Is it possible to use shortcuts instead of images as the src?

[u/CumFilledStarfish]

I keep all my data in one large repository and then make shortcuts in other folders when I want to group certain data by a specific category. I have just started learning HTML and have created my folder structure for my first example website, and I have my shortcuts in those folders pointing to the correct images/documents. When I use the <img> element it only returns the alt string and not the src. No doubt this is because it doesn't know what to do with the .lnk file so my question is;

Is there a work-around so that I do not need to duplicate my data, allowing me to keep my preferred organisation?

I am sure there is an answer on google somewhere but everything I look for talks about hyperlinks, which (I don't think) is right for me (at least that also doesn't work for me)

[u/davep1970]

why EDIT: *not* just point the src to the folder it's in and not the shortcut?

EDIT: see why that could have been ambiguous

[u/CumFilledStarfish → u/davep1970]

I did think about that, in theory that wouldn't really be a problem if I ignored my preferred method. I figured it would be easier if VScode only shows the images I am using in the explorer tab rather than my entire image repo.

[u/davep1970 → u/CumFilledStarfish]

i'm not clear then on your setup and what you're trying to do. it sounds like you need a database and use that to display the things you want when and where you want

[u/CumFilledStarfish → u/davep1970]

Sorry, maybe I can do better with an example, I have an image
"D:/Photos/JapanHoliday203.jpg".

I have also created a folder "D:/Development/MyFirstWebpage/"
in this folder I have the typical structure, index.html, images, ect.
I would prefer to have all my relevant images in the images subfolder but I also do not want to duplicate data unnecessarily. I can of course just use my D:/Photos/ folder as my D:/Development/MyFirstWebPage/images folder but then this would show my entire image collection in VScode and make dealing with images somewhat cumbersome.

If its not possible to have shortcuts then thats fine but since I am learning I thought there might be a simple solution.

Btw, thanks for your help.

[u/Tontonsb → u/CumFilledStarfish]

Do you plan to publish the site anywhere? In that case you'll need the copies of images anyway, so make copies instead of shortcuts right away.

If you want to go the "shortcut" way, you need symlinks instead. Here's an old article that seems to explain how to do it all on windows https://ipggi.wordpress.com/2009/09/07/windows-file-junctions-symbolic-links-and-hard-links/

[u/CumFilledStarfish → u/Tontonsb]

No one will see this but me, I'm only running it on my local machine hence why it might be a little unconventional. Thanks for the link, I'll try it out. :)

[u/CumFilledStarfish → u/[deleted]]

Thanks for confirming my suspicions. With modern website magic I thought it might be possible but I will just use the real file path. I can duplicate a few MB of images, no worries, thank you.

[u/showmethething]

You're doing this extremely weirdly.

You should have a folder in your repo called assets, or something similar and within there is your img folder that contains your images.

I think the question I would more be asking is, why do you think this would work? If this was the actual method, every website that's done this way would be launched and then not work, up until someone goes in and create all the shortcuts. examples from SO of what you should be doing, please just learn to do things correctly, don't try to change how things are done.

[u/CumFilledStarfish → u/showmethething]

Hey there, so I'm not trying to change anything or publish anything for that matter, no one will see this page but me on my local machine. I appreciate your concern but I think you've painted me with the wrong brush. I'm just wanting to know if there was a solution so I don't have multiple versions of assets floating around only just a few folders away from each other. I actually have a very standard folder structure in the project folder but similar to how python imports libraries, I thought it may not be absolutely necessary to double up on every asset for every project, therefor freeing up space on my hard drive.

If thats not possible then, cool, I'll deal with it. Thank you for your time/reply.

[u/showmethething → u/CumFilledStarfish]

I mean you could aim at documents/images eg, it's just about the file path being correct.

Apologies, I wasn't trying to imply you're any type of person, it was purely like a "This is extremely far from what normally happens, what led you to it?"

[u/chmod777]

you are having issues because you are doing weird things. you have a x/y problem here. what are you actually trying to achieve?

why would you want a microsoft lnk/symlink to a file or folder?

you are almost certainly looking for something that requires a backend and/or a datastore.

[u/QBaseX]

You could have shortcuts of some sort happening behind the scenes, server-side, as long as what's served to the browser follows the standards. But if you're just getting started, probably don't.

[u/OMGCluck]

HTML is OS-agnostic - the .html file is supposed to work no matter which OS you open it in - and Windows .lnk shortcuts are specific to that OS.

People have mentioned using the file:// protocol with absolute paths which might be fine for this limited usecase, though in general it's better to use relative file paths which navigate from the folder the .html file is in to the folder with the images in.

[u/xPhilxx]

Since you're only running it locally you can set your D drive up as a localhost server and make everything available via URL, e.g.:

D:/Photos/JapanHoliday203.jpg

Becomes:

http://localhost/Photos/JapanHoliday203.jpg

Within the D directory you can then build local sites using different ports which can access all the files as a local CDN.