Following the inspiration of my Comments Plugin idea, I wanted to jot down my Images one. I reckon it's less demanding so I may actually go forward with it.
The Idea
A plugin, similarily containing a controller, model and configuration file, which provides the mechanism to upload images, have them cropped/resized on demand, and have it's information accessible through a view panel or page.
This would all be done through an administration area (eg.
/plugins/images/admin/) that could only be accessed by the developer.
The accessible URLs would be added to the application by adding routes to it
dynamically.
Sample Case
I have a record for some data-resource (eg. a lecture or speaker) that I want to associate an image with.
I would simply go to the url /plugins/images/admin/, drag an image (HTML5 API)
to the page, and have it upload. It would them show me the image, with sample
paths that I could copy-and-paste, or the unique image id that I could add as a
foreign key to the lecture or speaker record.
Advantages
This would keep the image data very loose, and decoupled from any other data
source. It would allow me to use it as a quick uploader, and to store either the
image url or resource id for usage elsewhere in the application.
Requirements
This would require a few other of my libraries, but nothing dramatic.
The image library would faciliate the cropping and resizing, while the other two
would be limited to the CRUD operations.
Realistically
I think I'll make this one for my Lectures App. It's useful, and will save me time and headache in the long run. And it'll be reusable. Yippy!