Question

Trying to see if this is possible –

1.) User logs into our site
2.) Points to a directory
3.) The javascript code reads contents of the directory, shows thumbnails for any jpeg/gif in those directories. This all without uploading all the photos to the server. Kind of a semi desktop app.

Point 3 is something I have never done, is this possible for an online application to do ?

Answer 1

You can’t do this…yet (unless you’re using a prerelease of Chrome 9). There are some APIs coming down the pike that will make this possible in browsers that support them; there’s a description of using them in this article.

But right now, no. To do this, you’ll need to use a technology that allows local file access, such as a signed Java applet (normal unsigned ones obviously can’t do this) or, on a severely limited number of platforms and browsers, an ActiveX control.

Update: Sorry, the new JavaScript APIs I mentioned above don’t give you (user-granted) access to any old directory on their system. They do give you access to the file system, but it’s a sandboxed file system. So you’d have to have the users move the files into the sandbox (which you could do via the File API and with drag-and-drop, keeping it an entirely client-side thing, no uploading required). But that isn’t quite what you described.