[development] image node type

[Chris Johnson]

Robert Douglass wrote:

> Let's say that the relationship is called "attached file".
> 
> The next step is to be able to search through all existing nodes that 
> can possibly fill the roll of "attached file" while creating a new node. 
> A current limitation of our system is that I'd have to upload the same 
> PDF 3 times if I want to have it appear on 3 different nodes. This, we 
> can all recognize, is crap. I should be able to reuse the already 
> uploaded PDF.
> 
> This raises two issues: a search interface for media assets is hard to 
> build. Image assist is the best working example we have, and with all 
> due respect to its greatness, it is still clunky (haven't tried the 
> newest version though).

Smart use of taxonomy for media assets would go a long way towards making them 
usable in this fashion, however.  Perhaps free tagging as well.

In reality, this is a problem that lots of people are trying to solve.  Apple 
just tried to "solve" it by throwing Spotlight into its operating system. 
Apple could improve on that by fixing its Finder, as well (the spatial/browser 
issue):  http://arstechnica.com/articles/paedia/finder.ars/1

Lack of such a perfect solution for finding media assets for re-use should not 
stop us from treating media that way, however.  I agree with Robert.


..chrisxj