Photo Loader Woes, Portland Move: Ask Technical Terry

Ask Technical Terry is a series RMLS™ aims to offer once a month. RMLS™ subscribers will drive the content—submit any question about RMLS™ to Technical Terry in the comments or by emailing communications@rmls.com. Don’t be shy—we won’t identify you by name.

Technical Terry:

Aaaaargh!!!! Does every subscriber have the same issues I do when uploading or reordering photos in the Listing Load Photo Manager? I’ll reorder photos, save my work, then discover that not only was my new order not saved but sometimes the photos disappear! Am I the only one having this issue? What can I do?

POed in Portland

POP:

Not all RMLS™ subscribers are having the issue but you’re not the only one who is. And I’m glad to tell you, today is a new day! Our development team has created a tool you can use if you’re having that issue again.

Behold—the new Refresh button on the RMLSweb Photo Loader!

Here’s how it works: if you’re using the Photo Manager and believe your listing photos have disappeared, reordering hasn’t happened, or are experiencing some other issue, click the Refresh button above the image preview (see above). This will refresh the work done inside the Photo Manager (like refreshing a web browser) and the issue should be resolved.

If you find that this new tool is not resolving the issue, there could be something else at play. One behavior the RMLS™ Help Desk has noticed while working with subscribers is that if someone is uploading a batch of photos and closes the Photo Manager window before processing is 100% complete, using the new Refresh button is not going to magically restore the whole batch.

The majority of Photo Manager issues have been fixed by using the Refresh button though, and that should have a profound impact on you and other subscribers who have been experiencing this issue. If you use it and the issue persists though, contact the RMLS™ Help Desk and they’ll do their best to assist!

Technical Terry

Dear ATT:

I remember hearing a while back that the RMLS™ office in Portland is going to move. When is that move happening? Where will you be?

Roman Realtor

Dear RR:

What a timely question! The Portland office will be moving in just a couple of weeks, but other parts of RMLS™ will see some impacts as well.

First things first: as we reported back in August, the new office location will be in Southwest Portland at 16101 SW 72nd Avenue. The office in Northeast Portland will close its doors at 12:00 PM (noon) on Friday, November 1st. On Monday, November 4th, the office will remain closed, but we plan to be open and available for RMLS™ subscribers on Tuesday, November 5th! We also plan to invite subscribers in for an open house a few weeks after we’ve settled in.

While the office in Portland is in transition, the RMLS™ Help Desk and Front Desk will still be available for questions by phone and via email, as we utilize staff across the region to assist subscribers through those methods.

Once the Portland office has moved, the RMLS™ office in Clark County will close at 12:00 PM (noon) on Friday, November 8th in order to do some office maintenance involving furniture. We’ll still have staff on email and phones ready to assist, and otherwise Clark County REALTORS® are advised to plan to do any office business that morning.

We’ll have up-to-date information posted on the RMLSweb desktop as needed, so don’t forget to check there for the latest!

Technical Terry

Ask Technical Terry: Customize Search Results, Uploading Listing Photos on Macs

Dear Technical Terry,

Much like your post about saving ML numbers for future searches (THANK YOU!), I’m desperate to figure out if I can customize my search results to contain only the fields I want to see for a specific client. Is that possible?

Carol in the ‘Couve

Excellent question, Carol! You can, in fact, create “custom” displays of the initial search results based on your specific client needs. You’ve been able to perform this customization for several years on RMLSweb, but much like the process for saving ML numbers, it does require a bit of orientation.

Check out Customize Your Search Results (Document #1749) available on RMLSweb in Forms and Documents. This document explains in detail all aspects of creating and saving custom search results displays to meet a specific need. As you review the document you’ll see that in addition to data elements, you can also include both a thumbnail image and a map image. You can also look at your custom layout to ensure it meets your needs in the Preview section of the layout window. Keep in mind that the tool will allow you to create layouts that will exceed the typical print margins of a standard 8 1/2” x 11” page. All of this information and much more is included in Customize Your Search Results (Document #1749). Additionally, the RMLS™ Help Desk and Training Departments are always happy to walk you through the process if you need any help.

Dear Technical Terry,

Will we ever be able to upload photos on Listing Load using a Mac like PC users do? The current option for Mac users is really clunky…

Manzana Macintosh

Yes…in fact, the timing of your question could not be better!

On October 15th RMLS™ will deploy a brand-spanking-new photo loader for RMLSweb. This new module eliminates the need to use Microsoft Silverlight so the module will work the same for Mac users as it does for PC users.

The improvements are numerous, but let me touch on just a few:

• Up to 32 high resolution images can now be loaded.
• Multiple photos can be uploaded at one time. (Note: this process is bandwidth-sensitive so if you’re on a slow internet connection, you may find uploading photos one at a time is more efficient.)
• Users can upload photos from a mobile device.
• The new module can recognize photo orientation: if the photo is uploaded in landscape orientation but should be in portrait orientation, the module will adjust the photo automatically.
• Photo editing will be possible in the new photo loader: you can crop, rotate, and change brightness and contrast.

RMLS™ staff is hard at work on preparing a video and other materials that will provide subscribers with the information they need to efficiently use the new photo loader. Keep an eye out for it!

A New Listing Status and Photo Loader: Final Steps in This Year’s Forms Change

RMLS™ is releasing two improvements in October that represent the final steps in the RMLSweb forms change for 2015. We’re confident that subscribers will find something to like in these important changes to RMLSweb, all recommended by the RMLS™ Forms Committee!

Pending Lease Option (POP Status)

Pending Lease Option (POP), a new listing status, was added on RMLSweb Thursday, October 1st. This status is for listings which have offers accepted with lease option terms. When a listing is marked as POP, the anticipated lease end date is collected to use for status change reminders from RMLSweb.

This will result in fewer unnecessary emails to the listing broker, when their listing remains in Pending status for months or longer. POP listings will also be separated from regular Pending (PEN) listings, meaning cleaner statistics from RMLS™.

The RMLS™ Rules and Regulations were changed to reflect the new POP status…have a look!

An All-New Photo Loader

RMLS™ will introduce an all-new photo loader on RMLSweb the morning of October 15th. We’re confident that subscribers will be enthusiastic about the new setup, which features higher-resolution imagery that will really dazzle clients.

We’ve doubled the capacity for listing photos—users may now load up to 32 photos per listing with a 4MB file size limit. Files may be added via drag and drop or by selecting the correct files on the user’s machine. If a photo is larger than the maximum file size, the system will shrink or adjust the file to fit in the RMLSweb parameters.

Subscribers may also take advantage of basic photo editing on the interface—cropping, rotating, brightness, and contrast adjustments can all be handled from inside Listing Load before publishing a listing.

Mac users, rejoice: the new photo loader eliminates the Silverlight software that made the previous photo loader difficult for subscribers using an Apple operating system. This new photo loader is also mobile-friendly, meaning subscribers can upload photos from their mobile device!

What about listings published before the release of this new photo loader? No problem! Subscribers can use the new software to replace existing photos on active listings, to see the difference in image quality right away. If your brokerage uses the RMLSweb Slide Show feature to highlight listings on an office monitor, high definition monitors will offer the best presentation of the new photo setup. These higher-quality photos will also be seen by clients on RMLS.com…so we encourage you to explore this new feature as soon as you can!

RMLS™ trainers are currently preparing a series of materials to demonstrate the capabilities of the new photo loader. Here’s what we have:
How to Upload Photos Using Photo Manager (RMLSweb login required)
We’ll update this post as we have more.

As always, subscribers with questions about either the new POP status (released Thursday, October 1st) or the new photo loader (being released Thursday, October 14th) should contact the RMLS™ Help Desk at (503) 872-8002 or (877) 256-2169 for assistance.

Survey Says: 39% Have Added Captions to Photos

41% of respondents have not used the new photo caption feature

Recently, we posted a one-question survey on the RMLSweb desktop for RMLS™ subscribers. With the new ability for subscribers to add captions to their photos (using the new Photo Manager), we wanted to gain some insight into use of the captions. Posting of the survey also had another purpose – to inform those who might not be aware that the caption feature exists.

We had 2,137 subscribers respond to this question, which is roughly 20% of our subscribership. As you can see from the responses, 41% of those who responded to the survey said they have not added captions to their listing’s photos. While we have seen the number of photos with captions steadily increase since the release of the new feature, this percentage shows us that there is still room for more growth. If you combine the two “Yes” answers, you can see that 39% of respondents have added captions to photos. 11% said they have added captions to ALL of their listing’s photos!

Also interesting to note, 12% of the 2,137 respondents said they don’t have any listings, and 8% didn’t know there was a photo caption feature.

For more information on the new Photo Manager feature, view Document #1726: How to Upload Photos Using Photo Manager or watch our tutorial: Adding Photos To Your Listing. If you have any questions, feel free to call the RMLS™ Help Desk at 503-872-8002 or toll-free at 877-256-2169.

New Photo Manager Available on RMLSweb

You can now upload multiple photos at one time and add captions to photos!

The new, transformed Photo Manager is now available in Listing Load on RMLSweb! Feedback from subscribers in the 2010 Subscriber Satisfaction Survey, as well as other channels, showed a need for RMLS™ to update our photo loading functions. Due to this interest, we have released a new Photo Manager, which enables users to upload multiple photos at one time, add captions to photos, and provides users with added functionality to make uploading and maintaining photos much more efficient.

Here are some exciting things you can do with the new Photo Manager:

Upload multiple photos at one time. When locating photos to upload, you can now select multiple photos and upload them all together. The new photo upload feature also displays thumbnail previews of the photos, as well as status and progress information, so you can track the uploading process. Note: To use this feature, you will need to install the free Microsoft Silverlight plugin on your computer, which can be downloaded here. For users who don’t want to download Silverlight, the previous functionality of uploading photos individually will still be available via a link on the Silverlight installation prompt screen.

Add captions to your photos. You can now add captions and sub-captions to your photos from a list of provided captions. If you don’t see a caption that fits your desired description, please email the desired caption to rules@rmls.com. The captions will only appear within RMLSweb and not in data feeds at this time. Note: you cannot assign a caption to the first photo.

Drag and drop your photos to reorder. The new Photo Manager allows you to drag and drop your photos to reorder them, making it easier than ever to manage all of your photos! To rearrange, simply click on the photo you would like to reorder, and drag that photo to the location you would like it to appear. Once the photos are in the desired order, you must click “Save the Order” before continuing for the changes to be saved.

Auto resizing. No more stretched photos! One of the reasons the new Photo Manager will be more efficient than ever is that it now resizes photos for you! Silverlight allows you to select any sized photo and will resize it prior to upload. It will resize the photo to the size of 640 x 480. This makes uploading faster! For best results, we recommend using landscape photos. However, the Photo Manager now recognizes the orientation of the photo (whether landscape or portrait) and will now add padding (white space) to portrait photos to make them into a landscape-oriented photo. Therefore, portrait photos are now accepted and will be resized (with padding/white space) to prevent distortion and stretching.

Other highlights:

Bulk deletion – delete multiple photos at one time!
List & Preview/Grid View – two viewing options via a dropdown menu!
New arrow buttons – allows scrolling through photos using a “previous” and “next” method!
Pop-up Viewer – view and print larger photos!

For more details and information on the Photo Manager, take a look at Document #1726: How to Upload Photos Using Photo Manager. Or, watch our video tutorial: Adding Photos To Your Listing.

If you have any questions or need help with the Photo Manager, feel free to call Help Desk at 503-872-8002 or toll-free at 877-256-2169.