As noted in priorposts, I've recently moved to Photos from iPhoto. So far, it's been a mixed experience. There are some elements of Photos I like, but as of today, those things are outweighed by the things I don't like.
I've vented on a number of the things I dislike on Twitter, but wanted to expand on both the positives and the negatives in more detail. Hence, this "one week in" review (of sorts) of Photos, from the perspective of an experienced iPhoto user.
I've also included some tips for working with and migrating to Photos for those who haven't yet made the move from iPhoto. Finally, if you're still reading, I've listed the key features I'd really like to see come to Photos in a future update.
Note that I am not a great photographer, but I do take a lot of photos—I have over 40,000 photos and a couple thousand video clips in my database. To keep things organized, I use lots of keywords and Smart Albums, so much of my feedback on Photos is concerned with those areas of the program.
First off, my time with Photos hasn't all been bad; there are some things that I really like in Photos…
My migration from iPhoto to Photos continues, and today's snafu was my discovery that I couldn't rename files in Photos. This is something I've long done in iPhoto—not for every file, but for ones I'd like to group together using something other than Keywords.
For example, I have a collection of iOS wallpapers, for both the home and lock screens. I name each with either "H_" or "L_" as the start of the filename, which let me create this Smart Album to see them all together:
The inability to rename files isn't critical, in particular because the Title field can be used for the same functionality. But I had a problem: When I migrated, Photos created Titles for some, but not all, of my custom-named images. In particular, it missed all of the iOS wallpapers. I'm not sure if this is because these aren't photos in the traditional sense—they're edited photos I export as PNGs. But whatever the reason, I had hundreds of images that needed a Title that was equal to their Filename.
AppleScript to the rescue…this simple bit of code acts on the selection in Photos, and sets the Title equal to each image's filename.
AppleScript
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tellapplication"Photos"
activate
setmySelectionto(getselection)
ifmySelectionis{}then
error"Select photos before using script."
else
repeatwiththePhotoinmySelection
tellthePhoto
setthenametothefilename
endtell
endrepeat
endif
endtell
To use this bit of code, just select the photos you'd like to modify in Photos, then run the script. You can make it a bit easier by saving the script into your user's Library > Scripts > Applications > Photos folder (create as many of those as don't exist). It will then be available in the AppleScript menu in the menu bar, assuming you've enabled that in the AppleScript Editor's preferences.
This saved me literally hours of work, copying and pasting filenames to the Title field. (I was surprised this worked, but it did—you can't change the filename, but you can select and copy it.)
April 28 2019 Update:
In the comments, Daryle W. asked about using this script when there wasn't a modified filename—he'd like to use the filename, but drop the extension. I did a quick bit of searching, and came up with the following, which seemed to work in my limited testing. Please have a good backup before trying this, as it's not nearly as well-tested as my original version.
This should work for any filename extension; I tested with JPG and HEIC and it worked fine. (I originally tried this without using a new variable, but it didn't work—I wasn't able to use the filename in the set cutPosition... line, for example.)
As a recent somewhat-forced convert to Photos, I'm struggling with a number of things—more on that coming in a future post. But one of the tougher adjustments for me is that Photos uses a floating Info window, whereas iPhoto had an embedded info panel.
I keep the Info window open all the time, because I do a lot of work with keywords and location. (I also like to keep the Keywords window open, though this one was also floating in iPhoto.) I resize the iPhoto/Photos window quite often, depending on what I'm doing with other apps—sometimes I want my photos covering the screen, sometimes I don't.
In iPhoto, this isn't an issue (dark-background iPhoto GIF), as the info panel is attached to the main window. In Photos, though, resizing the main window leaves the Info window floating in space (light background Photos GIF).
I don't like the big gap, either visually or operationally, so I wind up moving the Info window next to the newly-resized main window.
There are a few solutions to this problem, the best of which only Apple could provide. They could make the Info window a panel below the photos, or they could make it magnetic so that it would stick to the edge of the Photos window, even as it resizes. I don't suspect we'll see either solution coming from Apple, though.
Instead of waiting for Apple, I used one of Many Tricks' own apps, Moom, which (among its other tricks) has the ability to save window layouts, either within an app or across many apps.
This morning, I was thinking about putting a clear screen protector on the iPhone 8 Plus, just because I had one that came with one of the cases I purchased. While cleaning the glass, though, I noticed something disconcerting: My iPhone 8 Plus is already showing fine scratches on the glass.
Compare my year-old iPhone 7 (top) with the weeks-old iPhone 8 Plus (bottom)…
Both phones are in similar cases that extend above the edge of the glass—I tried two minimal cases on the iPhone 8 Plus, but have only used the full-sized cases out in the "real world." Both phones have been used in similar ways, sitting in my pants pocket or in a tray in my car. After a year of such treatment, the iPhone 7 glass looks practically brand new. The iPhone 8 Plus glass, however, is already showing fine scratches. (There are similar scratches near the bottom of the phone, too.)
These scratches aren't—yet?—visible in day-to-day use, but it concerns me that they've developed to this degree after only a couple weeks' use. How bad will things get after a few months?
Are any other iPhone 8 (Plus or non-plus) users seeing such scratches on their displays? I'm tempted to go visit the Apple Store with my phone, because I can't believe this is normal, especially given how well the iPhone 7 (and all my prior phones) have resisted scratching.
I've recently—begrudgingly, forcibly—migrated from iPhoto to Photos. My iPhone 8 Plus was the main impetus, as Photos supports its new movie and image formats, as well as providing some additional editing features that I can't get in iPhoto. But in my limited time with the new app, my general conclusion is that Photos is not designed for someone who likes to actively manage their photo collection.
I may have more to say about this in a future post, but for now, consider this style of Smart Playlist that I used a lot in iPhoto…
This structure effectively creates an "and and or" logic, where you can have all conditions must be true at the top, yet have an "or" on the keyword: This playlist finds media that have the keyword Midnight or Moonlight (our cats), and are videos.
You simply cannot build this structure in Photos, because the Keyword field is a tokenized pop-up; you can only select one value. If I list the keywords as separate criteria, I wind up with a Smart Playlist that only finds videos with both Moonlight and Midnight. That's not what I want.
This structure is useful whenever you have multiple individual things—kids, lets say—and you want a smart playlist that will find any of your children and any other criteria, like year or camera or whatever.
My first thought at a workaround was to create a Smart Playlist called The Cats, which simply had the two Keywords as "or" criteria. I'd then create a second Smart Playlist that had one criteria set to "Playlist is The Cats" and the other set to find only videos. But Photos won't let you use a Smart Playlist as a criteria (neither will iPhoto, for that matter).
After some fiddling, I came up with an ugly but functional solution: I have to use an extra keyword. Now, any time I add photos of either cat, I have to set two keywords: One with the cat's name, and the other is The Cats. With two keywords on every cat photo, I can use this Smart Playlist to make my "video of either or both cats" Smart Playlist:
I'll have to do the same for our children; each picture of Erica or Kylie will also get a The Kids keyword. It really shouldn't be this hard; Smart Playlists should work as do Finder searches…
With the release of High Sierra, Apple removed the last vestiges of support for AOL's AIM protocol in Messages: You can no longer login to an AIM account. Yes, this is ancient tech. But it had one feature that a small group of my friends, family and coworkers relied on: The Buddy List window, as seen at right.
The buddy list was a great way to know if someone was available to chat or not—unlike Messages, which simply assumes that it's OK to text someone anytime. You could also customize the away message, to let someone know you're on the phone or you'll be back in 10 minutes or whatever.
As someone who works all day at my desk, the buddy list was a nice way to let friends and coworkers know when it's OK to talk and when I was busy. Also, I could keep these chats exclusive to my Mac, and not have them appear on all my devices, which was a nice benefit (no messages received when I didn't want to receive them).
Alas, High Sierra took that all away…or did it? It did not, as it turns out—the above screenshot was actually taken in High Sierra. The solution? Jabber, another ancient (but open source, unlike AIM; history) messaging protocol.
I know that's a shocking headline, but that certainly seems to what they're saying for a certain group of users (red emphasis added):
By default, your System Photo Library is stored in the Pictures folder on your Mac, but you can move it to another location on your Mac or store it on an external storage device. WARNING: If a Photos library is located on an external drive, don’t back up the drive using Time Machine. The permissions for your Photos library may conflict with those for the Time Machine backup
Jan 23 2018 update: Thanks to reader Brian for commenting below that Apple has updated this page with much clearer wording. It now reads (emphasis added):
If a Photos library is located on an external drive, don’t use Time Machine to store a backup on that external drive. The permissions for your Photos library may conflict with those for the Time Machine backup.
That just means you shouldn't use the same external drive for both your Photos library and as a destination drive in Time Machine. This makes much more sense; continue reading only if you care about my feelings on the original incorrect wording.
With the arrival of my iPhone 8 Plus and its A11 Bionic CPU, I thought it'd be interesting to compare its benchmark performance (for the CPU and GPU) with some of the other gear in our home—iOS devices, Macs, and even a PC and a Linux box. In total, I tested 15 devices.
How did I test? I turned to Geekbench, which you can run on MacOS, Windows, and Linux (anywhere from free to $99), as well as on iOS ($.99). It has tests for both the CPU (using single and multiple cores) as well as the GPU (OpenCL and Metal on iOS/macOS; OpenCL and CUDA on Windows; CUDA on Linux).
What follows is far from a scientific study; I was just curious how the CPU and GPU in the iPhone compared to other tech gear in our home. As such, I didn't run the tests under "ideal lab conditions," I just ran them—one time per machine, with no special setup other than some basic stuff…
Across these years of plus-sized iPhones, I've never owned one. But with the release of the iPhone 8, I decided I really wanted the dual cameras, so I chose to get the Plus. I did a lot of pre-testing in the Apple Store—using an iPhone 7 Plus— before I ordered. The size seemed doable, but the phones were definitely slippery—except for jet black, which was nicely grippy.
So I knew I wanted a case (no jet black iPhone 8), but I also knew I didn't want to make the iPhone much larger than it already was. In advance of my phone's arrival, I did some shopping on Amazon, looking for relatively thin and inexpensive cases to test. I wound up ordering five…
It's important to note that none of these are specifically designed for the iPhone 8 Plus, though most mention that phone in their description. The size differences between the 7 Plus and the 8 Plus are minimal—the 8 Plus is .1mm both wider and thicker—aren't great, and with a couple noted exceptions, I had no size-related issues with these cases.
Total cost for all five was $65—not dirt cheap, but certainly well under the $40 to $80 you can spend for a single "nice" iPhone Plus-sized case. Given that I've had the phone for only a few days, what follows are not full-on case reviews, but some initial thoughts on each of the five…
With 150 or so purchased movies over the years, these dupes make reading through the movie list quite annoying…
Finally annoyed enough to do something about it, I chatted with Apple Support this morning, and they quickly identified the cause…
Why are there two? iTunes is showing both 1080p and 720p versions of each movie (which also explains the size differences), so you can choose which to sync to an iOS device—you'll save a bit of space with the 720p versions. That makes sense, though the way it's handled seems quite odd and visually annoying.
To prevent this from happening in the future, iTunes support suggested I open iTunes' prefs, go to Downloads, and make sure only the "Download full-size HD videos" box is checked (assuming you want HD). My iTunes had both that and the "Download high-quality SD videos" box checked, so I unchecked the SD box.
I don't really understand how this will prevent the dupes from showing on future purchases, because my dupes are primarily all in the cloud, as noted by their icons, so I wouldn't think this setting would help. But I won't know until I purchase my next movie—changing the setting had no effect on existing duplicates.
But what about getting rid of the existing duplicates? That took a bit of trial and error, but this method seemed to work for me…
As noted in prior posts, I've recently moved to Photos from iPhoto. So far, it's been a mixed experience. There are some elements of Photos I like, but as of today, those things are outweighed by the things I don't like.
With the release of High Sierra, Apple removed the last vestiges of support for AOL's AIM protocol in Messages: You can no longer login to an AIM account. Yes, this is ancient tech. But it had one feature that a small group of my friends, family and coworkers relied on: The Buddy List window, as seen at right.