Can't post photos hosted on public sites

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pcrussell50
Posts: 118
Joined: Fri Oct 16, 2015 1:08 am
Location: SoCal/SoNev

Can't post photos hosted on public sites

Postby pcrussell50 » Fri Feb 19, 2016 12:09 pm

I tried to post a photo hosted by my photo hosting site, as per this text from the "Creating New Topics and other Hints":

If you have images hosted on a public hosting site, you can include those images in your posts using the [IMG] tags. For example, to include an image hosted at

http://yourHost.com/yourImagefile

you can just wrap that URL with the [ img ] and [ /img ] tags.


And all I get in return is:
It was not possible to determine the dimensions of the image. Please verify that the URL you entered is correct.


The URL is definitely correct, because it was cut and pasted... No opportunity for a typo.

I get the idea that the size limit doesn't apply when the picture is being hosted elsewhere. Do I have that right?

Confused...

-Peter

jimh
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Joined: Fri Oct 09, 2015 12:25 pm
Location: Michigan, Lower Peninsula
Contact:

Re: Can't post photos hosted on public sites

Postby jimh » Sat Feb 20, 2016 9:12 am

If you post the URL that is causing the error a better assessment of the problem can be made.

My initial reaction is that you did not use a URL that linked directly to the image. You probably posted a URL that linked to a webpage on the hosting site that has the image. A lot of hosting sites have changed their ways, and they no longer give you direct access to the image. The forum is very pleased to link to images hosted outside of the forum, but not to pages that wrap other material around the image or only generate the image on the fly by some function call.

The image file must be in an acceptable file format. It should be a JPEG file or a PNG file or a .GIF file. It cannot be a TIFF file.

The image file must not be wider than 900-pixels (so that it does not create problems for displaying it as an inline image with text).

If the URL to the image does not end in .JPG or .PNG or .GIF, then it is not a direct link to the image. If the URL ends in .HTML it is not a link to an image file but a link to a webpage. If it ends in .ASP or something similar, it is not a direct link to an image.

Also, the hosting website must allow serving of the image when the referring website is not the hose website. Many sites do not permit direct linking to an image unless the referring URL is in the domain of the image hosing website.