So so confused with iCloud

[FyerFyer]

Can someone please help me

I would like to free up some space on my iPhone 6s by uploading some photos to the iCloud. I did this today I think by "backup".

What I want to know is can I now delete these photos off the phone and in the future when I would like a few of them how can I access them?

Everything I have read says that I don't need to access them but I want to..!

I also confused right now, can someone I simple terms explain if I doing this right..?

Thanks guys

 

[Sid777]

Can someone please help me

I would like to free up some space on my iPhone 6s by uploading some photos to the iCloud. I did this today I think by "backup".

What I want to know is can I now delete these photos off the phone and in the future when I would like a few of them how can I access them?

Everything I have read says that I don't need to access them but I want to..!

I also confused right now, can someone I simple terms explain if I doing this right..?

Thanks guys

Have you uploaded photos using Photo Stream or iCloud Photo Library?

 

[jgelin]

Here you have 2 options:


1. I would suggest turning ON icloud photo library, and have the photos upload to the cloud. If you have space this will be seamless. Once uploaded, turn on optimize storage and it will significantly reduce the size of your photo library while still keeping the originals in the cloud.
2. Also, instead of this you can use Google Photos, which has free storage, and upload them all to there and then after all are backed up in the Google Photos app, you can then select the ones you want to remove from the device > menu > delete device copy.

 

[Defender2010]

Download and join Dropbox - it's a much simpler way to save photos securely.

 

[FyerFyer]

Download and join Dropbox - it's a much simpler way to save photos securely.

Yep that's what I've done, Apples alternatives are awful

Thanks man

 

[Defender2010]

Yep that's what I've done, Apples alternatives are awful

Thanks man

The solution given by Apple is not any better than Dropbox. It's stores hundreds of important photos of mine for years. Accessible on every device...so I don't see the problem you do. Works for me.

 

[Phil A.]

The solution given by Apple is not any better than Dropbox. It's stores hundreds of important photos of mine for years. Accessible on every device...so I don't see the problem you do. Works for me.

The biggest issue I have with iCloud Photo Library is the lack of control over what is stored locally on your device. It tries to simplify the process by deciding itself what (and when) to keep photos on your device, but it seems to cause confusion.

IMO, It needs an option to delete local copies in a similar way that Apple Music allows you to remove a download. Until it does, I'll continue to use alternatives that allow that level of control

 

[FyerFyer]

Thanks guys

What I dont understand is once I have backed up my iPhone photos (which I can now see in the cloud in a computer browser) can I delete them off my phone..? Or if I do this will it next time I backup sync with the phone and delete those files from the cloud..?

 

[inkahauts]

Thanks guys

What I dont understand is once I have backed up my iPhone photos (which I can now see in the cloud in a computer browser) can I delete them off my phone..? Or if I do this will it next time I backup sync with the phone and delete those files from the cloud..?

No you do not delete them. If you do the delete everywhere. (Although there's a album of deleted pictures you can undelete for a month. )

Just make sure you turn on photo optimize for device. This means they will remove photos on your phone and keep just thumbnails or smaller copies as you need more space. It's done automatically. No need for you to try and guess what you need to do that way.

 

[FyerFyer]

No you do not delete them. If you do the delete everywhere. (Although there's a album of deleted pictures you can undelete for a month. )

Just make sure you turn on photo optimize for device. This means they will remove photos on your phone and keep just thumbnails or smaller copies as you need more space. It's done automatically. No need for you to try and guess what you need to do that way.

Thanks

So just to clarify, if I delete from the phone, they will delete from the cloud...?

Why so Apple implement certain things that are so backwards...!

 

[inkahauts]

The biggest issue I have with iCloud Photo Library is the lack of control over what is stored locally on your device. It tries to simplify the process by deciding itself what (and when) to keep photos on your device, but it seems to cause confusion.

IMO, It needs an option to delete local copies in a similar way that Apple Music allows you to remove a download. Until it does, I'll continue to use alternatives that allow that level of control

I'm curios where you believe the confusion is. It's got some version of every picture on your device. If you are editing it its definitely full Rez. As space is needed the Rez is dropped for as many pictures as needed to make room for whatever else you are putting on the device.

And you don't have to sit there and figure out how many pictures and which ones to remove.

 

[inkahauts]

Thanks

So just to clarify, if I delete from the phone, they will delete from the cloud...?

Why so Apple implement certain things that are so backwards...!

That's not backwards. It's forwards. It means your collection of photos is automatically kept in sync and the same everywhere. Everywhere. No more having to manually keep track of which pictures are where.

And it will automatically resize stuff on devices and keep full Rez in the cloud so they all fit everywhere too.

Surely you don't enjoy the old way of trying to remember which pictures are on your computer and not your phone etc...

Why would you think that's backwards?

 

[inkahauts]

And take a photo of something random and then delete it. Then go to albums and you'll see what happens to photos you delete. They stay in the cloud for 30 days under a deleted album in case you make a mistake.

 

[FyerFyer]

It's just so pointless. There are some users who don't want it on all/any of their devices and would just like it in the cloud.

Tbh onedrive and Dropbox are so much better

 

[inkahauts]

It's just so pointless. There are some users who don't want it on all/any of their devices and would just like it in the cloud.

Tbh onedrive and Dropbox are so much better

You realize that if you still keep them in the cloud anytime you open the app that has them stored it's got the thumbnails on your device so it's no different than iCloud. They all take a little space. The only way to avoid this is to keep some on a computer and not in the cloud anywhere.

Neither of the other options are nearly as good for my use for photos. I love one drive for documents. But if all your trying to do is create space then optimize and don't worry about photos taking any real space. It'll delete them from your device as you run low on space and not lose them.

 

[FyerFyer]

From what I understand one drive and Dropbox store the photos; the files don't hv to be on the device. If they are needed they can downloaded to the devices.

The reason I don't like iCloud now is because of the syncing . If I'm correct, for it to be most beneficial for space turn on certain features which will upload the files and store smaller versions of it on the device, but as I'm travelling I don't always have the internet so I can't upload them instantly which is what this option needs...???

 

[inkahauts]

Well you can't upload files to any cloud if you don't have Internet.

And those photos iCloud keeps can get down to the same size as the thumbnails all the others use that also end up being cached on your device.

But if the device already has some pictures it knows are in the cloud it can down Rez those files without being connected to the Internet. So the only ones it can't are the pictures you've actually taken since the last time you had wifi. And that's no different than any other service either.

I look at it differently than most I believe. I look at the photos on my device in iCloud Photo Library as just being temp files that can and will be automatically deleted as space is needed when you have the option to optimize photos turned on. No different than Internet temporary files.

 

[Phil A.]

I'm curios where you believe the confusion is. It's got some version of every picture on your device. If you are editing it its definitely full Rez. As space is needed the Rez is dropped for as many pictures as needed to make room for whatever else you are putting on the device.

And you don't have to sit there and figure out how many pictures and which ones to remove.

I'm not confused, but it's clear from this thread and the many like it that some people do get confused.

Personally, I prefer to make the decision over what gets stored locally on my device myself.

As an example, I've got over 40GB plus of photos and they were all in iCloud photo library. When I upgraded my phone to a 128GB 6S Plus, iCloud photos saw all that free space and decided to download the entire contents of my photo library at full resolution to my phone even though I had optimise phone storage on, which put a lot of load on my broadband until it had finished.

I'd much prefer it used a more intelligent caching mechanism where you could set the maximum size of full sized photos that are going to be stored and also to be able to clear it down when you want

And as a final nail in the iCloud photos coffin it won't upload over cellular so if you're away from a WiFi location for any period of time, newly taken photos are at risk if you lose your phone before you get back. I have a 30GB a month cellular plan and I should be able to use that how I want, not how Apple decide I should use it: They have options for cellular use for other system services, so why not photos?

Other providers allow uploading over cellular and intelligent caching so I use them now

 

[cynics]

iCloud Photo Library can be used as a backup in a sense but that is not its intended purpose. It designed to be a single location to store all your photos and seed them to all your devices, seamlessly without user intervention.

If used as intended its excellent. If I take a picture with my iPhone I can view it on my iPad and/or iMac without doing anything. Its stored safely in the cloud (and on my iMac) and those pics use minimal device storage. I have 700 mb on my iPad for 8000mb of accessible photos and video.

I like to mention, check the storage size of the dropbox app. Currently mine is 550 mb (this will vary depending on cache) and I don't use it for photo storage. But that is approaching my photo library size sooooo... comparatively is it much better?

If you are trying to shoe horn iCloud Photo Library into other uses such as purely a backup system then you will not be happy with it. Dropbox or Onedrive might be better at what you are looking to accomplish however they are not better than what iCloud Photo Library is designed to do since they are not in competition with each other.

 

[zorinlynx]

Personally, I prefer to make the decision over what gets stored locally on my device myself.

It's funny; I used to think this way. Then I realized I was spending way too much time managing which photos get synced to my phone, worrying about running out of space, and so on.

Maybe I'm getting older, but I don't have time for that crap.

iCloud Photo Library lets me get to any photo I want on my phone. Period. By default it downloads the photos at phone resolution, which doesn't take up much space. I can browse my library and find things. I can download the full version easily if needed.

It's actually pretty damn nice and I was resistant at first (look at my post history) but was very happy once I accepted it. My main issue was being able to keep a full, complete backup of my photos, and I found out that's easy to do with the Mac Photos app. There's also an iCloud app for Windows which will download every photo you take so you can have a backup if you're not a Mac user.

Same thing with Music; I subscribed to iTunes Match and ever since then I have full access to my entire music library, and can decide what gets downloaded and kept on the phone, on the fly. But all the music is available if I need it.

Just give in. If after a few weeks you're not happy, it's easy enough to turn it off and try another solution.

 

[Phil A.]

It's funny; I used to think this way. Then I realized I was spending way too much time managing which photos get synced to my phone, worrying about running out of space, and so on.

Maybe I'm getting older, but I don't have time for that crap.

iCloud Photo Library lets me get to any photo I want on my phone. Period. By default it downloads the photos at phone resolution, which doesn't take up much space. I can browse my library and find things. I can download the full version easily if needed.

It's actually pretty damn nice and I was resistant at first (look at my post history) but was very happy once I accepted it. My main issue was being able to keep a full, complete backup of my photos, and I found out that's easy to do with the Mac Photos app. There's also an iCloud app for Windows which will download every photo you take so you can have a backup if you're not a Mac user.

Same thing with Music; I subscribed to iTunes Match and ever since then I have full access to my entire music library, and can decide what gets downloaded and kept on the phone, on the fly. But all the music is available if I need it.

Just give in. If after a few weeks you're not happy, it's easy enough to turn it off and try another solution.

I used it from when it was launched (in fact, I started using it while it was still in beta) until recently so I gave it more than a good try

If it worked more like Apple Music, I'd be happier (i.e. be able to delete locally downloaded photos when I want to), but to be honest the thing that is worse is the lack of uploads over cellular - that is the single biggest missing feature because I generally want my photos to get safely into the cloud as soon as I've taken them, not at some point in the future when I'm range of a WiFi signal.

Also, when I was on holiday abroad it refused to upload my photos even over WiFi when Google Photos and OneDrive had no issue at all - it was this that finally made me ditch apple photos.

I now use Google Photos (I have a paid business account so no privacy issues as they don't data-mine business accounts) and it makes all my photos available on my device, works over cellular and lets me control how much space it uses on my device. It has shared albums like Apple Photo does and a whole host of other features (such as rediscover this day, auto-enhance, auto story albums, etc, etc). It's also far quicker than Apple Photos and has an infinitely better web interface.

My view is Apple makes the best devices out there, but they still struggle with cloud services...

 

[zorinlynx]

If it worked more like Apple Music, I'd be happier (i.e. be able to delete locally downloaded photos when I want to), but to be honest the thing that is worse is the lack of uploads over cellular - that is the single biggest missing feature because I generally want my photos to get safely into the cloud as soon as I've taken them, not at some point in the future when I'm range of a WiFi signal.

This is actually one of my primary gripes with iCloud Photo Library. There really should be a button you can push to force an upload over cellular. I have a 20GB data plan so I'm not worried in most cases.

It's not a big enough gripe to be worth switching to something else though. Also I have a feeling Apple will eventually enable this once cellular networks get more robust.

 

[inkahauts]

I have unlimited data so over cellular uploads would be nice. But I've never not been able to have photos uploaded pretty much once every 24 hours so the most you could ever lose is ones you took in the last day. Not a big deal to me.

I'm almost 40... I recall the days when you had old fashion point and shoot cameras with 35mm film and had to wait ages before you got your photos back and if you hurt that cartridge you lost everything you had taken for days or weeks or sometimes even months. So for me the immediate backups really is not something I fret over. It'd be a nice to have.

 

[M. Gustave]

It's funny; I used to think this way. Then I realized I was spending way too much time managing which photos get synced to my phone, worrying about running out of space, and so on.

Maybe I'm getting older, but I don't have time for that crap...

+1

That's exactly how I feel about it, and the reason I also switched to Apple Music. The constant obsessing about files, tags, backups, album art, what album I had forgotten to put on my phone... I just don't have the mental and emotional bandwidth to "own" and maintain collections of things anymore.

 

[inkahauts]

I used it from when it was launched (in fact, I started using it while it was still in beta) until recently so I gave it more than a good try

If it worked more like Apple Music, I'd be happier (i.e. be able to delete locally downloaded photos when I want to), but to be honest the thing that is worse is the lack of uploads over cellular - that is the single biggest missing feature because I generally want my photos to get safely into the cloud as soon as I've taken them, not at some point in the future when I'm range of a WiFi signal.

Also, when I was on holiday abroad it refused to upload my photos even over WiFi when Google Photos and OneDrive had no issue at all - it was this that finally made me ditch apple photos.

I now use Google Photos (I have a paid business account so no privacy issues as they don't data-mine business accounts) and it makes all my photos available on my device, works over cellular and lets me control how much space it uses on my device. It has shared albums like Apple Photo does and a whole host of other features (such as rediscover this day, auto-enhance, auto story albums, etc, etc). It's also far quicker than Apple Photos and has an infinitely better web interface.

My view is Apple makes the best devices out there, but they still struggle with cloud services...

There is something to be said in general for preferences. Everyone is different. I haven't tried google photos since it first launched but for me it seemed annoying.

Personally what I do is I organize into albums and such and tag and such on my Mac. I keep all photos in my iCloud Photo Library. I like having everything geotagged and I love how easy it is to search locations on maps in photos. So so easy...

Then I also drop copies of everything onto my one drive photos folder so I also end up with a second cloud backup and a copy on my Windows machine. And then I also have backups of both my Mac and Windows computer running regularly. (Time machine and Windows version) then I also just drop everything into a backup drive I keep unconnected generally every month or two. I figure that's a lot of backups so I am as prepared for failure as I think I need to be.