Google Axes Drive and Photos Integration

I got an email earlier today stating:

> Over the next few weeks, we are making some changes to help simplify how Google Photos and Google Drive work together. We are making these changes based on the feedback we've heard that the connection between these services is hard to understand.

> • Your photos and videos will no longer automatically sync between Google Photos and Google Drive.

> • You will still be able to upload to both services using the Backup and Sync app on your computer.

> • We’re also adding a new “Upload from Drive” feature that lets you copy photos and videos to Google Photos.

> • Your existing photos and videos are still in Google Photos and Google Drive.

This is very sad for me as this was how I backed up my and my wife's photos on my Linux machine, as I'm not aware of any tools that interface with the Photos API. I wish there were more cross-platform tools for basic things like photo sync and backup.

It's also frustrating that they're removing perfectly good functionality for nothing but a chinchy reason of it being "hard to understand". It wasn't and they could provide a better UI around it to make it easier to understand.

2 comments

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mceachen 7y ago ↗

There's https://github.com/mholt/timeliner that will use the API, but realize a bunch of tags (including GPS lat/lon and captured time) will be stripped, and videos will be very low resolution.

If you want your metadata tags intact-ish, Google Takeout seems to be the only way now, but they still downsample and muck with metadata.

I'm now using syncthing (open source) and Resilio Sync (closed source) on my freeNAS and Ubuntu server to pull original photos and videos from our smartphones onto spinning rust, and then use PhotoStructure (disclaimer, I'm the author) to browse and share them.

jimktrains2 7y ago ↗

Thanks! I'll see if syncthing is available for iOS and will look at photostructure! Thanks!