Forum Discussion

ArshadKhwaja's avatar
ArshadKhwaja
Qrew Commander
8 years ago

Uploading photos As Part of Import

Uploading data is great but how do I attach a photo to each record as part of the upload?  Does it mean that I have to upload and then attach photos manually? 
  • Yes, photos need to be uploaded manually.  If you have a child table of Photo's there are add ons like from Juiced called "Multi file" upload.  The add on allows you to select multiple files by the usual method to highlight them in a Windows explorer type interface and then click and a record is created for each photo. http://www.juicedtech.com/add-ons/file-attachment-multifile-upload

    I would imagine that other QSPs have similar tools, but I have used the Juiced tool myself for clients.
  • You can batch upload files with script. You create a simple form with (a)drop zone you drag the files to or (b) create a file input with multiple selected (<input type=file name=myfiles multiple>).

    This is not a technical problem but a workflow problem - let me explain. If you took a bunch of photos at a wedding or during house inspection the photos are going to land in some type of directory with random file names. If you were to then create a spreadsheet captioning or adding meta data (location, date, notes, photographer) to the files you data might look like this:

    Detroit, 1/2/2017, John, master bedroom, photo101.jpg
    Austin, 1/2/2017, John, kitchen, photo103.jpg
    Boston, 1/2/2017, John, hurricane damage, photo107.jpg
    Smith Wedding, 1/10/2017, John, Church, photo401.jpg
    Smith Wedding, 1/10/2017, John, Cute Bridesmaid, photo402.jpg
    Smith Wedding, 1/10/2017, John, Receiving Line, photo403.jpg

    Note that this spreadsheet explicitly associates the file name with the other data. Now you can then create a form with two file inputs - one for the spreadsheet or CSV file and a second for the multiple selected files  (<input type=file name=myfiles multiple>).. The script can then perform a consistency check that the file name in the spreadsheet matches one of the selected files and send the spreadsheet to QuickBase and obtain the record ID for the newly created records. Then the script can upload the appropriate images into the correct record.

    You could also have the script read the EFIX data from the files and automaticaly extract and upload this data. For example see:

    https://github.com/exif-js/exif-js

    So to summarize the technical issues of uploading multiple files is not the issue. The main problem is what workflow you want to use to associate any particular file with other metadata saved in the record - this could be done offline through a spreadsheet as outlined above or online after just the photos were bulk uploaded.