[robluxus]

> iCloud photo albums have no API. However, if you share an iCloud photo album to a public link [...]

How do folks feel about the security vs. convenience aspect of this? I almost talked myself into doing this for our shared family albums, but I know I really shouldn't do it.

Some of our older family members run Windows and iCloud sharing is just horrible there. Basically, the photos keep disappearing from their computer. It looks like we're not the only one with the issue: https://www.reddit.com/r/iCloud/comments/150nq4i/icloud_wind...

[podviaznikov]

I even have build a small product to show apple shared albums online https://public.photos/

also wanted to add API on top so that people can show photos however they want. But didn’t have a time to finish it yet.

[bandergirl]

That’s cool but why not fetch the photos via URL? Seems easier than having to maintain an email inbox

[podviaznikov]

have more information that way I think on each photo.

Plus feels more robust.

Getting from the website might break if layout breaks.

[GauntletWizard]

I feel really okay with this, but I'm not okay with is that there isn't language to talk transparently about it. Facebook does the same thing (or did, because I haven't used Facebook in a long time), if you copy link to image, you can just forward that, even if the post is private.

This is pretty inherent in image sharing, though. You can just download the image, or if the website limits that you can take a screenshot (let's not get into the debate about DRM and assume that it doesn't work).

Where should you draw the line? Time limited link sharing? Login based doesn't work because you can't share with Grandma - she doesn't know how to login.

We need words and descriptions of these basic patterns, and better ways to Intuit which is in use.

[mrehler]

I think the phrase used here quite often is "security through obscurity" when it comes to links. The question is whether people feel comfortable with family photos falling under that principle. They're obviously not meant for public consumption, but the feeling of privacy invasion if a random person stumbled on them is going to vary from person to person. If one was totally comfortable with them being public and has zero reservations about random folks peeking on them, then I'd be surprised if there weren't an even sturdier way to do this publicly (through Flickr or just an open FTP link – but that loses some of the convenience of just an iCloud album for some people).

[GauntletWizard]

Securely-generated unique links aren't security by obscurity at all - They are literally the same as any password or private key being unique and high entropy. The security problem is inherent with any data that is shared widely.

[Lord-Jobo]

Its actually damn near impossible to retrieve all of your photos/videos from icloud for a backup if you are using a windows machine to do so. It will constantly fail to sync fully, duplicate files, takes eons to download even on a fast connection, and there are bizarre file format conflicts with certain types of images. Very infuriating, and its been an issues for at least 5 years. 'Buy a mac if you want to actually adhere to proper backup standards' i guess this is the apple stance on the issue.

[GloriousKoji]

I've been using icloudpd to get photos off of icloud. It took a while the first time but after that I set it up to only download the latest 500 photos (total number downloaded is usually way under) and run it every few months.

https://github.com/icloud-photos-downloader/icloud_photos_do...

[aksss]

A workaround is to use OneDrive with Camera Upload feature turned on, and then sync this back down to your PC. You can choose how to sort (e.g. folders by year and month).

[WWLink]

TBH, the Photos app on Macs is just as bad at this. Especially if you have a LARGE album.

I'll give you exactly the use case, and exactly why that is:

I decided I didn't want to pay for the family 1tb icloud plan anymore because 90% of it was being used up by my brother taking silly pictures and videos all the time. So I had him get an external SSD and set him up with the Photos app to download to it.

~900gb of images and videos. It took OVER. A. MONTH. to download. The whole time the photos app was being very cagey about when it would bother to download. To an M1 iMac. With an 500mbit fiber connection and connected via ethernet.

I think they do that on purpose to discourage people from quitting icloud. They want to keep you dependent on their cloud storage and they REALLY don't want you taking your files back.

I fucking hate icloud. I hate the way apple uses dark patterns and is so naggy about having an icloud membership when using an iPhone. I hate their crappy cloud syncing software too.

I ended up back on icloud later because, well, reasons... but I moved my own photo/video syncing over to onedrive. Now let's not get ahead of ourselves - one drive is a piece of crap too. But at least it's consistent on all platforms. And it's cheap as fuck.

[jdminhbg]

> I think they do that on purpose to discourage people from quitting icloud.

I think they just haven't updated the CPU/bandwidth-saving provisions that have been in the products for years. The same issues happen if you are staying on iCloud and syncing to new devices. I know that I have a gigabit ethernet connection to a machine that is not doing anything else, but the app doesn't have a way to tell it that.

[BanjoBass]

Yup. iCloud is just my most recent photos. Once my 200gb starts getting full, I go back and delete photos and videos year by year until i'm down to the last year or two. My entire library is still backed up to a NAS which has offsite backup as well as google photos.

[physicles]

Agreed on the dark patterns. I’m pretty adamant about staying on the free 5GB plan. So once a year or so my backup fails and I have to spend half an hour fighting with their intentionally terrible UI to reduce its size.

[gigglesupstairs]

Apple should just pull that windows app/feature if they’re being this shitty with their users. That thread was infuriating.

[rockooooo]

The iCloud file syncing on Windows destroyed my files twice and I never touched it again.

[croutonwagon]

By most standards im fairly security conscious. IE: No listening devices/alexa/google home in the house. For the most part no cameras or mic's inside (obviously cant get past the phone thing). Generally i prefer to self host stuff (ie: my security cams are local only and have no interenet access.)

That said I DID setup a public shared album to share to a Dakboard....Its also one i share with family.

The URL is so long, from a privacy standpoint its less a concern. The facial details are already on the internet due to family sharing stuff on facebook etc. None of the photos are particularly revelealing and nothing i wouldnt care if they were on a billboard...So meh. I doubt i could be targeted to find it and anyone stumbling across it wont see anything they wouldnt see if they drove by my house and saw my kids playing in the front yard. We also dont religiously post to it, so its not like anyone is going to glean we are out of town because of something we put there.

TL:DR - meh, not much a concern on my end, despite other concerns that may border on tinfoil.