I have a few questions about plugins.

1. What plugins are required, if any to set up a gallery?
   cacheManager - OK, I am nitpicky. I like having this
   class-video - Need for video content
   comment_form - need for comments
   deprecated-functions - Do i need this
   mobileTheme - for mobile to have different theme
   multiple_layouts - OK, I see purpose
   PHPMailer - for email
   rss - Do i need this
   security-logger - OK, I see purpose
   site_upgrade - OK, I see purpose
   slideshow2 - adds slideshow if theme does not have, correct?
   uploader_http - Do i need this
   userAddressFields - Do i need this
   zenpage- what these does this support?

2. I ran into a strange issue.. I created an album, copied in about 40 photos. this is part of a gallery with 1600 images already. As soon as I copied in the photos... Pow... ZP was hung up. Slow. Non responsive. albums not showing up.
   in admin. Delete the photos and all goes back to normal.

• Does ZP start processing pictures as soon as they are added? Should I have just waitned? if it isprocessing the photos, what is it doing?

• I removed xmpMetadatamedia and openstreetmap, and all went back to normal. images don't cause things to hang up.

First please don't not mix several unrelated questions in one topic in the future. It really gets inconvenient mixing all these. Thanks.

cacheManager - OK, I am nitpicky. I like having this

Not required. Please see: https://www.zenphoto.org/news/caching/

class-video - Need for video content

Not required, unless you want to use video and audio files.

comment_form - need for comments

Not required, unless you want to use commentts.

deprecated-functions - Do i need this

Not require as it's comment says if you are using official stuff.

mobileTheme - for mobile to have different theme

Not required and outdate technology. For granted official thems are not responsive which is the way to go. But there are good 3rd party /half official themes for that.

multiple_layouts - OK, I see purpose

Not required and the theme require special support.

PHPMailer - for email

Not required as zenphoto

rss - Do i need this

Not required unless you want to provide RSS feed for your visitos to subscribe to naturally (which you should if the site is public)

security-logger - OK, I see purpose

Not required but useful.

site_upgrade - OK, I see purpose

slideshow2 - adds slideshow if theme does not have, correct?

No, a theme requires support for it. See the theming tutorial.

uploader_http - Do i need this

You need one of the uploader handler plugins enabled if you want to upload.

userAddressFields - Do i need this

Not required at all.

zenpage- what these does this support?

https://www.zenphoto.org/news/zenpage-a-cms-plugin-for-zenphoto/

Second

I ran into a strange issue.. I created an album, copied in about 40 photos. this is part of a gallery with 1600 images already. As soon as I copied in the photos... Pow... ZP was hung up. Slow. Non responsive. albums not showing up. in admin. Delete the photos and all goes back to normal.

Image processing is a memory and power consuming server task. Please see: https://www.zenphoto.org/news/problems-with-albums-and-images/

Does ZP start processing pictures as soon as they are added? Should I have just waitned? if it isprocessing the photos, what is it doing?

https://www.zenphoto.org/news/caching/

I removed xmpMetadatamedia and openstreetmap, and all went back to normal. images don't cause things to hang up.

I cannot say if there is a relation but might as they naturally access image album data. But not necessarily.

Sorry about mixing questions.

As to processing. Say I have just created an album. I drop 100 photos into it. Nobody is on the website yet.

Is ZP start processing the images at that point?

As the article about caching tells. no.

How Zenphoto regonizes depends how you upload:

1. If you use the backend it knows about them since you upoad them via the system.

2. If you upload via FTP you bypass that and have to wait until they are discovered by visits on front or backend.

Zenphoto processes images sizes on request when someone visits the site. Generally Zenphoto does not even know which image sizes a theme or plugin may require. Any theme or plugin can request any size and registering to the cache manager is neither necessary nor required as it happens on the fly when needed.

If you upload lots of larges (dimensionwise) images at a time and your server cannot handle that you have to upload less at the time.

I would assume that if I run cacehmanager it will take care of that. Correct?

The cacheManager will pre-cache the image sizes that are registered.

Also to add to your list I recommend to use the static_html_cache.

thanks. Done