Learn more about icloud photos, photo galleries, and photo streams

"icloud Photo gallery on Mac" after half a month long time finally finished uploading, this is also a very helpless thing. " GB level of data encountered at the KB level upload speed is like this, but fortunately uploading has always been in the background silently work, the use of the usual does not have any impact.

In the icloud package, photo Gallery, icloud Drive, icloud backup have high requirements for the network environment, and photo Gallery's relationship with the volume of photos and video files highlights the importance of speed in the synchronization process.

The photos "icloud settings include three items: icloud Photo Library, my photo stream, icloud photo sharing, and the iphone's photos and camera settings. The same thing about these services is that ICloud services are used, but the difference is that they correspond to different requirements scenarios:

icloud Photo Library, which synchronizes all photos and videos in two directions between devices that have icloud Photo library turned on and the same Apple ID.

My photo stream, sync recent (30-day) photos (not video) between devices that have my photo stream turned on (same Apple ID)

ICloud photo sharing, select photos or videos to publish to shared albums, share, comment with family and friends, share photos and videos in albums will automatically sync and push notifications to members ' devices.

　　The relationships and differences between the three

The various services in ICloud are first identified based on the Apple ID, and then the content is synced or uploaded based on the specific settings on the device. This is also true when photo gallery, photo Stream, and photo sharing are enabled on different devices.

Enabling "icloud Photo Library is the preferred and easiest way to synchronize photos and edited photos between devices (same Apple ID) and choose optimize storage if you want to save on your local footprint.

The easiest way to share photos with friends and family is to turn on "icloud photo sharing and create your own shared albums or join a shared album created by someone else, which is the best way to sync and push photos between different Apple ID devices. Sharing a shared album is a prerequisite for joining a member group of a shared album, which needs to be initiated and received by a person to complete. It is not appropriate for colleagues to share albums with each other occasionally, and the correct posture in this scenario is to select photos to be done through AirDrop, IMessage, or a third-party application installed.

Photo Stream and photo gallery can be used to synchronize photos between devices, but the former mainly serves short-term needs (the last 30 days), the latter is full and full synchronization. The difference comes from Apple's progressive approach to functional planning (Photo stream is introduced first, ICloud photo Gallery is launched), and on the other hand two features have their own positioning:

Photo Stream does not occupy ICloud space, the footprint of the local space is limited (more than the time of the photos are no longer saved in the local, first-out), only synchronize the last 30 days of photos;

Users with multiple devices may not want all photos synced everywhere (with the results of ICloud Photo Gallery enabled), while browsing and editing are convenient, but also increase the cost of privacy security and maintenance. For example, it is sufficient to locate the IPad on the read and watch, or just open "my photo Stream" to browse the latest photos;

Mac devices and mobile terminals are slightly different, and your Mac automatically downloads and permanently stores all the photos in my photo stream. If the "icloud Photo Library is also open on your Mac, the photos in my photo stream will also be imported into the"icloud photo gallery. You can see that in photo management, MAC is naturally positioned as a storage center by Apple;

The MAC, as the center for managing photos, can turn on my photo stream, "icloud Photo Library, and save photos from different devices to the Photos app's gallery and automatically sync to ICloud cloud.

　　Photo Gallery on Mac side　　

The MAC version of photos is positioned as the center of photo management and features more than the IOS version of the mobile Terminal:

Multiple galleries can be managed (hold Option to open the photo app);

Provides the Photos Library repair tool (press and hold Option+command while opening photos), and the repair tool will analyze the library database and fix any inconsistencies detected (such as problems with missing photo thumbnails);

If you fix a library that has the "icloud Photo library enabled, the entire contents of the gallery will be updated with ICloud again after the repair is complete

You can specify and modify that library as a "system photo Library";

The System photo Library supports syncing with ICloud Photo Library, and the Apple app and third-party apps have access to the system photo Library through the media browser;

Reference files in photo library (files stored in other locations outside the photos library are referred to as reference files) are not uploaded to ICloud photo gallery.

　　System Photo Gallery　　

Option to open photos to create a new library, and to switch between different galleries, of course, you can also choose to double-click a library file directly to achieve the switch.

The way multiple galleries are managed helps us manage photos of different types (or time ranges), but only one photo in a gallery at a time. To work with photos from other galleries, you must switch to the gallery.

The difference between the system photo Library and other galleries is that only the system library can be set to sync with the "icloud Photo Library, and the system photo Library is accessible to Apple apps and third-party applications through the media browser.

The system library can be specified in preferences, but it is important to note that if you specify a new system photo library, the library's "icloud Photo library is turned off by default and you need to open it again in your preferences. When the "icloud Photo Library option is turned on for the new system photo library, photos stored in ICloud will be merged with the photos in the new system Photo Library.

After uploading the contents of the new System Photo Library to ICloud, you can't cancel the merge gallery, so it's a good idea to think carefully before changing the system photo Library.

　　Cite photos　

There are a lot of photos we just want to be centrally managed and edited locally using the Photos app, and don't want them synced to the "icloud Photo Library, which removes the" import "tick option in preferences.

When you turn off import options, dragged or imported photos appear in photos as a reference to a photo, except that you can right-click the "Show reference files in Finder" menu on such photos. In this way, it is easy to manage the content of photos in other folders.

If you want to upload a reference photo to icloud Photo Library, you can choose File-Consolidation from the menu item after you reference the photo, so that the reference photo is really saved to the current photo gallery and synced to icloud.

For ease of management, it is recommended that you add a smart album in photos, as shown in the image above to set the matching criteria as "reference", so that you can more intuitively see all the cited photos, easy to maintain and manage.

The import option affects only the photo import of the current MAC, and the connection data cable imports photos from the photo "iphone device unaffected

When you choose to import a new image from the same folder as the referenced file, a copy of the existing image may be imported when you select duplicate photos. This is because if you edit a referenced photo using another application, the Photos app recognizes the images as changed and then re-imports them as new images.

　　Experiment and thinking

　　Turn off ICloud Photo Library and then open it?　　

Originally, I thought the photo gallery would be smart enough to recognize the cloud and the local photo gallery, but the actual result is that the "icloud Photo Library will re-upload your photo gallery, so you need to think carefully before you do this.

To observe the effect of turning off icloud photo gallery again after shutting down, trying to close the "icloud Photo Library, a task that was downloaded to One-third was interrupted because the sync task for icloud Photo Library was not completed and a two prompt was popped off:

Turn off the "icloud Photo library on your device and don't lose the photos you've uploaded to the cloud

Other photos that are not downloaded to this computer will still be synced to other devices that have "icloud Photo library enabled via the"icloud photo Gallery

Turn the "icloud Photo Library on again after you close the first action is to upload the photos from the current system photo library, which can be a bit of a crash.

If your settings are "optimize storage", only some of the original photos and videos may be on your device. To download the original photos and videos on your Mac, open the photos-preferences selection to downloads the originals to this mac". On the same IOS device, go to "set-icloud-photos" and select "Download and keep originals".

　　How do the photos repeat?

First let's rule out whether ICloud Photo library repeated switching will cause duplicate photo problems.

Experimental verification Steps:

Open Photo Library to deactivate the "icloud Photo Library;

Leave 1 photos (this photo already exists in the ICloud library, 1 can quickly complete the upload action) to do the comparison, delete the other photos in this map library;

After deletion, reopen the "icloud photo library, not surprisingly"icloud Photo library will first upload the only photos in the gallery;

When the upload is complete, photos starts downloading the icloud Photo Library cloud content locally, and the result is not repeating the original photo of the icloud cloud that was left behind.

Special NOTE: Please do not delete photos from this map library until you close the "icloud photo library, otherwise your behavior will sync to delete photos from the cloud

　　Scenario 1 : The IPhone is connected to the MAC via a data cable, will it repeat when importing photos using the Photos app?

When you connect your iphone with a data cable, the default photo opens the window that imports the iphone photo (you don't want it to pop out automatically to remove the tick that opens the photo). Two types of photos are displayed in the IPhone Photo import window: Imported, new items. Imported is a photo that already exists in the current photo gallery, and the new item is a photo that is not yet in the current photo gallery.

The photos listed in the import new item are not duplicated, and the photos imported in the imported category are definitely duplicates.

　　Scenario 2 : icloud Photo Library is already enabled on the IPhone, but speed is definitely not directly plugged into the MAC when syncing multiple photos with icloud. So the question is, will the ICloud sync cause the photos to repeat after the photos have been imported?

Another similar scenario is when photos are synced to ICloud Photo Library after a photo or screenshot on the iphone, and then the local library of the Mac that was turned on is not ready to sync with the cloud, when the iphone is connected to the Mac via a data cable and the photos appear in the new project.

Importing photos In either of these cases does not cause duplication, as long as importing photos that appear in the new items category will not cause duplicates.

　　What causes "duplicate" photos?　　

Photos saved to albums by IM applications such as IMessage, Telegram, WeChat, etc. will be considered as new photos by the photo gallery, and the same photos will appear in the same picture you save several times.

Dragging a photo from the Photos app to the desktop equals creating a new copy on the desktop, and if you drag back the photo app will be considered as a new image, and the file name is the same;

The photos and cameras setting enables hdr"to keep normal exposures, which will look like two in the photo, one with an HDR icon in the top left corner;

The "Save original photo" is enabled in Instagram settings, and when you take a photo with Instagram, the original photo before the filter effect is retained, or the photos you've edited in Instagram to access the photo gallery are the same, and eventually you'll see two similar images in the photo app.

Reference photos in external folders, photos referenced in a folder will be considered new if edited by a third-party app, and will coexist with previous photos.

Delivery and editing within the Photos app's official system (including ICloud Photo Library, imported new item via photo app) doesn't cause duplication, but once a photo is sent, copied, transferred, and edited outside the photo app, it's a new photo.

　　Why is "icloud Photo Library" not syncing now? "

Photo Gallery has its own rhythm when dealing with our requests, and if you are uploading a photo, you may need to wait until the next time to schedule the download, which is the reverse, and when you encounter multiple photos of large data transfer requests, the timing period is too long, which gives you a feeling of not being obedient to ICloud, When you no longer care about it next time to see and inexplicable synchronization.

How to verify: When the photo gallery is performing a large volume of download tasks, we import a photo into the Mac's photo gallery to see when the photo will be ready to be uploaded.

Here choose to download Photo Gallery instead of uploading is because the download is more intuitive, it is not difficult to imagine "photos" show is uploading 3000+ and is downloading 3000+ will give people what different feelings, there is because the domestic network download faster than upload, but also can bring operability to the experiment.

First create a new, empty photo gallery (hold the Option key and open the Photos app and select New). After opening this new photo gallery and setting it to "use as a system Photo Library" in preferences, there is nothing in the photo gallery until we tick the "icloud Photo Library in preferences, and the photo starts to download.

Photos sync Download icloud Photo Library for a long time, import a photo to see when you can sync to icloud and display it on another device that has "icloud Photo library enabled.

The time to wait is longer than the last 1 minutes of the "apple you encounter each time you upgrade, and the interface always shows" uploading "and the IPhone does not see the download of this photo. When we lose patience close the program to switch focus to the other desktop, first busy and then open the photo app (the photo background process is again active), this time only a short time to upload the task is the priority to complete the upload and continue to complete the download task. This kind of result is like a "photograph" very reluctant you to stare at it to work, although eventually certainly will complete, can time flaky.

Many times, ICloud is a series of services because the network speed severely reduces the user experience, but in the storage security and convenience is still worthy of recognition and recommendation, the network speed problem can also be expected to gradually improve. So the big can not unworthy, how to use also how to use, give it a little time to let it in the background slowly forward.