9 ms·

John Gruber praises iCloud as one of the best things but do people really feel that way? I feel Dropbox or Google Photos / Drive is way better on software exper

John Gruber praises iCloud as one of the best things but do people really feel that way? I feel Dropbox or Google Photos / Drive is way better on software experience.

saagarjha 8y ago
Dropbox and Google Drive aren’t great on Apple’s platforms. Files integration on iOS makes them somewhat passable (though, they don’t quite work right there either), and on macOS Dropbox is horribly invasive while Google Drive is poorly maintained and slow :(
- tonyedgecombe 8y ago
  True although iCloud on Windows isn't great either.
dewey 8y ago
He specifically praises iCloud Photos which works great for most people and keeps a lot of users photos safe without setting up anything. The "put things into a folder to share with other people" aspect isn't really mentioned which would be the Dropbox or Google Drive use case you are talking about I guess. Personally I think it works just fine, also as a Dropbox equivalent if you don't need to share it with other people. As soon as you want to share something it gets annoying pretty quickly though in my experience.
gwilkes 8y ago
Agree with you 100%. I think all of Apple's online services are garbage (and I used them since iTools), most of their applications aren't so good either. Thankfully, their OSes get out of the way and are mostly pleasant to use, good platforms for others to build on. I should probably add that I don't even think Apple is capable of making good online services which is one major reason I switched from iPhones to Nexus/Pixels in 2013. Sure you can use Google services with iPhones but for things like Google Photos they will always be better integrated with Android.
- addicted 8y ago
  iMessage is better than any competitor and it’s not even close. iCloud works excellently as a backup and sync service now. iCloud photos is as good as Google Photos. Apple’s service chops have really improved, as evidenced by their rollout of Apple Music which had no service related complaints (the complaints were around policy) AFAICT.
  - gwilkes 8y ago
    iMessage is nice but can't communicate fully (more than basic SMS/MMS) with roughly 85% of the active cell phones in the world. iCloud Photos really isn't as good. The AI features, face recognition, free backup is all better on Google Photos. Let's look at Apple Maps for example, do you ever think it will surpass or meet parity with Google Maps? Look at icloud.com services with the online office suite, calendar, etc. Will that ever come close to Google Docs?
  - deleted 8y ago
    [deleted]
skh 8y ago
I like iCloud drive and use it exclusively for online backup. It’s been seamless for me but I just use it for backup and synchronization. I teach some online courses and tried using it to link to online assignments but it has a serious flaw. Every time I update the file the link to the file is no longer valid. I’m guessing other advanced features equally suck on it.
addicted 8y ago
iCloud has become pretty good as a set and forget type of service for backing up parts of your life you care about. Once I setup iCloud on my parents’ iOS devices, I’m fairly confident that if something goes wrong, they won’t lose their data, especially their photos. This is in sharp contrast to the early years where I would have to constantly remind them to backup their phones to their computer because iCloud wasn’t reliable.

John Gruber praises iCloud as one of the best things but do people really feel that way? I feel Dropbox or Google Photos / Drive is way better on software experience.

saagarjha 8y ago

Dropbox and Google Drive aren’t great on Apple’s platforms. Files integration on iOS makes them somewhat passable (though, they don’t quite work right there either), and on macOS Dropbox is horribly invasive while Google Drive is poorly maintained and slow :(

tonyedgecombe 8y ago
True although iCloud on Windows isn't great either.

dewey 8y ago

He specifically praises iCloud Photos which works great for most people and keeps a lot of users photos safe without setting up anything. The "put things into a folder to share with other people" aspect isn't really mentioned which would be the Dropbox or Google Drive use case you are talking about I guess. Personally I think it works just fine, also as a Dropbox equivalent if you don't need to share it with other people. As soon as you want to share something it gets annoying pretty quickly though in my experience.

gwilkes 8y ago

Agree with you 100%. I think all of Apple's online services are garbage (and I used them since iTools), most of their applications aren't so good either. Thankfully, their OSes get out of the way and are mostly pleasant to use, good platforms for others to build on. I should probably add that I don't even think Apple is capable of making good online services which is one major reason I switched from iPhones to Nexus/Pixels in 2013. Sure you can use Google services with iPhones but for things like Google Photos they will always be better integrated with Android.

addicted 8y ago
iMessage is better than any competitor and it’s not even close. iCloud works excellently as a backup and sync service now. iCloud photos is as good as Google Photos. Apple’s service chops have really improved, as evidenced by their rollout of Apple Music which had no service related complaints (the complaints were around policy) AFAICT.
- gwilkes 8y ago
  iMessage is nice but can't communicate fully (more than basic SMS/MMS) with roughly 85% of the active cell phones in the world. iCloud Photos really isn't as good. The AI features, face recognition, free backup is all better on Google Photos. Let's look at Apple Maps for example, do you ever think it will surpass or meet parity with Google Maps? Look at icloud.com services with the online office suite, calendar, etc. Will that ever come close to Google Docs?
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]

skh 8y ago

I like iCloud drive and use it exclusively for online backup. It’s been seamless for me but I just use it for backup and synchronization. I teach some online courses and tried using it to link to online assignments but it has a serious flaw. Every time I update the file the link to the file is no longer valid. I’m guessing other advanced features equally suck on it.

addicted 8y ago

iCloud has become pretty good as a set and forget type of service for backing up parts of your life you care about. Once I setup iCloud on my parents’ iOS devices, I’m fairly confident that if something goes wrong, they won’t lose their data, especially their photos. This is in sharp contrast to the early years where I would have to constantly remind them to backup their phones to their computer because iCloud wasn’t reliable.