Using Picasa for On-line Photo Storage

This is a repeat topic I recently entered in the ZonePro Journal blog. The idea is to use an on-line service such as Picasa for storing photos and then using a script to launch the photos. In this scenario I envision a customer creating a separate on-line photo album for each property. The name you give to the album will then be part of the URL that is used to later launch that page of photos from the ZonePro property screen. Whatever you name the album, you need to store that name in a field in the Property database so you can access it via a script and launch the site. Alternatively you could name each album after the Property ID so you don't have to waste a field, but then the album name would be meaningless outside the context of ZonePro. In my example I created an album in Picasa and named it after the address: LOWELL584. I then stored the value "LOWELL584#" in the User3 field of the Property database. Note the # sign. Picasa adds that when it creates its URLs but it may not be necessary. The rest of the URL is always a constant for my Picasa account. Your account would be different, of course. I'm going to use the User Script button to launch the web page and create a script that checks to make sure a value exists in User3 before attempting to launch the web page. To set up the script I use "Base" for the Module, "Property" for the Screen, and "Left" for the Action:

IF NOT EMPTY(property.user3)

GoURL("http://picasaweb.google.com/zonepro32/"+property.user3)

ENDIF