I've got an idea in my head, something I want to create, but am not sure about the best approach. I'd like to pitch the idea and get some opinions on a smart way to go about this before I dive headfirst in the wrong direction!

I've got a photography website that displays multiple portfolios for a few different photographers. It's got thumbnails and large images, and they are organized into li in a ul.

The idea:

I'd like to have a login requiring only a password that takes you to a page allowing you to upload, rename, or delete files in a specified directory. The directory would be defined by a selection in a dropdown menu.

After the images are uploaded I'd like them to be resized into a large image and a thumb, the thumb in a sub-directory, and have the files named sequentially.

The gallery page would automatically create one gallery per folder in a specified directory. Each folder containing the images and a thumb folder.

What I'm thinking:

I'm thinking PHP or Perl script for image upload and manipulation, and maybe using a script out there for AJAX file upload and manipulation, but I'd like to hand code as much as possible.

I imagine after each upload session is finished that a PHP script would generate HTML into the gallery file, rather than each time a visitor access the page having it create the content based on the directory.

Could I get some advice on how best to approach this?

• Which languages are best suited for each step? (I'd like to use mostly jQuery as that is most of my JS)
• Any suggestions on the methods or sequence?
• Things to avoid doing all together?

Thanks in advance!