iPhoto Server?

Question

Level 1

11 points

iPhoto Server?

Is there such a thing from Apple (or someone else) that would serve more as an iPhoto Server?

We are a small landscape company that is just dabbling with a new iMac after the resounding success of my personal iMac with making DVD's and photo albums, etc.

We have been very happy how the iLife series interacts so well and want to maintain the ease of use of, for example, being able to drag photos into iMovie from iPhoto.

Right now, we are running mostly PC's and using Terminal Services and have been saving photos in directories of the individual landscape job on our main server. This, of course, provides no content or indexing services that enable us to find a picture of a "Swamp White Oak," unless someone actually changes the file name.

We are looking down the road wondering if there is a multiuser program that could reside on a central computer that would be the central store for all of the company's photos (and maybe videos later). This program would then hopefully interface with iMovie, iPhoto etc. to enable us to make video, brochures, etc. from any other networked Mac.

We will also need to be able to download pictures at a local machine from a digital camera that is then uploaded to the central photo store. Also, individual machines downloading as necessary.

Could this be as simple as a single computer running iPhoto all of the time in a shared directory, or more involved?

We are just in the beginning stages of scanning 1000's of pictures and slides from our nearly 40 year history into the computer and would prefer to get them into the right program the first time.

Thoughts and opinions greatly appreciated.

iMac G5 iSight 1.5gb Ram 160gb hard disk, Mac OS X (10.5.1)

Posted on Feb 8, 2008 9:38 AM

Reply

Answer 1

Yer_Man

Level 10

165,984 points

Feb 8, 2008 11:46 AM in response to MacSkoog

MacSkoog

iPhoto is not a media server. It's a single user photo organiser.

Some things are possible. For instance you can share the library:

There are two ways to share, depending on what you mean by 'share'.

If you want the other user to be able to see the pics, but not add to, change or alter your library, then enable Sharing in your iPhoto (Preferences -> Sharing), leave iPhoto running and move to the other machine. There, enable 'Look For Shared Libraries'. Your Library will appear in the other source pane. This will allow the other user to drag your pics to his/her library, and then, to all intents and purposes they can manipulate them as their own. But they have no way to write back to the Original library, and edits or changes they make will not be visible to main library.

Remember iPhoto must be running in both accounts for this to work.

If you want the other user to have the same access to the library as you: to be able to add, edit, organise, keyword etc. then:

Quit iPhoto on all machines

Move the iPhoto Library Folder to an external HD set to ignore permissions. You could also use a dmg.

(Some people have had success putting the library in the Users/ Shared folder. If you do this make sure the file permissions are set to allow read/write access to everyone.)

In each account in turn: Hold down the option (or alt) key and launch iPhoto. From the resulting dialogue, select 'Choose Library' and navigate to the new library location. From that point on, this will be the default library location. Both machines will have full access to the library, in fact, both accounts will 'own' it.

However, there is a catch with this system and it is a significant one. *iPhoto is not a multi-user app., it does not have the code to negotiate two users simultaneously writing to the database, and trying will cause db corruption. So only one user at a time, and back up, back up back up.*

There are other apps that will do this kind of work, and are specifically designed for serving media:

http://www.macupdate.com/info.php/id/679/extensis-portfolio

is one.

There's a price difference.

Regards

TD

Reply

Answer 2

Old Toad

Level 10

215,784 points

Feb 8, 2008 3:03 PM in response to MacSkoog

MacSkoog:

If only one user needs to control the photos and the content of the file that gets read by the other users then iView MediaPro might be able to do the job. You can have the photos, organized in any folder system that you would like and the iView catalog file on a server or mutually accessible computer running iView. By distributing the iView Reader, anyone can access the catalog file, which contains thumbnails of a user determine size, and all user added metadata for those files. The reader can enlarger the photos up to full screen.

iView is still available until July with a free upgrade to its new format, Expression Media which is owned by Microsoft. After July the price will about triple. I use iVMP as my primary image management application. One can add keywords to files in the catalog and write them to the actual file, add files to Catalog Sets which can be hierarchical, for grouping of photos and easy retrieval. Location metadata can be added to files also.

A few caveats: Current use of files on servers and the application on a PC is dismal. I don't know about using the Reader with a catalog on the Server. However, Service Pac 2 for EM is not too far in the distance and that's one of the prime fixes that is being addressed.

Although multiple users can use the Reader to access and view the catalog file, they cannot make any changes to the annotations, etc. They can add notes with the Reader that other can access (not positive of that as I've not used the Reader in that context). I really is a very powerful digital asset management application. If you have more questions visit the iView User Forum as there are many professionals there that can give you better insight than I can. The application can be run on both platforms as well as the Catalog Reader (which is free).

TIP: For insurance against the iPhoto database corruption that many users have experienced I recommend making a backup copy of the Library6.iPhoto database file and keep it current. If problems crop up where iPhoto suddenly can't see any photos or thinks there are no photos in the library, replacing the working Library6.iPhoto file with the backup will often get the library back. By keeping it current I mean backup after each import and/or any serious editing or work on books, slideshows, calendars, cards, etc. That insures that if a problem pops up and you do need to replace the database file, you'll retain all those efforts. It doesn't take long to make the backup and it's good insurance.
I've created an Automator workflow application (requires Tiger), iPhoto dB File Backup, that will copy the selected Library6.iPhoto file from your iPhoto Library folder to the Pictures folder, replacing any previous version of it. It's compatible with iPhoto 08 libraries and Leopard. iPhoto does not have to be closed to run the application, just idle. You can download it at Toad's Cellar. Be sure to read the Read Me pdf file.

Reply