeared. History looks like this:



I just checked and the thread is still out there and my mages are still in it. What's up with that?

quote Originally posted by fyrebird68: Im my PIP history I have PIP images that have disappeared. History looks like this: I just checked and the thread is still out there and my mages are still in it. What's up with that?

Your upload history is based on the local folder on your PC where you found the images for the initial upload.. Not on the server side.

Example, if your images are in C:\Pictures and you upload them, as long as those same images are in that same folder in that same location, your history will show them and provide the thumbnails.

If you rename C:\Pictures to something else, or you delete or move the images, then you will get the "Not Found" bit.

quote Hockaday need to write an alternative for macs. But useing ftp is more of a pain then what its worth...just use dropbox. no red X, its free, much easier and don't have to touch Dos.

Care to elaborate on what "dropbox" is for us non-Mac users? Is it a web service that will PERMANENTLY store image files indefinitely? And there isn't a single part of PIP that requires DOS, so not quite sure where you are getting that from... Also, PIP uses FTP transparently. You do not have to set anything up to use PIP. You just install the program. The PIP config file consists of all of the necessary settings to allow PIP to upload to the server and provide [img] tagged photo links. So, PIP is actually VERY easy to use. Launch Parallels, slap XP onto a VM, and try it once. You'll be surprised at how it works. If you want a Mac version of it, feel free to write one up, and have it use the PIP config file. I am sure Cliff would love to be able to cross platform his app.

If you have a solution that will help eliminate the plague of red X boxes for Mac users, by all means, share.

You beat me to it. I was thinking of doing the step by step screenshots for PIP setup. I frequently post encouraging people to use PIP and avoid the red X / not found / broken links. There are WAY too many pics lost forever because PIP was not used. In my opinion it is not hard to install PIP (one time for each computer you want to use it on). After that it is just as easy or easier to use than uploading to an image site and then link to it. How hard is it to open PIP, browse to your image, click post it, then paste in your thread.
This comment is for the 90% of the computer world NOT using MACs

dropbox.com is a unique filehosting client available to both mac and pc. it never deletes files or pictures unless you do. It creates a file system that syncs with the dropbox servers instantaneously. the free storage amount is 2gb. There is no limit on individual file size. You are also able to create photo albums and host websites on it ( for free ). They do a much better job then I can atm at explaining how it works. I have not used it on a pc but for mac it is seamless integration.

As for dealing with dos, all PC that run the dreaded Windows is based on dos. And macs and anything / everything else is Unix.

You can access PIP ftp server but that in itself isa royal pita i've found useing cyberduck firefox and the like.

For extra space use this link. https://www.dropbox.com/referrals/NTM4NTEzOTk

[This message has been edited by Hockaday (edited 07-08-2010).]

I admit that I use photobucket to host, which runs the risk of the picture being moved or link changed.

However, in order to upload to PIP, I would have re-size every image before I do, since they are all too big right out of the Camera.

It would be terrific if PIP offered a feature to automatically adjust an image which was too big to an acceptable size for upload.

quote Originally posted by Fformula88: I admit that I use photobucket to host, which runs the risk of the picture being moved or link changed. However, in order to upload to PIP, I would have re-size every image before I do, since they are all too big right out of the Camera. It would be terrific if PIP offered a feature to automatically adjust an image which was too big to an acceptable size for upload.

That would be a nice feature. There is also a free power tool from Microsoft that will auto resize all of the photos you select in one shot.

What I generally do is make two folders, one inside the other. Copy all of the oversized images into the first one, and then an exact copy of those images into the second folder.
In the second folder, select all of the images, right click, choose "Resize" and then set the size you want. A few seconds later, you have smaller images. Post from this folder, and you still have your large ones for linking to if you'd like.

Hockaday... Anything from Windows Vista on is NOT DOS based. They use DOS emulation for older applications. But, that is a discussion for another time.

Thank you for the info on Dropbox.. That sounds like a suitable alternative. If you delete your account, or it lapses, will your images disappear?

I used PIP for posting 3 or 4 pics today then I get:

Enter User name and Password for images.fieroforum.com
Username___________________
Password___________________


And using this doesn't work:

# Username/Password for login:
Username = images2011@images.fieroforum.com
Password = pass2011


Aaaarrrrrrgggghhhh...............

No can do PIP here, admin has blocked this system from having anything installed on it. I can get to a DOS prompt through one of my applications and use command line FTP, but that's it. Admin also has all photo hosting sites blocked, so no image shack, photobucket, etc...

I'ved used PIP for years now..No issues. The only thing I would add is that now that I use Comodo Firewall, I have to shut it off to post pics. Turn it back on when I'm done.

(BTW: Thanx Cliff...)

Bob

So what are we supposed to do to avoid all our pictures showing up like this when we try to link to the uploaded picture from another forum?

quote Originally posted by fieroguru: So what are we supposed to do to avoid all our pictures showing up like this when we try to link to the uploaded picture from another forum?

That is something that Cliff did not set the server up for.

He has the image hosting server to allow Fiero forum members to post photos for the Fiero forum.
Otherwise, images being hosted on the PFF server but posted on other forums would just eat Bandwidth that Cliff pays for.

You can still use PIP if you have a separate FTP server to host files. Just edit the PIP file and then load it up.

PIP usually was a headache for my XP cmptr. Ive gotten used to posting them elseware and linking them. I usually leave my pics there like forever so they dont become red Xs. Red Xs on my posts are because I removed the pic. I like being able to remove a picture permanently if I desire to. If you been here a few years, you noticed most of the girl friends pics I put up are red Xs now. That is because I chose to remove due to member abuse. Thats just my .02.

quote Originally posted by fieroguru: So what are we supposed to do to avoid all our pictures showing up like this when we try to link to the uploaded picture from another forum?

^^^^^^

One of the reasons I use photobucket for everything. Another reason is what roger says. PIP was a headache for me on XP and vista. Third reason is now I have a Mac.