Help - Media - Selecting/uploading

In the places where we hold/link media Drupal uses the Media Manager to provide a common dialogue to enable you to select an existing item in the media library, or to upload a new item. This describes that part of the process.

You are first presented with a screen showing you existing items in the library with the most recently modified at the top of the list. There is also a box that gives you the option to add (upload) a new file.  In the top left hand corner it shows the media types that we allow, the default being Images. If you are handling a different media type click the appropriate name in the list, e.g. file for a pdf.

Existing library items

We categorise media items by type, county etc. and above the list of items are options to specify some of these categories and just show them in the list. This does depend of course on filling in these fields when uploading new media items. Click 'Apply filters' to see the new list. Click an item to select it, and then 'Insert selected'.

Upload new item

Click 'Browse' to start the upload process and this pops up a new window. This provides the browser which lets you choose the file to upload. The file name does need to have the appropriate suffix for that media type. If you select an inappropriate one a warning message is displayed telling you which type will be accepted. An image will then appear in the left hand region. That doesn't happen if it is an invalid file for that type. You will also get a rather cryptic 'This value should be of the correct primitive type.' when you try to upload it.

In most case you will have chosen a valid file, so you then need to fill in the fields in the right of the window that are used to describe the media item that will be created and which are used when searching for existing media items. There are also fields such as Label and Copyright which are displayed along with the media item in the web page. Then press 'Save and select' to upload it into the media library and continue the dialogue.

Next

That is the end of the Media manager part of the dialogue an the next step will depend on the route where you started.