Best Practices
Used correctly Image Surfer Pro will greatly increase your enjoyment of collecting and sharing images which have been published to the Internet. However, it is important to use the tool in a respectful way to both ensure the publisher's copy right protection and avoid launching denial of service attacks on the servers which host the images you enjoy.
Unlike some of the competing software, Image Surfer Pro does not condone blasting webservers with unsolicited file requests for every conceivable text and numerical file name combination. While such behavior may seem to have few consequences to the user it is in fact quite detrimental and website administrators are taking increasingly aggressive defensive actions against such attacks which essentially constitute a denial of service attack on their servers.
It is not uncommon to have your IP Address blocked at least temporarily by a server if you conduct this type of activity. It may not be long before such blocks become permanent and require you to access the site through a different internet connection and request the site administrator unblock your address. Continued attacks could very easily result in you not being able to access any of the images hosted by a site.
Remember your IP Address and credentials are passed in every HTTP request made and your information may be stored and tracked - especially if it is found to be conducting denial of service attacks on a regular basis. Without passing the information the Internet simply won't work and the Internet is not as anonymous as you might think - behave appropriately!
Numeric Fusks
Few image sequences contain hundreds or thousands of images. There is very little reason to set the {Size of Range} user value to large numbers. In fact many websites publish the number of images contained in a sequence on the Free Hosted Gallery landing page for the sequence. Use the Auto Range Override input on the Image Surfer Pro toolbar to tailor the size of numeric fusk created when you know the number of images in the sequence.
List Fusks
List fusked files are useful for files which are not numerically named. But unlike auto ranging for numerically named files, trying to automatically guess non-numerically named files will generally lead to a significant number of Server 404 File Not Found errors. It is recommended that you let Image Surfer Pro automatically build list fusks when images are added to directories or that you only manually build list fusks from known lists of valid file names (such as combining directory names into a single fusked list directory). Do not conduct searches for hidden or related files based on some preconceived list of likely names.
Limiting the Number of Images Referenced
Because Image Surfer Pro will attempt to access each of the files as an image, it may be safe to search and see if related images exist and this is a natural extension of using Image Surfer Pro. However, it should be done responsibly by limiting the number of images referenced during your search. This can be done in two ways:
- Limit the size of the fusk you are using to search
- Limit the number of images per search page created
Because browsers will send simultaneous requests for multiple (maybe even all) images on the webpage it is trying to draw, it is important to limit the number of those requests which will generate Server 404 File Not Found errors. This can be done by using either a basic or guided view to look at only the first image in each sequence and also limiting the number of images placed on each page for that type of view (See the user's manual page for configuring Fusker Collection Views) when you are searching and not just enjoying your fusker collection.
Remove Missing File References
Missing file references may be generated by your use of Image Surfer Pro for several valid reasons, including:
- A previously valid file has been moved, renamed, or deleted
- A sequence of numerically named images is sparsely populated (not every number in the sequence has a matching file but many of them do)
- The number of images in the sequence was unknown so your search included some missing files or sets of files
In these situations it is important to remove the missing file references from your fusker collection to avoid having repeated attempts to access the same missing file be viewed as a denial of service attack. This can be done by simply manually deleting the fusker collection segments which reference the missing files.
In the case where a sequence of numerically named files contains both valid and missing file names, This example of removing missing file references can be used to clean up your fusker collection.
Free Hosted Galleries And Image Surfer Pro Forms
The safest and cleanest way to build fusker collections is to process webpages using the
button to process an Image Surfer Pro form. Using these tools will never access missing files as they retrieve
the file names directly from the published website information.
By first creating the ISP Form using the
button to create the form you gain the following advantages:
- Browsing continues in the same window
- You can immediately tell if image content visible on the origianl page is blocked from client side fusking because the images will not be present.
- You can more directly control which links are accessed by a Directed Search and which image files are added to your fusker collection.
When in doubt it is recommended you use the
button. For sites your are familiar with and surf often using the
button directly is often easier and as effective.
However, these tools may generate Server 403 File Forbidden errors. It is possible for webservers to inspect the browser and referring website credentials and deny access to files if that access is not directly from within their domain. Repeated access to files blocked in this way may also be interpreted as a denial of service attack and should be avoided by removing the file references from your fusker collection (or in the case of using Image Surfer Pro Forms not adding the references in the first place).