Basic options

Type of thumbnail format to create

HTML Tables

This option will create an HTML table for each index and an individual thumbnail image for each original image. The main advantage with this format is that other information such as file size can be shown in the table. Also the HTML page background can show through between the images. The disadvantage is that a connection back to the server will have to made to get each image in the table. Also there is greater effort to upload all the individual thumbs to the site.

Contact sheet image maps

This option will create a single JPEG image map for each index. This technique can ease the burden on the server because only one HTTP connection need be made to the server no matter how many thumbs are in the index. The file size of the index image can be signicantly reduced by reducing the JPEG quality. File size information is included with the image map using the "ALT" tag and this will appear in recent browser versions when the cursor is over the thumbnail.

Thumb width and thumb height

This is the size of the notional box (in pixels) within which the thumbs have to fit. ThumbFactory will resize the thumbs in order to preserve the original ratio of width to height

Number across and down the page

ThumbFactory will create index pages with the specified number of thumbs in them. Increasing these numbers will increase the size of the index pages.

Use pixel area averaging

It is recommended this is set to "No" for very large numbers of images (eg. 100+). Setting this to "Yes" will produce the best quality thumbs however there will also be substantial amounts of memory used to do this and the thumbnailing process may slow down as it progresses.

Put all images in a directory relative to the HTML

Often websites are arranged so that all images are in a directory below the HTML directory. By enabling this option the default directory name of "images" appears but this can be changed to whatever is actually used.

Create copies of original images as well as thumbs

When ThumbFactory creates the index pages and the thumbnails it can also copy over the original images from which the thumbs were taken. This can allow you to both test out the look of the thumbs produced and also upload everything together from one place to your website.

HTML page for each original

The index pages can point to the raw image or by enabling this option, ThumbFactory will create an HTML page for each image.

Use skeleton with "thumbfactory" tag for HTML

If the above option is enabled so that an HTML page is created for each image, then it also possible to specify a "skeleton" HTML page to use for the image. This skeleton can contain anything but must contain the tag "thumbfactory" to specify the place where the thumbnail index is inserted. This feature is very useful if certain advertising material is always to be presented along with index's and images.

Other options such as centering in ThumbFactory have no meaning when using a skeleton. If you want the thumb image centered then you should center tags around the thumbfactory tag in the skeleton file.

Thumb JPEG quality

This is the JPEG quality with which the thumbnails are created. The default is a high 75% but it may be acceptable to reduce this down as far as 50% in order to achieve much faster loading of index pages.