[pubutil]

Have you tried using the Files app for image/file transfers? You can add Samba (and other) shares in there by tapping the '...' in the upper-right corner, hitting 'Connect to Server', then inputting your local server's address and connecting. I use this not just for photos, but for transferring various files and docs to/from my phone/home server.

You mentioned not wanting to mass-select 2000+ photos. If the photos you're uploading fall within a certain date range, you can open the Photos app, search for the date range of photos you want to upload (e.g. "April 20 2024 to today", or "sept 21 2018 to mar 2020"). It'll return photos taken in that date range, where you can tap 'See All', then 'Select' > 'Select All' at the top of the screen. Then you can hit the 'Share' dialogue and upload to your server through Files without having to scroll and select tons of individual pics. Keep in mind that you can't use a '-' in place of the word 'to' when specifying a date range for some reason.

If your images are family memories, you might be interested in Immich[1] (if you're open to making changes to your photo storage setup). Stand up and configure the local server, install the smartphone app, enable automatic sync, and it'll automatically upload new photos from your phone when you open the Immich app. No need for you to manually keep track of your photo syncs. Built to be a local Google Photos replacement. Has features like shared albums, face recognition/person naming, smart search, etc. AI tasks, like everything else, are done entirely locally. It's a nice piece of software, and lots of people (including privacy advocate Louis Rossmann) vouch for it.

[1] https://immich.app/

[nostrademons]

Where's "Select All" after "Select"? I'm not seeing that option (either on a search result or the "All Photos" collection), it'd solve a bunch of my problems. Thanks for the tip on Files, it seems like that's a nice alternative to AirDrop that's even more direct.

[pubutil]

I'm sorry, seems I misspoke. It seems that when you look at an album in Photos you can select all; if you're in the camera roll or elsewhere, you won't get that option. Not sure why Apple would do that, but maybe they'll change it with the Photos rework in iOS 18.

As an alternative, here's a tiny script through iOS' Shortcuts app that selects photos in a date range and sends them to a Samba share through Files.[1] This time I actually tested, and was able to successfully run the Shortcut to copy a date range of photos/videos from the Photos app to my Samba share.

Quick instructions, in case you need them:

1. Create a new Shortcut and add a "Find Photos" module (You can search with the bar at the bottom). Add a filter, set it according to the screenshot[1], starting from "Date Taken" and ending at the stop date.

2. Add a "Save File" module beneath the Photos module (icon visible next to "Save Photos" in the screenshot). Shortcuts should auto-populate the selected photos as a variable so it reads "Save Photos". Hit the ">" next to "Save Photos" and tick any options you need.

3. Make sure to modify the date range each time you need to run the Shortcut.

You can also add/modify filters in each module to better suit your needs. For example, instead of "Date Taken" you could select by "Creation Date", or add in a "Media Type" filter so you only return photos and not videos (or vice-versa).

One thing to know: There's no progress bar so it's helpful to run the Shortcut from the Shortcuts app so you can see when it finishes executing/transferring. You should see a little 'stop' button with a semicircle around it when a Shortcut is executing from the app; it'll turn into a '...' button when it finishes.

[1] https://i.imgur.com/LPsQ8au.jpeg

[pubutil]

My comment edit window closed, but if you trust me, I also made up a quick little pre-baked shortcut that should be fairly user-friendly[1]. Will prompt for date range input, calculate and display total upload size, ask for confirmation, prompt for upload location, then show an alert on completion. Also has some very rudimentary error handling in that it takes a file count before and after the upload, and warns if the two counts don't match up.

A few things to note (applies to my above comment as well):

-If you have a less powerful iOS device, your screen may go semi-unresponsive during the upload process. My iPhone XS goes unresponsive until the upload finishes (less the ability to terminate the shortcut via the "stop" button), but my 2017 iPad Pro is totally usable during upload.

-You may get an error along the lines of "This Shortcut is trying to share more than [x] photos." You can allow this by going to iOS Settings > Shortcuts > Advanced, then toggling on "Allow Sharing Large Amounts of Data"

-Again, there's no progress bar, so it may help to run the Shortcut from the editing pane in the Shortcuts app. That way you can at least watch the app step through the script.

[1] https://www.icloud.com/shortcuts/d3258e1d720548cd9e635bbe090...