4 ms·

I wonder how the "seamlessly drag and drop files, photos, and videos between your iPhone and Mac" will work. Right now, if you just want to grab the raw files

I wonder how the "seamlessly drag and drop files, photos, and videos between your iPhone and Mac" will work. Right now, if you just want to grab the raw files of your photos and videos and not deal with the Photos app, your best bet is Image Capture, a 20+ year old seemingly unmaintained program that seems to glitch out disturbingly frequently. I really hope they can introduce something that seamlessly lets you drag photos off your phone and into your filesystem, just in the Finder.

amarshall 2y ago
Drag and dropping photos and other files from iPhone (plugged via USB) works well on Linux in the file browser. Too bad it seems Apple can’t figure it out on their own OS, though maybe they have now.
isametry 2y ago
> and not deal with the Photos app What’s the point of this qualifier? Why not use the current, up-to-date default app for photo import that has been there since 2002 to literally serve this purpose? Yes it has a lot of extra functionality, but that doesn’t mean you have to use it. You can get originals from Photos and be done with it…
cantSpellSober 2y ago
> Every time you email a file to yourself so you can pull it up on your friend's laptop, Tim Berners-Lee sheds a single tear. https://xkcd.com/949/ https://xkcd.com/949/
dataflow360 2y ago
iMazing might be worth checking out, for photo and video import/export. It also has a Quick Transfer feature so you just drag and drop a file to your target device, and iMazing gives you a choice of apps to send the file to. It's similar to AirDrop but also works for Windows and seems a bit faster and more stable.
josefdlange 2y ago
Universal Access (Control? Whatever it's called) between multiple Macs not only allows sharing input methods but also dragging files back and forth, and works pretty seamlessly. I imagine the same mechanism is at work here.
magnio 2y ago
I thought that's what AirDrop is for? Even Android can drag and drop files to Windows.
- lucianbr 2y ago
  What do you mean from Android to Windows? How exactly can that happen? I have an android phone in my hand now and a windows desktop in front, and no clue how to even begin this drag and drop operation. Where would I even start dragging in Android?
  - nostrademons 2y ago
    Plug it in via USB, and then most Android devices show up as USB sticks within Windows Explorer. You can access the filesystem the same way you'd access any external media, and drag & drop photos over. Apple, however, in their infinite wisdom made MacOS pop open iTunes when you connect an iPhone as a USB device. You can "import" them into Photos (another Apple walled garden), but they don't show up as a filesystem, and you can't use normal filesystem operations or terminal commands to move them over.
    - k3nx 2y ago
      I know it's not ideal, but if you have iCloud disabled in Photos.app, use that to download photos from your phone to Photos.app, then in Photos.app, select all, and export to your chosen location, then delete from Photos.app. I know it's a few more steps, but this might make it easier than selecting 10+ files to AirDrop. There might be a way to automate that with the shortcuts app. I haven't looked yet. I hope this doesn't come across as "you're holding it wrong", that wasn't my intent.
- crazygringo 2y ago
  That's exactly what AirDrop is for. I think the commenter must just not know about it?
  - nottorp 2y ago
dsego 2y ago
I frequently just airdrop stuff between my iphone and mac, that's the best thing coming from android, that and pasting text between devices, eg iban, passwords, etc.
- talldayo 2y ago
  I use KDE Connect to do the same thing across Android, Mac and Windows: https://kdeconnect.kde.org/ https://kdeconnect.kde.org/ Well worth checking out.
  - makeitdouble 2y ago
    > Made for people like you. I'm stealing this marketing line
- marricks 2y ago
  Right? Airdrop "just works" and so does copy paste between devices. If this is a better AirDrop I'm all here for it. AirDrop was already leaps and bounds better than email my android phone to my PC.
  - jcynix 2y ago
    You can rsync over ssh from and to Android devices, if you install Termux (Linux in an app). And SolidExplorer is a good app to transfer data from/to Android. I'm a long time Mac user, but I really dislike Apple's walled garden on the iPhone and thus switched to Android some years ago.
  - c1sc0 2y ago
    Airdrop just about never works for me. It’s slow to connect if it connects at all. And this is between my own devices connected to the same iCloud account.
- ttul 2y ago
  AirDrop is great in theory, but in practice 80% of the time I try to send a photo to my partner using AirDrop, it simply fails to bring up a notification on her devices. In my experience, Apple often delivers well much of the time, but will allow mysterious bugs like this to pervade a feature for years without finding a fix despite much discussion in their customer forums. I wish they did a better job of fixing such problems.
StrLght 2y ago
It's already been working for quite some time: shared clipboard on iOS and macOS has supported photos and videos since more than 2 years ago. I'd expect drag-and-drop works the same way.
- nostrademons 2y ago
  Like I mentioned in another comment, I've got 2000+ photos to dump onto an external hard drive (Samba share technically, but I can always move from local disk to SMB easily). I'm not going to cut & paste 2000 photos individually. Hell, I don't even want to select 2000 photos for a batch operation.
  - mleo 2y ago
    You can use Image Capture with phone plugged into USB and then drag and drop photos/videos to any folder.

amarshall 2y ago

Drag and dropping photos and other files from iPhone (plugged via USB) works well on Linux in the file browser. Too bad it seems Apple can’t figure it out on their own OS, though maybe they have now.

isametry 2y ago

> and not deal with the Photos app What’s the point of this qualifier? Why not use the current, up-to-date default app for photo import that has been there since 2002 to literally serve this purpose? Yes it has a lot of extra functionality, but that doesn’t mean you have to use it. You can get originals from Photos and be done with it…

cantSpellSober 2y ago

> Every time you email a file to yourself so you can pull it up on your friend's laptop, Tim Berners-Lee sheds a single tear. https://xkcd.com/949/ https://xkcd.com/949/

dataflow360 2y ago

iMazing might be worth checking out, for photo and video import/export. It also has a Quick Transfer feature so you just drag and drop a file to your target device, and iMazing gives you a choice of apps to send the file to. It's similar to AirDrop but also works for Windows and seems a bit faster and more stable.

josefdlange 2y ago

Universal Access (Control? Whatever it's called) between multiple Macs not only allows sharing input methods but also dragging files back and forth, and works pretty seamlessly. I imagine the same mechanism is at work here.

magnio 2y ago

I thought that's what AirDrop is for? Even Android can drag and drop files to Windows.

lucianbr 2y ago
What do you mean from Android to Windows? How exactly can that happen? I have an android phone in my hand now and a windows desktop in front, and no clue how to even begin this drag and drop operation. Where would I even start dragging in Android?
- nostrademons 2y ago
  Plug it in via USB, and then most Android devices show up as USB sticks within Windows Explorer. You can access the filesystem the same way you'd access any external media, and drag & drop photos over. Apple, however, in their infinite wisdom made MacOS pop open iTunes when you connect an iPhone as a USB device. You can "import" them into Photos (another Apple walled garden), but they don't show up as a filesystem, and you can't use normal filesystem operations or terminal commands to move them over.
  - k3nx 2y ago
    I know it's not ideal, but if you have iCloud disabled in Photos.app, use that to download photos from your phone to Photos.app, then in Photos.app, select all, and export to your chosen location, then delete from Photos.app. I know it's a few more steps, but this might make it easier than selecting 10+ files to AirDrop. There might be a way to automate that with the shortcuts app. I haven't looked yet. I hope this doesn't come across as "you're holding it wrong", that wasn't my intent.
crazygringo 2y ago
That's exactly what AirDrop is for. I think the commenter must just not know about it?
- nottorp 2y ago

dsego 2y ago

I frequently just airdrop stuff between my iphone and mac, that's the best thing coming from android, that and pasting text between devices, eg iban, passwords, etc.

talldayo 2y ago
I use KDE Connect to do the same thing across Android, Mac and Windows: https://kdeconnect.kde.org/ https://kdeconnect.kde.org/ Well worth checking out.
- makeitdouble 2y ago
  > Made for people like you. I'm stealing this marketing line
marricks 2y ago
Right? Airdrop "just works" and so does copy paste between devices. If this is a better AirDrop I'm all here for it. AirDrop was already leaps and bounds better than email my android phone to my PC.
- jcynix 2y ago
  You can rsync over ssh from and to Android devices, if you install Termux (Linux in an app). And SolidExplorer is a good app to transfer data from/to Android. I'm a long time Mac user, but I really dislike Apple's walled garden on the iPhone and thus switched to Android some years ago.
- c1sc0 2y ago
  Airdrop just about never works for me. It’s slow to connect if it connects at all. And this is between my own devices connected to the same iCloud account.
ttul 2y ago
AirDrop is great in theory, but in practice 80% of the time I try to send a photo to my partner using AirDrop, it simply fails to bring up a notification on her devices. In my experience, Apple often delivers well much of the time, but will allow mysterious bugs like this to pervade a feature for years without finding a fix despite much discussion in their customer forums. I wish they did a better job of fixing such problems.

StrLght 2y ago

It's already been working for quite some time: shared clipboard on iOS and macOS has supported photos and videos since more than 2 years ago. I'd expect drag-and-drop works the same way.

nostrademons 2y ago
Like I mentioned in another comment, I've got 2000+ photos to dump onto an external hard drive (Samba share technically, but I can always move from local disk to SMB easily). I'm not going to cut & paste 2000 photos individually. Hell, I don't even want to select 2000 photos for a batch operation.
- mleo 2y ago
  You can use Image Capture with phone plugged into USB and then drag and drop photos/videos to any folder.