Which is the best place to store images?

[cesark]

Hi !

I want to store images, but I don’ t know which is the best place to store them.
I have two cases:

Case 1 (a few images) :
I have 100 permanent images, jpg’ s and gif’s (from 10 kb to 30 kb) to display in some cases on the page depending on the user selections.

Case 2 (images uploaded by the users) :
On the page the users will be able to upload images (from 800 kb to 3.000 kb), and later these images will be displayed in another page.
The file of these images will grow always, and it could be 5.000, 60.000 or 25.000.000 of images.

I am considering to store all the images (in both cases) into a Sql database, and then querying the DB when I need to display these images or pictures.

Which are your opinions and suggestions?

Thanks,
Cesar

[plenderj]

Store them as files on the drive. I wouldn't store static content in a database.

[venerable bede]

I have to agree with Jamie.

Don't store your images in a Blob field. They are a pain in the bot.
Store the images in a folder somwhere and have a field in a table somewhere which will hold the images location and name.

[cesark]

Ok thanks, I think this is a very good system.

But I have a question, the physical file that I need to create will store images of many users, and every image (one or more) will belong to an offer. Then, what happens if some images have the same name?

[venerable bede]

You will have to check to see if a file already exists with that name already or you could always name the files being uploaded yourself.

[plenderj]

Well seperate them out. For example :

\root\images\username\*.*
so...
\root\images\plenderj\me.jpg
\root\images\plenderj\you.jpg
\root\images\venerable bede\me.jpg
\root\images\meh\bleh.gif

[cesark]

But in my case one user can has several product images with the same name, because a user can publish several offers with the same product image. I mean, in my case the only thing that is unique is the offer_id (offer number), every offer has to have different images name if the offer has several images, but different offers can have identical images names.

[plenderj]

Well then use the offerid in the path?

\root\images\username\offerid_imagename.jpg
or
\root\images\offerid\username\imagename.jpg
or
\root\images\username\offerid\imagename.jpg
or
\root\images\offerid\username_imagename.jpg

... whatever works for you ...

[cesark]

Ok, then I think that the best choice for me would be:

\root\images\offerid_imagename.jpg

I don' t need the user file, because in the database every offer has its user_id.
I suppose that the 'root' file is a good physical place to store this kind of data..

[nemaroller]

You could also use a GUID for the filename...

[cesark]

How I could use a GUID to store an image name?

Maybe it is better to store the offer_id (bigint) followed by the image name.. Do you think that it would be better to use a GUID?

[nemaroller]

Not a matter of better, just choice.

I was noting it for others that may read your post months from now with a similiar question.

MyFileName As String = Guid.NewGuid.ToString

[plenderj]

A GUID is definitely a good idea. I might try that myself in some projects

[cesark]

Ok, thank you!

[Serge]

We are storing images in the database and so far I dont see any problems. It also allows you to manage it in one place: no file storage on the HD, no pointers to the filename in the database.

[nemaroller]

Other than every now and then, everyone's pictures on my page have red x's instead of pictures... (btw kidding)