Sidebar Sidebar
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

iCloud Drive app..?

T

taldo

macrumors regular
Original poster
Jun 12, 2013
101
17
Am i missing something..?

Didnt Apple say that you would be able to access all types of files from all devices and not just your mac..?

No iCloud app in the gm, where is it and what are they waiting for..? How can i access a simple file i saved in iCloud drive on my mac, from my iPhone..?
 
batting1000 said:
The docs show up in apps that use/support iCloud Drive. There is no iCloud Drive app.
Click to expand...

I know that - that's not my question.

I'm talking about the "document picker" style of app that should have been integrated in iOS 8 as a part of the transition to iCloud drive.
The whole point in iCloud drive is the ability to save any file in any of your devices and open it in the others.
Even Apple website shows this app concept in the officail iCloud drive features page.
So again, where is it and why are'nt we able to use it the final release of iOS 8...?!
 
Antoni Nygaard said:
I think they mean Document Picker for developers to implement in their apps. to look at the iCloud Drive files
Click to expand...

Maybe i got the document picker wrong, but i'm sure that the features list specifically say that you will be able to save and open every file on every iDevice, including iPhones.

How do they intend to implement it without an iCloud drive app or a document picker app...?

Edit:
Look at this link from the Apple site - that's exactly the kind of app i'm talking about.
https://www.apple.com/icloud/icloud-drive/
 
Why do the developers not know the basic functionality of iCloud drive.....

The website clearly shows that there is to be a document viewer of some form, asking why it's not there is an entirely reasonable question..... Any takers....
 
Maybe they are waiting for the release of Yosemite and will release it as an iOS 8 update..?

This doesn't seem reasonable because why wouldn't they test it by now..?
They had 5 beta version to test this app in iOS 8 but they chose not to, this is very weird and i sure do hope so they are not backing off from this app.

This would make the iCloud drive transition process unnecessary!
 
Last edited:
You need an app with iCloud drive support to view the contents of the drive. The picker is in app only, there is no drive app. This question has been asked many many many times before.

As iOS 8 is not out yet, no apps have been updated with drive support.
 
afaik the iOS document picker "app" is a layer dev's can integrate in their apps in place of the old iCloud save feature. It basically expands on the feature to allow you to access documents saved in iCloud by different apps directly.

I've never seen it mentioned there would be a stand alone app. The link you posted even shows the picker integrated into pages. The reason you probably won't be seeing much, if any of if it is because the apps that have support for it have yet to be released.

If you want a stand alone app though it shouldn't be too hard for someone to release an iCloud drive supported app that just lets you chose the "open in..." option, I actually expect apps like iFiles to implement it. Although such a feature would be an unnecessary extra step in a workflow as you'd be going open file browser app>choose file>open in app as opposed to simply open app>choose file.
 
samplane123 said:
You need an app with iCloud drive support to view the contents of the drive. The picker is in app only, there is no drive app. This question has been asked many many many times before.

As iOS 8 is not out yet, no apps have been updated with drive support.
Click to expand...

kurosov said:
afaik the iOS document picker "app" is a layer dev's can integrate in their apps in place of the old iCloud save feature. It basically expands on the feature to allow you to access documents saved in iCloud by different apps directly.

I've never seen it mentioned there would be a stand alone app. The link you posted even shows the picker integrated into pages. The reason you probably won't be seeing much, if any of if it is because the apps that have support for it have yet to be released.

If you want a stand alone app though it shouldn't be too hard for someone to release an iCloud drive supported app that just lets you chose the "open in..." option, I actually expect apps like iFiles to implement it. Although such a feature would be an unnecessary extra step in a workflow as you'd be going open file browser app>choose file>open in app as opposed to simply open app>choose file.
Click to expand...

Both of you say that a drive app is unnecessary, but i don't really understand how the workflow would be.

For example, today, i use my Google Drive as my main folder for my studies.
I have folders for the different courses, inside of those folders i have folders by subjects - Tests, Lecture Notes etc.
If what you're saying is the workflow expected from me to use, there is no way i would be able to use the iCloud drive as my main folder for anything other than maybe photos. There is no way i would be able to arrange anything with that confinement of opening iCloud drive saved files through their dedicated apps! For example, i don't want to open the Pages app on my iPhone or iPad and see all my Pages files from all the different courses i take. Even if i would hassle and arrange it somehow with an enormous duplication for every app, still, how am i supposed to remember that the specific test i am looking for was saved as a Pages file and not PDF...? Maybe a search inside of iCloud drive could have made things better, but not much better because there is no way i can remember the exact file name of every file i'm looking for.

They actually didn't improve anything other than giving more apps the ability to work with iCloud drive. that's just absurd. There is no way people would use it as their main folders for anything. They've totally missed it!
 
taldo said:
Both of you say that a drive app is unnecessary, but i don't really understand how the workflow would be.

For example, today, i use my Google Drive as my main folder for my studies.
I have folders for the different courses, inside of those folders i have folders by subjects - Tests, Lecture Notes etc.
If what you're saying is the workflow expected from me to use, there is no way i would be able to use the iCloud drive as my main folder for anything other than maybe photos. There is no way i would be able to arrange anything with that confinement of opening iCloud drive saved files through their dedicated apps! For example, i don't want to open the Pages app on my iPhone or iPad and see all my Pages files from all the different courses i take. Even if i would hassle and arrange it somehow with an enormous duplication for every app, still, how am i supposed to remember that the specific test i am looking for was saved as a Pages file and not PDF...? Maybe a search inside of iCloud drive could have made things better, but not much better because there is no way i can remember the exact file name of every file i'm looking for.

They actually didn't improve anything other than giving more apps the ability to work with iCloud drive. that's just absurd. There is no way people would use it as their main folders for anything. They've totally missed it!
Click to expand...

I didn't say it was unnecessary, I just explained the situation with how Drive works on iOS. As far as I know there is a search inside the document picker.

Things have improved a lot, Drive means that apps can access each other's files so there aren't copies being made anymore.

There's a lot of misinformation and confusion about the whole situation with drive going on in this board right now, probably because of the GM coming out
 
Just thinking out loud, but do the API's allow for a Dropbox / GDrive like app to be developed and released?

I too use GDrive to store all my utility bills etc and it is handy just to browse the folder structure.
 
samplane123 said:
I didn't say it was unnecessary, I just explained the situation with how Drive works on iOS. As far as I know there is a search inside the document picker.

Things have improved a lot, Drive means that apps can access each other's files so there aren't copies being made anymore.

There's a lot of misinformation and confusion about the whole situation with drive going on in this board right now, probably because of the GM coming out
Click to expand...


Sorry if i made it look like i'm angry at you, of course that's not the situation :)

Well, i still think Apple got the concept wrong. The app structure would never replace the folder structure in my opinion, maybe this wasn't their intention, but it's definitely a huge disappointment for me.

By the way, i honeslty think that the confusion is because of the WWDC keynote that made it sound like iCloud drive would be the same as Google drive or dropbox, and they will give you free access to everything you save in drive folder from every device. Also, the pics on their website is pretty misleading.
By the way, if everything is accessed through it's own app folder, why can i save a Pages file outside its specific folder (just did it on my mac..)..? How will I see it on my iDevice..?
The whole issue is just not clear.
 
Apps have to be updated to support iCloud Drive (and thus the document viewer), and that includes Apple's iCloud apps (Pages, Numbers, Keynote).
 
batting1000 said:
Apps have to be updated to support iCloud Drive (and thus the document viewer), and that includes Apple's iCloud apps (Pages, Numbers, Keynote).
Click to expand...

What do you mean by "thus the document viewer"..?
It's pretty obvious that apps should be updated to iCloud drive in order to use it, but it is just useless without a Dropbox or Google Drive style of workflow.

Seriously - why is iCloud drive a better iCloud service than what we had until now..?
 
taldo said:
What do you mean by "thus the document viewer"..?
It's pretty obvious that apps should be updated to iCloud drive in order to use it, but it is just useless without a Dropbox or Google Drive style of workflow.

Seriously - why is iCloud drive a better iCloud service than what we had until now..?
Click to expand...

The document view is what you're talking about, isn't it? Apps need to be updated to iOS 8 / be updated with iCloud Drive support to have it.

The difference between iCloud Drive and what we had before is that Drive will store anything, not just content you create in apps or things like that. I could have a Photoshop file on my Mac and now I can drag it into my iCloud Drive file in Yosemite and it'll be on all of my devices. Before, there was no way to do that because you didn't really have full access to your iCloud account. You had partial access, in that apps that could save docs / data in iCloud could access your storage. Hope this makes sense.
 
taldo said:
Maybe i got the document picker wrong, but i'm sure that the features list specifically say that you will be able to save and open every file on every iDevice, including iPhones.

How do they intend to implement it without an iCloud drive app or a document picker app...?

Edit:
Look at this link from the Apple site - that's exactly the kind of app i'm talking about.
https://www.apple.com/icloud/icloud-drive/
Click to expand...

Apps put it a little bit of code to have the picker pop-open when you need files. There is no dedicated app yet.

----------
taldo said:
What do you mean by "thus the document viewer"..?
It's pretty obvious that apps should be updated to iCloud drive in order to use it, but it is just useless without a Dropbox or Google Drive style of workflow.

Seriously - why is iCloud drive a better iCloud service than what we had until now..?
Click to expand...

The document picker also supports any third party apps. So dropbox and Google drive can join in the fun.

Also, iCloud drive allows you to use files from other apps without duplicating the app. Previously, without a document picker, apps would duplicate it and show it with their own interface.
 
I too thought there would be a dedicated app like SkyDrive, Google, Dropbox, ect.

I'd rather have a central hub to manage and arrange my data than to have to go from app to app to do so.
 
Well now there is a web app, perhaps there is still hope...

https://www.macrumors.com/2014/09/10/icloud-beta-site-icloud-drive/
 
stridemat said:
Just thinking out loud, but do the API's allow for a Dropbox / GDrive like app to be developed and released?

I too use GDrive to store all my utility bills etc and it is handy just to browse the folder structure.
Click to expand...

Yes what more these existing Apps can advertise the files they hold so other apps can use those files directly.
 
Have to say this feels like false advertising. I meant, look at apples own website for icloud drive - what does it show a drop box like feature, what does it NOT have - exactly that.

If they are depending on others to enable this for a user why advertise it as their feature. Have their been cuts at apple programming or are they just determined to mess this up and annoy.

It's quite simple, if they are not intending on doing something, they shouldn't say that's what they are doing.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.
Top Bottom
Back