How 'customized' is the Media Gallery, for future migrations?

[psTubble27]

One of the plugins I've been looking a lot lately is the Media Gallery. The biggest thing holding me back is the anxiety of getting too en-meshed into the XF ecosystem, in case of having to migrate my media collection elsewhere in the future.

My ideal analogy is Gmail, vs. something like the Linux email system. With Gmail, you are 100% stuck with it, forever. There is no ideal way to ever get your emails out, and moved somewhere else. In contrast, the Linux email system stores your emails in a platform-independent format. You can pick one email platform, then drop it and swap out for something else, and all the while your emails are kept in a platform-independent format, which means you're not held hostage to any one.

The same is my question with the Media Gallery: will I be kept hostage to it in the future, or is it more like the elegant Wordpress 'media gallery' which is nothing more than just a few folders, with minimal-to-none SQL/database integration (meaning that you're left free to move to other platforms, without requiring a custom importer).

I hope my question made sense. Thanks for any of your help on this!!

 

[beerForo]

1. You can just go for it, and hope XF will be the permanent home and worry about a migration if the time comes (or others can answer this)...
but
2. There's a new feature called Attachment Mirroring where, if you really wanted to keep all of the images as attachments and part of the forum, but show in the gallery, you now can! (in 2.2). See:

MG 2.2 - Media Gallery 2.2 - Lightbox navigation, attachment mirroring and more!

XenForo Media Gallery (XFMG) 2.2 sees a range of new features and improvements. Some of these are a result of new integrations with XenForo 2.2 itself, while others are exclusive new features to XFMG itself. Lightbox navigation Starting with XenForo 2.2 we are introducing a brand new lightbox...

xenforo.com

You could disable direct uploading to Gallery and just mirror from posts.

 

[psTubble27]

Thanks for the reply! I'm not worried about keeping my images as attachments. In fact I won't even be using the media gallery for forum attachments at all.

I am trying to make a wholly independent media gallery to feature our media content. But I also want to be as independent of XF's nuts and bolts as possible, in case of a future migration to another platform. Think of the Linux email system, as opposed to being locked into Gmail. Or think of the elegant Wordpress media system, which is just a bunch of folders and doesn't require complicated migrations of any kind.

 

[Chromaniac]

With Gmail, you are 100% stuck with it, forever.

errm. this is not accurate. gmail is not proprietary. it offers pop and imap. which means you can use any desktop client to download mails and sync them on another id using imap. or you can download your mail data in mbox format using takeout.google.com.

 

[beerForo]

Well it's an add-on for the forum software so you can either use it with this knowledge or use another.

 

[psTubble27]

Well it's an add-on for the forum software so you can either use it with this knowledge or use another.

Right, and that's why I need help from those who know its workings intimately; to say whether it's a locked-in world of its own, or has a simple file structure permitting the media gallery to migrate elsewhere if need be.

 

[psTubble27]

@Chris D any thoughts?

Appreciate any help...

 

[Chris D]

The same is my question with the Media Gallery: will I be kept hostage to it in the future, or is it more like the elegant Wordpress 'media gallery' which is nothing more than just a few folders, with minimal-to-none SQL/database integration (meaning that you're left free to move to other platforms, without requiring a custom importer).

XenForo Media Gallery stores its media across several folders depending on the type of media it is and stores its data across multiple MySQL tables.

There is much thought and logic around where things are stored, why they are stored and how they are stored and none of it comes from a position of trying to keep anyone hostage. The reality is that a powerful add-on like XFMG that integrates with a powerful forum software like XF is always going to need to approach things in a way that is widely compatible, scalable and performant whether it is someone who just wants to store a few cat pictures and memes a couple of times a week or whether it is a community that revolves around GBs of media being uploaded every day.

But our logic isn't a black box. So, while a custom importer would be required, it's not hard to figure out how. Indeed competing forum software already have their own importers which can convert content in our forum and our media gallery into their own forum software and their own gallery applications.

I hope that answers your question.

 

[psTubble27]

Yup, thanks!!