In Settings:
Camera - Change Formats to "Most Compatible"
Apple ID - iCloud, Photos should be Off to leave the photos on the device.
iCloud Drive - I turned this off to retain control of my data.
General - Airdrop should be contacts only so you don't get "weird stuff sent to you on a bus".
Photos - Turn off iCloud Photos, My Photo Stream, and Shared Albums.
This allowed me to have full access to the photos locally when I plug the phone into the cable to the laptop.
The Long Story:
Maybe this all started before the phones. Maybe I should be blaming it on T-Mobile, I am not completely sure.
I've had T-Mo since before I moved to Fort Lauderdale Area, say back to 2003 when I got my first cell phone when I was on vacation on a Florida area code, and went back to Philadelphia.
I have been quite fortunate that a very good friend of mine gave me a couple of his old Android phones over the years. One "stuck". It's an 8 year old Samsung Galaxy S4 and I have been able to root it gaining full control, then install an "alternate" version of Android called LineageOS when true to form, Samsung stopped supporting the thing after two years. That particular eight year old phone has a fresh 8 day old operating system that is still supported.
If it isn't rooted, you don't fully own it. It is like having a car that you can only drive on Northbound roads.
But it is uncertain whether that beloved S4 phone will still be supported.
I am waiting for Q1 2021 to see which of these phones will actually work on the network. I vastly prefer Android since I know more than a little bit about the Linux operating system that they are based on.
A Smart Phone Is A Computer That Makes Calls. If I can't use it as a computer, its use is highly limited to me.
That brings me to Apple and my complete disdain for the company's design practices.
You see over the years, I've been given iPhones.
Currently, working are an iPhone 6, and 7. I was told that I should have them because the 6 "Is too old for me" and the 7 "has the better camera and you need it for your blog and for skating".
Generous, but still, iOS does not like me. They have a nasty habit of hiding things from me. Microsoft is doing the same thing these days with Windows 10.
You see the 7 came without any way to use a NORMAL pair of headphones. You know, that little plug thing that we have all been using since the 1980s? Those dozens of headphones that you collected over the years? Yeah they are worthless on an iPhone 7. Go get an adapter.
Some clueless designer decided that thin and gorgeous is better than useful and compatible. I guess that is a pretty good view of how Apple designs things. Consider that using an iPhone without a case is dangerous, and now I have a case on that phone that weighs about a half pound and definitely is not thin and gorgeous. 242 grams because you actually want an extra battery to be able to use it without thinking about Range Anxiety.
Mind you if I am trying to take pictures or video while I am about town the camera works, and the phone has 128GB of space on it.
But I still can't listen to the headphone of choice while I am skating because it does not fit.
The other reason why I was given the 7 was so that I could do Facetime with my sister on her birthday.
I am sure you folks have done many more video calls than I have, I use the phone for internet radio and photos for this blog... when I have the headphones that work.
Anyway, I said that I had some pictures on the phone that I needed to get off the thing and copy to my laptop. You know what? They were not there. My pictures were no longer on the phone.
You see the iPhone cajoled me with a red dot that said I should upgrade the phone to iOS 14.0.1 NOW. New! Shiny! FasterSaferBetter!
Rule One of Project Management. Never force a major change to a system without getting permission from the main user.
You or me. We are the users, we own the system. They need permission from us. It isn't the other way around.
Except. If it isn't rooted you don't own it. Welcome to Apple, do as I say, not as you need.
The theory with Apple is you live in a walled garden. My theory is that the only thing that the Walled Garden has a lot of similarities to a Prison Exercise Yard.
You see, they have disdain for the open world that I personally subscribe to.
Where they say they have "upgraded" the phone, my pictures vanished.
Where they say they have "upgraded" the camera, my pictures came up in a strange format.
It took me about an hour of hunting to find the hidden tick box that allowed me to make the pictures visible when I plugged the phone to the side of my laptop, then another hour to find another way to get the pictures back into JPEG format.
Mind you, the version of Linux I use, Debian, is known to be "conservative". They take their time and do very measured updates. When I do an update to my laptop, it is a novelty and on my schedule. Things Do Not Break. It Just Works. I use it and enjoy it, and it does what I want, not what That Dead Guy thinks it should. If I want to change something, I can and do.
It also means that when Apple decided to change the format of the pictures to a weird format, I had to go into the camera and change them back. Then launch the weird format pictures into a program one by one and copy and paste them into another piece of software to put yesterdays dozen or so back into JPEG.
Why? I Was Not Asked. The reason seems to be storage and that there is a newer standard for DSLR use that is supposed to be more better-er for video. Well, just throw out your old toys and make new E-Waste, you won't mind will you?
The problem is like someone went to your garage, switched the engine out on your car while you were not watching, put in a Diesel engine and left you with enough fuel to get to the filling station... without telling you.
I hope you noticed that the filler cap is now green. You didn't? Car won't go now will it?
I don't care if the standards have shifted, mine have not. Not yet, later.
The moral of the story? Let go of my ears I know what I am doing.
Or Linux People Think Too Much To Live In A Walled Garden.
As my good friend in Atlanta says, with a shrug, "It's Just Apple and Apple Just Sucks".Personally I think that there's a worm in that apple called a fetish for mimimalism and it needs to be excised.
It used to be "Think Different". Now, It seems to be "Don't Think At All".
Sorry but Momma Didn't Raise A Fool.
No comments:
Post a Comment