At 10:16 AM 12/2/2003, John T. Blair wrote:
>I think it sounds like a great idea. However, I'd like to make a suggestion
>that you use Rich Text Format (RTF) as your format. It is universal and
>then you don't have to worry about what version of Word each article is
>in. Also some people don't use Word - I for one. I own but chose not to
>load MS Office due to it's vaunerability to virsus. I use MS Works instead.
>It's saved me the few times I've gotten a virus that my Norton didn't catch.
Good point John. What I'd like to know is if RTF is OK on Mac
systems. I'm a Windoze guy and want to be able to properly provide
articles for Mac-types. Can someone speak up on this? We could always use
plain-text files... on Windows, that's a TXT file, on Mac that's a Simple
Text document. As a side note though, Word is secure IF (and it's a big
IF) you continue to update it with Microsoft's free updates to registered
users. Word is almost ubiquitous in the work place, it wouldn't be if that
weren't so.
>As to the pictures, if you really want "hi-res" then you should be using
>TIFF as it is a "no loss" format. JPG and GIFs are lossy - they loose
>data in their compression. Also why restrict the image's quality. I've
>got many articles that used 640x480 and in a small picture it worked great.
>I take what ever I can get. Also how much disk space do you have? For
>graphics in the current issue - Jan 2004 - of The Brickline that I publish
>(to see/download a copy - http://www.bricklin.org/BL_July2001.pdf) I have
>3 pictures - 2 @ 24M and 1 @ 44M. This eats up a lot of disk space quickly.
Very true John, JPG is lossy, as a photographer I deal with that issue
every day. :) But server space and practicality of upload and download
speeds dictate JPGs be used. In Photoshop, a quality setting of 8 or
higher in versions 3 - 6; and a setting of 10 or higher in versions 7 and
CS, are certainly adequate for our needs. (After all, the Associated Press
moves every picture in JPG format. That means that virtually every picture
you see in Newsweek and Time magazines were delivered electronically in JPG
format.) Now, size does matter when it comes to pictures. Most printers
like 250-300ppi files, so that means we should probably utilize files at
least 1500ppi in width so they could be used up to 5 inches. But... if we
can only get smaller files, like, as you say 640x480, we'll take 'em!
> >I'll upload the files and images to a directory and
> >include the description for easy browsing. Then whenever you needed an
> >article, you could go to the site, and pull whatever you need down.
>
>If your web site supports FTP and ASP you might want to try and have an
>area where we can FTP the articles to - faster xfer - and even a form
>to fill out that describes the article. This would reduce your work load.
Definitely a good idea. My server does support FTP for uplaods and I will
set that up. As for ASP or PHP, I'm just a rookie at that stuff. At least
for now, I'll manually update the file info. As my talents improve, and I
suspect that sort of database would be fairly simple (I know, famous last
words!), I'll move to a PHP system.
> >It occurs to me that we are all re-inventing the same wheel each month. I
> >ask other newsletter editors for articles....
>
>Are you planning on restricting the article submissions to TR only? In
>publishing The Brickline, I pull articles from all kinds of web pages,
>many from TR or British car webs. I have several great general articles
>(any that were authored by me - John T. Blair) on my Morgan web page:
>www.team.net/www/morgan that are in the public domain for non-comercial
>use by car club newsletters. Just to mention a few - there is an article
>on tools, a nice series (3 articles) one electrical systems in a car, etc.
>
>I've also done several articles about safety in our hobby.
That's great and I'd take them. I was thinking any British marque would be
welcome. I'll arrange them by marque on the page, but there is quite a lot
of crossover, especially when it comes to Lucas electronics and other
topics that relate to multiple marques. Once I really get savvy with PHP I
could do a sort of keyword search or something like that. But for now,
let's just crawl, it's at least a start.
A couple of folks have already emailed me articles! And several have
written offering to do the same once it's set up. Keep the feedback and
suggestions coming.
Cheers,
Blake
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