Preview Cloudinary Photo on the fly, in a form

[Aaron_R_Stewart]

Here is what I am trying to accomplish, with partial, but not complete success.

1. Upload an image (usually square and meant for Instagram)
2. Use that image and Cloudinary transformations to create 7 different versions of the graphic for a variety of social media sites.
3. Preview the transformed images in the app so the artist can review.
4. Text input for client to add caption text to be uploaded with image.
5. Choose date for the post, or leave blank to post now.
6. Allow editing of trending hashtags loaded in a company profile.
7. Preview the images and text entered one last time.
8. Click a button to either fire off a Zap, or Submit link to submit data.
9. Have screen refresh after Zap button or Submit link is clicked to go back to the Home screen to create another post.

So… This is kind of a mess. I have been able to accomplish all of the above in a variety of methods, but I can’t seem to put it all together. Each strategy I try to employ doesn’t allow some portion of the above to happen seemlessless (as far as I know).

First I tried to just use a form, but I had an issue gaining access to the image uploaded via the image picker, and using that URL to create the variations in Cloudinary.

Second, I started again and used the image picker to upload to the user table, from there I was able to trigger the cloudinary transformation and preview the different sized images. Then I would use a button to open the a form and use the form to import the text, keywords and hashtags for the social media posts. But when “Submit” was clicked I was able to get all the user data inputed and form fields saved to a GS, but the app only refreshes back to the screen where the file picker and client choice to the user table are entered. I can’t get it to refresh back to the home screen. (I’m guessing I could use some filtering to make it go all the way to the home screen?)

Third, I tried to just use the form into a table, where I was hoping to have the best of both worlds. Being able to access the “suspended” data to create image transformations based on client and social media platform, but also be able to submit the form and have it refresh all the way back to the home screen to start another post. The problem here was there was no easy way to get all the data entered from the table to a GS. And I noticed there weren’t the hidden values in the table either, which are really helpful.

I know there must be a best practice to doing this the right way, I’m just not well-versed, or frankly smart enough to figure it out. Any advice would be warmly apprecaited.

I am sorry for such a long post.

[ThinhDinh]

After reading through your trials I think you have done everything you could. Form is a bit of a sandbox, we can’t do anything with the data temporarily stored inside it, and you can’t direct the user to a chosen screen after submission.

[Aaron_R_Stewart]

Thanks ThinhDinh. I appreciate you weighing in. I’ve tried everything that I could think to do, so if those are the limitations, I’ll just do the best I can.

Thanks so much, I’m sore I would have spent another few days fruitlessly trying other ideas. You have saved me a bunch of time.

[PanaYoung]

Español: Lamentó que no lo pudiese lograr con Glide. Puede intentar con otras opciones como Bubble, Adalo, AppSheet.

English: He regretted that he couldn’t do it with Glide. You can try other options like Bubble, Adalo, AppSheet.

[Aaron_R_Stewart]

I have completed the app for my wife’s business and it works great. I essentially just update the user table and a second table to preview the images after the Cloudinary transformations are applied. I have the steps the app requires clearly outlined for her. Part of the Cloudinary transformation relies on the company my wife is creating the graphics for, so I have her upload the image, then choose the client account, and then require she flips a switch to “approve” her choices image.

When the switch is moved to “true” an If/Then/Else function fires to add the company to the Cloudinary URL, which completes the URL request to Cloudinary and creates the images for her review, and reveals a “Preview Images” button so she can take a look at the images before completing the post.

After the previews, she enters in the caption text (used in automated posts for Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn, Pinterest, Tumblr, and Client’s WordPress blog), and then a separate place for Twitter, with the 240 character limit counter in place (leaving 40 characters for the image link). She can then schedule the post, if no future date is selected, the automation creates and posts all the graphics within 5 minutes of her completing the post.

The button at the bottom of screen 2 “CONTINUE TO COMPLETE POST” actually opens up the form for the first time. I have her check a box to agree to Terms and Conditions (which fires another IF/Then/Else script) to record/track her work for invoicing at the end of the month. On screen 3, the “CREATE GRAPHICS & POST” button connects to Zapier, the final step 9 is to hit Submit,

which returns her back to the first page to post again. The Zapier button fires off the automation to post the images and caption to all the client’s social media accounts, and it even pulls in the trending hashtags, keywords (managed by us), and current offer URL (usually changes monthly).

So, while the app isn’t exactly as I pictured it when I started, it does do everything we dreamed it would do, we just have to find a few workarounds to get it done. Man, this has been a wonderful learning process and I just want to thank all at Glide and this community for supporting the opportunity to increase our efficiency!

[ThinhDinh]

That’s just amazing.

[Rosewebstudio]

Amazing, very creative.

[Aaron_R_Stewart]

Thanks to your insight and knowledge about Glide, I finally gave up trying to make it perfect and just made it work. My wife is very happy, it is saving her tons of time. One added benefit is she can now create her designs in Photoshop, save them, and then use her browser to upload to Instagram via the app. Previously she had been uploading her work to Dropbox and then downloading the images on her phone so she could upload via her phone to Instagram. I didn’t know you had to use a phone to upload to Instagram. That is a huge benefit I had not considered. ◡̈

[Aaron_R_Stewart]

Thank you very much. There is so much flexibility with Glide, what an amazing system.

[Krivo]

@Aaron_R_Stewart it is a pity that Glide doesn’t allow templates where you make use of external sources like Cloudinary. You have done a really nice app - and actually a lot of people could benefit from it if it was in the template store. I wonder whether you would allow people to look under the hood (and make the app copyable) - without the account information of course

Thanks for sharing in the community.

[Krivo]

@Aaron_R_Stewart I’m not sure if it would be relevant for you but you might want to upload images directly to Cloudinary - and more at a time.

I have made two different apps in relation to that - here are two links to the community posts. Take a look if you want:

Upload image to Cloudinary from within Glide

Cloudinary as image store for uploaded images URL https://uploadtocloudinary.glideapp.io/ The app is copyable The app is using my personal Cloudinary account - so please keep uploads in the app low - and use your own Cloudinary account if you are going to do exploration of cloudinary Background Glide has an image upload functionality where the images are uploaded to Glide. Unfortunatly, these images are out of control from us as app developers. This means that we cannot delete…

Upload multiple images to Cloudinary

Intro I thought I was going to publish my first app in the Template store but external sources like Cloudinary integration are not allowed in a template. So after hours spend you will instead see the app here. Upload multiple images to Cloudinary Try out version: URL: https://multiupload.glideapp.io/ The app is using my personal Cloudinary account - so please keep uploads in the app low - and use your own Cloudinary account if you are going to do exploration of cloudinary Backg…

[Aaron_R_Stewart]

This is excellent Krivo! I will take a look, this seems like a very good option for us! Thank you for taking the time to reply!

Aaron

[Aaron_R_Stewart]

Sure Krivo. I am happy to contribute where I can. I will need to learn how to make this app available. This is my first Glide App, so I am just getting up to speed. I really don’t think there is anything new or earth shattering. I really just read through this community and watch Glide Videos on YouTube to get up to speed on things. I am not smart enough to come up with stuff on my own. ◡̈

[Krivo]

@Aaron_R_Stewart I think it can be beneficial to others If you will share it would be really great.

It is possible to make an app copyable by going to Settings / Sharing and click in the checkbox “Allow anyone with the link to copy the app & sheet”.
If you do so, please remember to remove any personal or account information - actually - duplicate the app to another app and then remove personal or account infomation and then make the app copyable would be the way to go.

Let me know if you got questions for the cloudinary upload apps.

[kyleheney]

Does your process above still require formulas in the sheet the ENCODEURL of the uploaded images? Does this create any delay when previewing the images that are being generated?