Okay, let's unpack this ever scroll endlessly through your phone trying to find
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that one photo.
Oh, yeah. That's like our digital lives are just, you know, exploding with memories.
Right. But keeping them organized, that feels impossible sometimes.
Totally. But what if there was a maybe a straightforward way to bring some order to
that chaos?
Well, that's what we're talking about today. On the deep dive, we're diving into
Piwigo
Right. Pee Wee Go. It's an open source photo gallery application runs on the web.
Think of it like your own personal photo library online under your control.
Exactly. And it's really not just for the super techie people.
No, definitely not. If you've ever just wished for a simpler way to manage your
photos,
whether you've got, I don't know, a few hundred or even hundreds of thousands, this
could be for you.
Yeah. Businesses use it, teams, but also just individuals, you know, the overflowing
camera roles.
Totally. And before we jump into deep, we should give a big thank you to Safe
Server.
Oh, absolutely. Thanks to Safe Server for supporting this deep dive.
They specialize in hosting solutions that are perfect for software like Piwigo,
and they can really help with your whole digital transformation.
You can find out more about them at www.safeserver.de.
Definitely check them out.
So our mission today is pretty simple, really.
We want to give you, the learner, a clear, kind of beginner-friendly look at what Piwigo
is.
Yeah, what it does and maybe why it's a fantastic solution for getting those
digital photos organized,
hopefully without feeling too overwhelmed.
Exactly.
So let's start right at the beginning.
What is Piwigo, fundamentally?
Okay, so in simple terms, Piwigo is software.
You install it on something called a web server.
Okay, a web server.
Yeah.
Like a special computer that's always online.
That's a good way to put it, yeah.
And then you access your photo library using any web browser.
You know, like Chrome, Firefox, whatever you use to visit websites.
Ah, okay, so my photos aren't just stuck on my phone or one computer.
I can see them from anywhere.
Exactly.
Computer, tablet, phone, as long as you've got internet access, can log in.
Okay, so it lives online.
Makes sense.
Now you mentioned open source.
That sounds a bit technical.
Can you break that down for us non-coders?
Sure, absolutely.
Imagine like a recipe that's published for everyone to see, right?
Open source is kind of similar.
The actual code, the instructions that make Piwigo work, they're freely available.
Anyone can look at it, use it, change it, even help improve it.
Huh, so it's like a community kitchen, everyone working on the same dish.
That's a great analogy, yeah.
And that transparency, having lots of eyes on the code,
it helps make the software more secure and reliable.
People spot things.
Okay, built by a community for the community.
That's a pretty neat idea.
But practically speaking, what does Piwigo actually do with my photos
once I put them in there?
How does it help me get organized?
Right, it's main job is really to help you manage, organize,
and then easily share your photos online.
Manage, organize, share.
Okay, think of it like creating your own perfectly cataloged
photo albums, but living on the internet.
And you get to decide the structure, who sees what, all that stuff.
Alright, organization is the magic word here.
So what are some of the really simple things Piwigo offers
to help a beginner, like me maybe, get started organizing?
I don't want to get lost in complicated settings right away.
Yeah, good point.
One of the first things you'll probably appreciate
is the ability to create an album's hierarchy.
Hierarchy, like folders inside folders.
Exactly, just like on your computer.
You can create main albums, maybe family events or travel,
and then inside travel, you could have sub albums
like Italy Trip 2023 or Weekend Getaway.
Ah, I see, so you can nest them, structure it logically.
Precisely, it helps you categorize things
so you can actually find them later,
instead of just one giant photo dump.
That sounds way better than my current system,
which is chaos.
What if I have like 100 photos from one birthday party?
Is there a way to manage them all at once?
Clicking each one sounds tedious.
Oh, definitely.
Piwigo has a feature called batch management.
It's a lifesaver.
Batch management?
Yeah, it lets you select a whole bunch of photos at once,
maybe all those birthday pictures,
and then do the same thing to all of them.
Like what?
Like add the tag birthday to all of them,
or move them all into the birthday party album,
or maybe add a description like Uncle Bob 60th
to the whole set.
Oh wow, okay, that saves a ton of clicks.
I like the sound of that.
It's hugely helpful when you're dealing with large numbers
of images from one event or shoot.
Okay, useful.
What about making my gallery look nice?
You know, make it feel like my space.
Is there customization?
Yes, absolutely.
Piwigo is quite flexible visually.
It uses something called themes.
Themes, like skins.
Kind of, yeah.
Think of them as different outfits for your photo gallery.
They change the overall look, the layout, the colors,
but they don't touch your actual photos or albums.
Okay, cool.
And then there are plugins.
These are like little add-on tools
that give Piwigo extra features or abilities.
Extra abilities, like what sort of things?
Oh, all sorts.
Things for adding maps, different ways to display photos,
integration with other services.
There are actually over 200 themes and plugins available.
Whoa, 200, so you can really tailor it.
You really can.
Yeah.
You can add just the features that you need.
Without making it overly complicated if you don't want to.
And you don't need to be a tech whiz
to install most of them.
That's good.
Now, super important, sharing.
What if I don't want everyone in the world
seeing my holiday snaps or pictures of the kids?
Can I control that?
Absolutely.
Privacy and control are like core features of Piwigo.
Okay.
You can set permissions on every single album.
You can make an album public so anyone can see it.
Or?
Completely private, just for you.
Or?
Or you can make it visible only to specific users
or groups that you define.
So you could have a family group who can see certain albums
and maybe a friend's group who sees slightly different ones.
Ah.
Okay, so really granular control.
That's really important, especially for personal stuff.
Definitely.
Complete control over who sees what.
Okay, so it's got the features,
it's customizable, handles privacy.
But why should a beginner choose Piwigo over,
I don't know, maybe some simpler online photo service?
What makes it stand out?
That's a fair question.
I think one big advantage,
especially if you're investing time setting something up,
is its history.
Its longevity.
Longevity.
Yeah, Piwigo started way back in 2002.
It's been continuously developed
and supported for over 20 years now.
Wow, that's ancient in internet years.
Right.
But it suggests it's a stable, reliable platform.
It's not some flash-in-the-pan app
that might disappear next year,
taking your carefully organized library with it.
That's a really good point.
You don't want to have to migrate everything later.
What about speed?
If I do end up with tens of thousands of photos,
will it grind to a halt?
That's often a concern,
but Piwigo's actually known for being pretty efficient,
even with really large photo libraries.
Oh, really?
Yeah, the developers put a lot of effort into performance.
It's built to handle, as they say,
thousands or even hundreds of thousands of photos
without becoming frustratingly slow to browse or manage.
Okay, that's reassuring,
because my collection will grow.
Exactly, it scales well.
What about updates?
Sometimes updating software is a real pain.
Is it complicated with Piwigo?
They try to make it as painless as possible.
Usually, when there's a new version,
you can update directly from within the administration area
of your Piwigo gallery, like a button click.
Oh, okay, not some complex manual download
and reinstall process.
Generally, no.
It's designed to be much simpler than that,
which saves you time and potential headaches.
Easy updates are always a plus.
Now, what if I, you know, get stuck,
I'm trying to do something, can't figure it out?
Is there help available for beginners?
Yes, definitely.
Piwigo has a really active
and importantly friendly community.
Community, like forums and stuff.
Exactly, there are online forums,
really good documentation on the website
and lots of experienced users and developers
who are often willing to help answer questions
and troubleshoot problems.
So you're not just left on your own
if something goes wrong?
Not at all.
It feels like there's a support network there.
Okay, you're convincing me.
Let's say I'm feeling brave enough to try it.
How do I actually get Piwigo up and running?
What's the easiest way for a beginner?
Right, installation.
For the absolute easiest start,
many people use what's called a net install method.
Net install.
Yeah, you download just one tiny little file, a script.
Then you need to upload that single file
to your web hosting space.
You usually use something called an FTP client for that.
Okay, hold on.
FTP client, what's that?
Ah, good question.
It's just a simple program for transferring files
between your computer and your web server.
Think of it like Windows Explorer or Mac Finder,
but for connecting to your web space online.
Lots of free ones are available.
Okay, so I use this FTP thingy
to upload the one small net install file.
Then what?
Then you just open that files address in your web browser.
It runs the script and it guides you step by step
through the rest of the installation.
It asks you some questions, sets things up.
It automates most of the technical bits.
Ah, okay, so the net install script does the heavy lifting.
That sounds manageable.
What was the other way you mentioned?
The other main option is the manual install.
This is a bit more hands-on.
You download the full P We Go software package,
which comes as a zip file.
You unzip it on your own computer first.
Then you use that FTP client again,
but this time you upload all the unzipped files and folders.
There'll be quite a few to your web space.
Right, upload everything then.
Once everything's uploaded,
you just go to your website's address in your browser
and the P We Go installation screen will pop up
and guide you through the final setup steps,
like creating your admin account
and connecting to the database.
Okay, a bit more involved,
but still sounds doable if you follow instructions.
Exactly.
But what if someone hears all this web server and FTP talk
and just thinks, nope, not for me?
Yeah, good point.
Is there an option for people
who really don't want to touch the technical side at all?
Absolutely there is.
For those folks, there's the Piwigo.com hosting solution.
Piwigo.com hosting, so they host it for you.
Precisely.
It's a paid service where Piwigo is already installed,
set up and managed for you by the Piwigo team.
You just sign up, pay a fee
and your gallery is ready to go.
Ah, so that completely bypasses the whole server
setup and installation process.
Totally.
It's the simplest way to get started
if you prefer a hands-off approach
and don't mind the subscription cost.
Great for non-technical users.
Okay, that's really good to know.
There are different paths depending
on your comfort level with tech.
Yeah, options are good.
You mentioned earlier that different kinds
of people and groups use Piwigo.
Can you give us a couple of real-world examples
just to make it more concrete?
Sure.
There's a neat example of a local jazz club,
the Jazz Club Trier EV in Germany.
Okay, a jazz club.
What did they use it for?
They had this big archive of old photos, historical stuff.
They used Piwigo to organize it all.
And because Piwigo is web-based,
their members could log in from home
and help add keywords, dates, names to the photo.
Oh, that's clever.
So they crowd-sourced the cataloging using Piwigo.
Exactly.
Made it a collaborative project.
Cool example.
What about someone just using it for their own stuff,
like a photographer?
Yeah, there's a testimonial from Ralph Kirchhoff,
a photographer.
He mentions he's tried various gallery systems
over the years, but keeps coming back to Piwigo.
Why?
What did he like about it?
He specifically highlighted its speed,
even with lots of high res images,
how easy it is to update and how configurable it is.
He found it reliable and feature rich
for managing both his professional portfolio
and personal photos.
So it works well for individual creators too,
not just organizations.
Definitely.
And another quick one,
the tourist office in Pays de Gourdon, France.
They apparently use it for both their internal photo library
and a public facing one.
Shows its versatility.
Right, internal and external use.
Okay, pretty flexible.
Let's just circle back quickly to that open source thing.
For someone who just wants to organize photos,
why should they care that the code is open?
What's the practical benefit?
You have a fair question.
For you, the end user, open source often translates to,
well, more reliable and arguably more secure software
in the long run.
Because the code is public, many different developers,
not just the core team, can examine it,
spot potential bugs or security flaws and suggest fixes.
More eyes on the code is generally a good thing.
Okay, security through transparency.
Kind of, yeah.
Plus, that active community we talked about,
they're constantly contributing improvements,
new plugins, new themes, fixing bugs,
so the software evolves and gets better,
often faster than closed source alternatives might.
You benefit from all that collective effort.
And you mentioned all those free plugins and themes earlier.
That's tied to the open source nature too.
Absolutely.
The open platform encourages people to build
and share those extensions, often for free.
The PyWeGo website itself, PyWeGo.org,
hosts over 200 of them.
That gives you amazing flexibility to customize
without necessarily spending more money.
You can check out things like the 3.4K stars
and 450-odd forks on GitHub too.
It shows community engagement.
Gotcha.
So open source means community, transparency,
and lots of options.
Yeah. Makes sense.
Okay, let's start to wrap things up then.
If there's one key thing you want a beginner,
and of course, a final big thank you again
to Safe Server for supporting this deep dive.
Yes. Thank you, Safe Server.
If you're thinking about P WeGo and need reliable hosting,
or just need help with your digital transformation journey
in general.
Definitely check them out.
You can find more info at www.safeserver.de.
Worth a look. Thanks for breaking all that down.
My pleasure.
Hopefully it helps folks feel a bit less overwhelmed.