LinPHA help

LinPHA Installation

 Configure Database Access Type Configure MySQL Database Administrator Configure LinPHA Administrator Configure LinPHA Database connection

LinPHA Administration

 General Configuration User Management Folder Management Thumbnails EXIF/IPTC LinPHA Plugins Miscellaneous Help

LinPHA Installation

Configure Database Access Type

YES !
I have full access to the MySQL database, I'm allowed to create new
databases and new users. In other words: This is my Server! TOC

If you are going to install LinPHA at your Home-PC or a so called "root-server" on the internet, this is the option to choose. You also need full access rights to a SQL database server to create a new linpha user.

NO !
I'm going to install LinPHA with limited access to the
MySQL database. My ISP does not allow the creation of new databases or users. TOC

If you are going to install LinPHA somewhere on the internet, this is the option to choose. Most internetproviders do not allow full access to the SQL database.

Please select Database type TOC

Some notes about the different supported Databases:
MySQL database: To continue, you need to have a root password (set) for your MySQL database. Please see the LinPHA FAQ for more details.

PostgreSQL database: Other than MySQL LinPHA will not create the DB itself for you. Therefore you need to run createdb linpha from the command line to create a new database called "linpha" before you continue. The rest is similar to the MySQL installation without the need of having a password set for your DB.
For all RDBMS make sure that there is PHP support for your DB!!!!

Configure MySQL Database Administrator

MySQL DB Admin name: TOC

The name of your MySQL database admin. This is often the so called "root" account.

MySQL DB Admin pass: TOC

The password for the MySQL admin/root account. NOTE: For security reasons LinPHA will NOT install on systems without an admin password, so make sure to have an admin/root account incl. password ready!

Configure LinPHA Administrator

LinPHA Admin name: TOC

The name of the LinPHA administrator. You can later login with this name to perform administrative LinPHA tasks.

LinPHA Admin password: TOC

The password for the LinPHA administrator.

Admin email: TOC

Email address of LinPHA administrator.

Configure LinPHA Database connection

Hostname: TOC

The hostname of the MySQL database server. This is often "localhost" for Home-PC's and something like "mysql.somewhere.org" for ISP's.

Portnumber: TOC

The MySQL serverport. In most cases this is the default 3306.

LinPHA Database name: TOC

The name of the database to hold all LinPHA tables. If unsure leave the default "linpha".
If you are going to install several versions or instances of LinPHA change the database name here.

Database name: TOC

The name of the database to connect. This name is given you by your ISP.

Prefix for all LinPHA tables TOC

The prefix for all LinPHA tables. All LinPHA tables will have the prefix "linpha_" in your database. Feel free to change it to whatever you like.

LinPHA Administration

General Configuration

Title of photo album TOC

This option allows you to set the name of the LinPHA photo album. Leave the option blank to use the default name.
Default: blank (The Linux Photo Archive)

Number of columns to display: TOC

This option allows you to increase/decrease the number of columns with thumbnails. It takes effect in all pages were thumbnails are displayed.
You may increase this value when running LinPHA in high resolution > 1024x768
Default: 4 columns

Number of rows to display: TOC

This option allows you to increase/decrease the number of rows with thumbnails. It takes effect in all pages were thumbnails are displayed.
You may increase this value when running LinPHA in high resolution > 1024x768
Default: 3 rows

Size of detailed photo view (width): TOC

This option allows you to set the default width of photos displayed in img_view.php. I.e. the displayed "medium" sized image when a thumbnail was clicked.
You may increase this value when running LinPHA in high resolution > 1024x768
Default: 512

Size of detailed photo view (height): TOC

This option allows you to set the default height of photos displayed in img_view.php. I.e. the displayed "medium" sized image when a thumbnail was clicked.
You may increase this value when running LinPHA in high resolution > 1024x768
Default: 384

Quality of detailed photo: TOC

This option allows you to set the default quality of images in img_view.php. (the image that appears after you click a thumbnail). You may increase loading speed due set to a lower value. Examples:
Image size (quality 75) = 28.55 KB
Image size (quality 50) = 18.47 KB
Image size (quality 40) = 15.80 KB
Default: 75

Enable/disable image rotation TOC

This option allows you to enable/disable the image rotation feature in img_view.php PLEASE NOTE:
If you are using the GD library please note that ALL OF THE IMAGE EXIF INFORMATION WILL GET LOST !!! during image rotation.
I already wrote a bug report to the PHP developers but they told me that they will NOT fix this bug! :-(

If you are using the convert tool from the ImageMagick suite you should be save but please make sure to test it!
Default: off

Enable/disable ALL EXIF support TOC

Many images in jpg format contain some special information known as EXIF. This option allows you to enable/disable the display of EXIF information in img_view.php. (the site that appears after you click a thumbnail) If there is no good reason you should leave the default (on).
HINT: If enabled you should also see:
EXIF default settings
EXIF verbosity level settings

Show EXIF information by default TOC

This option allows you to display the image EXIF information in img_view.php (the site that appears after you click a thumbnail) by default. Otherwise users have to click the "more details" link to get the EXIF information.
Default: off

Level of EXIF information TOC

The amount of EXIF information is defined in three levels (low/medium/high). The higher you set this level, the amount of displayed EXIF information increases.
Default: medium

Image IPTC information TOC

Some images contain so called IPTC metadata. This kind of data is mostly used by Adobe Photoshop to add/get some useful descriptions, copyright, keywords or other data to/from images. If enabled, LinPHA will display the IPTC info of an image (if found).
Default: Off

Level of IPTC information TOC

The amount of IPTC information is defined in three levels (low/medium/high). The higher you set this level, the amount of displayed IPTC information increases.
Default: medium

Enable/disable filenames TOC

This option allows you whether to display the filename below the thumbnail or not.
Default: on

Order thumbnails by TOC

This option allows you to change the order of the thumbnails. You can choose between "order by date" (latest photo first) and "order by filename" (descent).
Default: date

Auto create/delete thumbnails TOC

With this option set ON, LinPHA detects all changes in your albums automatically. This means LinPHA auto creates thumbnails for new added images, and deletes everything from DB if you remove an image or album.
Since this task causes heavy CPU load, you should set it OFF and only enable it if you changed something. Better leave it OFF and make use of the "Auto create/delete thumbnails" feature! (INFO)
Default: off

Enable/disable counter TOC

This option allows you to define, whether to display the user counter in the upper right or not.
Default: enable

IP blocking time in minutes TOC

This option allows you to define the time an ip adress is blocked. This means during this value the user is not counted as a new visitor.
Default: 15 minutes

LinPHA default language TOC

The LinPHA default language. If you enabled "language auto-detect" this is the default fallback language.

Enable/disable language auto-detection TOC

If enabled, LinPHA welcomes a vistor in his native language (if supported). If an unsupported language is detected, LinPHA uses the default language as fallback. (please see default language)
Default: on

Change the LinPHA theme TOC

This option allows you to change the default LinPHA look and feel. Choose from three avilable themes. (Aqua/Colored/Shadow)
Default: Aqua

Enable/disable HQ thumbnails and photos TOC

This option allows you to create high quality thumbnails using the GD library. They look much smoother but this causes very high CPU load.
Do not enable if your CPU is slower 1 GHz!!
Default: off

Enable/disable guest printing TOC

This option allows you to enable the LinPHA printing feature for guest users. If enabled everyone is allowed to print (eg. the "Print mode" link and icon are visible). If set off, users must first login to be able to print.
Default: off

Enable/disable slideshow TOC

This option allows you to enable/disable the LinPHA slideshow feature. If your server has low bandwidth or CPU < 300MHz you should disable the slideshow.
Default: on

Next/previous button image status/size TOC

This option allows you to enable/disable the use of images as next/previous button in img_view.php instead of arrow icons. If you have many visiors wih a low bandwidth you should disable this feature as it causes a 7kb "overhead" compared to the arrow icons.
Default: on

Change thumbnail size TOC

This option allows you to change the size of the thumbnails. You can choose between 90, 120 and 150 pixel max size. Please note that a change will NOT update the existing thumbnails. so you have to recreate them manually.
please see: recreate thumbnails found under "Other options"
Default: 120 pixel

Order thumbnails by TOC

This option allows you to change the order of the thumbnails. You can choose between "order by date" (latest photo first) and "order by filename" (descent).
Default: date

Allow/deny anonymous posts TOC

This option allows you to enable/disable anonymous postings. If enabled, every visitor is allowed to write a comment for images. If disabled, ONLY registered users are allowed to write a comment.
Default: off

Enable/disable anonymous downloads TOC

This option allows you to enable/disable anonymous downloads. If enabled, every visitor is allowed to download your images (download link is enabled below image). If disabled, the download link is enabled ONLY for registered users.
Default: off

Autologin TOC

If this option is activated, users have the option to use the autologin. The autologin creates a cookie in which the encrypted password is stored (MD5 hash). It should really only be used if it is their own computer. You can disable it if that's a problem for you.
Default: on

Autologin Userinfo TOC

If this option is activated, you don't have to login every time. The autologin creates a cookie in which the encrypted password is stored (MD5 hash). It should really only be used if that is your own computer.

Timer TOC

This option allows you to enable/disable the output of the parsetime in the footer bottem right.
Default: off

Enable/disable anonymous album downloads TOC

This option allows you to enable/disable the function to download zipped albums for anonymous users.
Default: off

Download speed limit TOC

This option allows you to set a speed limit for the download of zipped albums.
Default: unlimited

Enable/disable navigation bar TOC

This option allows you to enable/disable the navigation bar on the thumbnail pages.
Default: off

Default date and time format TOC

The default date and time format is only used if it isn't defined in the language file (for example in the english file because the time format is different in US and UK).
See http://www.php.net/manual/en/function.strftime.php for definitions.

Virtual "New images" folder TOC

With this option enabled, a new "virtual folder" will be displayed in the left menu.
It will show all new added images from all albums (you are allowed to view) without wasting any additional webspace!
The preview of images depends on the max age setting below.
The folder will disapear as soon as the "max age" is reached and show up again as soon as you add
some new images (isn't that magic :-))

Default: On

"New images" folder age in days TOC

This setting defines (in days) how long new added images show up in the "new images" folder

Default: 7 days

Enable/disable album comments in subfolder TOC

If set to on, this will display an album comment also in the "subfolder preview" for the subalbums and not only in the album itself.
You should consider to turn this feature off if you have long album comments as it may break the layout of the subfolder preview.

Default: on

Enable/disable caching of SQL queries TOC

Especially on slow SQL servers you should enable this feature. It stores the results of SQL querys in a directory structure within the /sql/adocache directory (default) for a given time in minutes (adodb caching time). Usually it makes no sense to enable thisfeature when having a CPU > 1GHz.

Default: off

Path to SQL query cache: TOC

The path where SQL results are stored. If you change the default (sql/adocache) make sure the webserver has full write permissions to the new directory

SQL query caching time: TOC

The caching time for querys in minutes.

Allow/deny mail mode for anonymous users TOC

If enabled, everyone is allowed to send images to other people via email. If disabled only registered users will have the option to send images as email.

Default: disabled

Mail mode: Max mail size TOC

This option allows you to set the max allowed size for emails in bytes.

Default: 2097152 (2 MB)

Enable/Disable random images in index page TOC

This option allows you to replace the LinPHA default logo on index.php with a random image of your image collection.
Everytime you revisit LinPHA you will see a different image from your image collection
Default: off

Max size of the random image in index.php TOC

This option allows you to change the size of the random image displayed in index.php (if enabled)
Default: 300 px

Enable/disable LinPHA update check TOC

This option allows you to disable the weekly update notice for admins. You should leave it on (default) to always be informed about updates, which includes security updates also!
NOTE: There is no personal data transmited or stored somewhere during the check!
Default: On

Try to create thumbnails for videos TOC

This option allows you to enable thumbnails even for some kinds of videos. As this is an long time and huge memory consumption task, it's strongly recommended to disable this feature on slow servers, or so called shared servers!
Default: On

User Management

Modify existing users TOC

Change user names, passwords, and email address here. You may also delete users here.

Add new user TOC

Use this form to create new user accounts and assign them password, email adress and user group.
The user groups (friend/admin) allows you to set the users privileges. Warning! if set admin, the user gains the same rights as YOU!

Modify/delete groups TOC

Use this form to delete/modify groups. The uploaders group is a special one, if you add a user to be member of this group, he/she can use the LinPHA filemanager for uploads in their "my settings" page.
Therefore it should not be deleted.

Add new group TOC

Use this form to create new groups. LinPHA comes with 3 default groups:
Admin (can't be deleted), friends and uploaders.

Folder Management

Set Folder Permissions TOC

This page allows you to hide albums/folders. LinPHA knows for stages by default. Of course you can add more groups if you need to:
PUBLIC: Visible to any user, no need to login.
FRIEND: Visible only to users which are member of this group.
ADMIN: Visible only to admin users. (not friends)
UPLOADER Pseudo group. Enables the filemanger for thoses users in their "my settings" page, so they can upload images

Thumbnails EXIF/IPTC

Create all your thumbnails at once! TOC

Also LinPHA is capable of creating all thumbnails and IPTC/EXIF data if Auto create/delete thumbnails is enabled on the fly, you still may want to create thumbs and/or EXIF/IPTC in advance. Well, you are in the right place!
Please keep in mind, that the above operations may fail due PHP runtime limits when using the PHP included GD lib, convert is known to work fine.
So, if you run into problems with mass creating metadata or thumbs (e.g. not all thumbs of an album where created, just a couple of them...), best leave Auto create/delete thumbnails turned on and things should work smoothly.


Add new category TOC

LinPHA allows you to create categories. These categories are NOT visible to the users if you choose to set them "private". Otherwise they were visible for guest and registered users in the search page.
This allows you to organize your photos within categories like Holliday, Cars, Cat, whatever. The main purpose is to find them much easier later via the search page, and for a better overview.

Modify/delete categories TOC

Modify/delete all your categories here...

LinPHA Plugins

Benchmark TOC

The benchmark plugin allows you to find the best settings for the size of the images and the quality depending on your server performance.

Watermark TOC

The Watermark plugin allows you to place a watermark over each image. The Watermark doesn't change your images, it is generated on the fly. You can take an own image or you can put your own text over each image.

Watermark: Add more example images TOC

To add more example images, just put it in your linpha directory in the folder 'plugins/watermark/examples'

Watermark: Add more watermark images TOC

To add more example images, just put it in your linpha directory in the folder 'plugins/watermark/watermarks'

Watermark: Add more fonts TOC

To add more fonts, just put it in your linpha directory in the folder 'plugins/watermark/font'. The fonts have to be Truetype-Fonts (.ttf). You will find a lot on the I-Net: Google Directory of Fonts

Watermark: Color settings TOC

To set the color, you can use the html color format ('#00FF00' or '00FF00') or normal text like 'blue' 'darkblue' etc.

Watermark: Delete all cached images with watermarks TOC

With this option you can delete all cached images which have a watermark. This option maybe useful if you have images already cached and you are changing the watermark.
(This option is only available if watermark and image cache are enabled.)

DB Management TOC

With the SQL DB Management you can create backups of your current database.

Image Cache TOC

The image cache plugin allows you to cache the medium sized images (the ones you see after clicking a thumbnail)This will greatly speedup LinPHA, especially on slow hardware.
Of course at the cost of additional webspace usage.
Default: OFF (enable if CPU < 500 MHz)

Max cache size in bytes (0 = unlimited) TOC

This option allows you to specify the maximum disk space, in bytes, used by the cache.
Default: 0 (= unlimited)

Cache directory (default sql/cache) TOC

This option allows you to change the cache directory.
If you change this directory, all cached files are deleted!
If the new directory doesn't exists, linpha tries to create it.

Default: sql/cache

Optimize/cleanup image cache data TOC

This option allows you to cleanup/optimize the image cache.

Mailing list plugin TOC

This plugin adds a mailing list where users can register themself to receive news from you later.
In addition (allowed) users can send out mail to all other mailing list members. Some new configuration options will show up in admin section to allow you to change the behavior of this plugin.

Default: off

Guestbook plugin TOC

This plugin adds a guestbook where user can leave you a message.
In addition some new config options will be available in the admin section to configure the guestbook behavior.

Default: off

Logger plugin TOC

This plugin adds logging functionality to LinPHA. Each type of Event can be logged to a seperate destination.
Currently supported events: login, update, thumbnail and database.
Currently supported destinations: none, system, file, email and database.

Default: off

RSS TOC

This plugin allows your visitors to be informed about changes in LinPHA by subscribing an RSS 2.0 feed. When you have uploaded pictures, or created a new album, just click on "Generate RSS" (or "preview RSS" if you wish to view the XML file without building it) and it will create a new RSS file, based on the the change date of the folders.
When enabled, an RSS 2.0 logo is added to the bottom. Draged and droped to an aggregator, it will display the updates.
On configuration section, you will find the following options:

Statistics TOC

This plugin allows you and your visitors to view some Statistics of LinPHA.
Like number of comments, number of downloads, most visited image and album, and so on...

Enable/disable realtime Statistics TOC

Especially on large image collections and/or high traffic sites, you should consider to disable "realtime statistics".
As this option takes only effect on the "Downloads size" value in the "user" section, it is mostly save to disable "realtime_stats" on large collections to prevent high server load!
Again: Even if disabled, all Statistics are realtime besides the value for "Downloads size".

Enable/Disable image auto rotation by EXIF data TOC

Many Images shot with a modern Camera feature so called EXIF data. Some Cameras provide an "Orientation" tag which contains information about the orientation of the image when it was shot. LinPHA can read this tag and auto rotate images to be displayed with the right orientation, without touching the original image, it's just something like a "virtual" rotation. If you have setup a PHP with an acceptable "memory_limit" value > 8MB and your server is fast enough, you should enable this feature as it's saves you from having all images rotated in the right direction before you use them with LinPHA.

Google and Yahoo Maps Plugin TOC

This Plugin allows you to playce your Albums as a marker on a Google or Yahoo Map. To get it working, you need at least a Google Key, or a Yahoo Application ID.

How to get a Yahoo ID TOC

To make use of Yahoo Maps you will need a Yahoo ID. Get one from:
http://api.search.yahoo.com/webservices/register_application and enter it here.

How to get a Google Map Key TOC

To make use of Google Maps and the "search location" option you will need a so called Google Key and sign up for the Maps API. Get one from:
http://www.google.com/apis/maps/signup.html and enter it here.

Map Type Controls TOC

This option let's you control whether or not to display the Map type controls on the Map. If enabled the type controls are displayed on the Map. These are usually Regular, Satellite, and Hybrid Map.

Map Slide Controls TOC

This option let's you control whether or not to display the Map slide controls on the Map. If enabled the slide Navigation is displayed on the Map.

Map Pan Controls TOC

This option let's you control whether or not to display the Map pan controls on the Map. If enabled the pan Navigation is displayed on the Map.

Map Marker Controls TOC

This option let's you control whether or not the Album markers on the Map should popup when Mouseover. This works at least for Yahoo Maps. If disabled you have to click a marker first to make it popup.

Miscellaneous Help

Search EXIF/IPTC information TOC

For a better performance LinPHA will no longer extract any EXIF/IPTC metainfo during the create of thumbnails. This means you need to have all EXIF/IPTC information ready before you can perform any kind of search in EXIF/IPTC metadata.
EXIF/IPTC data is created in two ways. Either when you view an image the first time, and/or if you made use of the "create all information once" option found in the LinPHA admin section under the "Thumbnails EXIF/IPTC". link.
For details please see:Thumbnails EXIF/IPTC
You may want to modify the available EXIF/IPTC search tags by editing the file/include/metadata.config.php.

Archive applications TOC

Additional applications to create archives or extract files can be defined in the file linpha/include/archiver.config.php.

Note: These applications cannot be installed in directories which contains spaces! If you want to use a program which is installed in C:/Program Files/... you have to use C:/Progra~1/...
Alternatively you can install the program in another directory OR you can add the directory to the PATH variable, this will work too.

Another reason why your application doesn't appear in the select box: safe_mode or open_basedir restrictions. If possible, disable safe_mode or open_basedir, or use the programs which are in the allowed paths of safe_mode or open_basedir.

Search information TOC

To get the expected search results, it's important to understand the way how to query for keywords. The following is a list which explains what to expect when querying: