Cannot access iCloud through Safari on iPad?

Today, 2017, 5 years after my first bugreport complaining about errors in iCloud it's still not working properly.

Synching is a pain. Three party tools like Dropbox or OneDrive are doing a much better job.

Instead of fooling around with AR and other bull... nobody really needs it's time to concentrate on bugs.

That's what we teach our programmers and that is also true to Apple.

Greetings from Switzerland, Ronald Hofmann

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My wife has an iPhone and she likes to take pictures and videos and share them with family and friends. Her memory on the phone is full, so we need to delete her photos from her phone. She does not know how to use a computer, and does not want to learn. So she would like to see the pictures and videos that she has saved on iCloud from her phone. It is perplexing that she can see pictures and videos on Flickr, on Google, and on other cloud storage, but Apple will not allow her to see the pictures and videos that she has paid to store on iCloud. Is there no way for her to see from her phone the pictures and videos that are stored on iCloud?

She is absolutely right if she wants to do it that way.

But iCloud is far away from being perfect and Apple refuses, or is not able to correct this misbehavior.

Saving pictures, music or other data to iCloud means that all of these items are available to every Mac, iPhone, whatsoever logged in with the same Apple-ID. This is the only requirement.

There are third party tools like DropBox or OneDrive doing a much better job.

Greetings from Switzerland, Ronald Hofmann

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Unlike a computer, https://www.icloud.com isn't accessible from any iPad browser AFAIK and that's almost certainly by design. If you have iCloud set up properly, everything you do on the iPad is already syncing (mail, contacts, Pages, Photo Stream, etc.).

You can also make any adjustments to your iCloud settings on the iPad. Settings > iCloud...

So there doesn't seem to be a need to access iCloud via Safari (or any web browser) from the iPad.

Others may figure out a work-around, but I'm not sure what it would accomplish.

I can see the need on a computer...particularly if you don't have yours with you and you want to access your mail or contacts...but it seems redundant to do it on the iPad.

Was there a reason you needed to have access with Safari?

It isn't obvious you cant access iCloud directly from iPad so thanks for this advice.

We wanted to put contacts into groups so support page http://support.apple.com/kb/PH2667?viewlocale=en_US suggested we could do this on iCloud.com yet we kept getting message to upload iCloud....which of course we already had...Access denied!

Frustratingly The apple store suggested once we had uploaded iOS 5 the iPad would be standalone from a computer. That's clearly still not the case. The iPad IS our only key device so we rely on occasional updates via others' computers... We're a bit frustrated but will continue to find solutions via apps ...:)

I think it's terrible that a $900 device is designed so that a second iCloud user can't even access their data on even a third party browser like dolphin. I'm so angry at apple. I knew I wouldn't be able to have iCal or other apps sync because my wife is the iCloud user on this iPad. But not even being able to access it online?! C'mon apple have a heart!

I recently experienced problems syncing contacts on my iPod to iPad through ICloud (i was getting duplicate entries) and part of the AppleCare Support fix required that I go into iCloud.com. The patient tech had to wait until I booted my PC which is running on XP. I don't think Steve would have been impressed!

In the case of the Contacts Ap, there IS functionality that is available only if you go into the iCloud.com account: setting up groups, and organizing the groups ( adding/changing the composition of the groups). Apple advertises going into the iCloud.com account to manage and organize things. Why would I want to have to boot up a computer to do that?

An Apple product with a "dumb" loop - sending me back to do something that it is not sensing I have already done? By design? I'm not convinced. Oversight? Probably. Steve would most certainly not be impressed.

We do need access to iCloud.com via Safari on our mobile devices.

Cheers

That does answer the question. It also points out a fundamental difference in perspective between technology providers and many technology users. Apple and Microsoft (yes, they do have the same perspective) believe in designing smart devuces and smart software for dumb users. Some of us dumb users would like to see a little less second guessing about what we want / need, a little less knowing what's best for us, and a little more flexibility in allowing us to persue our objectives -- even if that allows us to make a mistake.

I'd like to be able to access iCloud from my iPad simply to be able to see what's there and what isn't, without having to use my Mac or Windows netbook (HA HA -- the chink in Apple's lock-down armour). Even with the upgrades to iWork for MAC that just came out to automatically save documents to iCloud, that feature apparently only works under Mountain Lion, not Lion -- a fact that Apple does not reveal in the update. So I upgrade to Lion in June (waited for others to spot the bugs), then must pay to upgrade again to Mountain Lion to get the feature I upgraded to Lion to get in the first place? Perhaps I'll just wait to see if the feature is really there before I buy and rely on it.

I knew I wouldn't be able to have iCal or other apps sync because my wife is the iCloud user on this iPad.

That's where you are wrong. You can setup your iCloud account as a secondary account on the iPad and have your contacts and calendars sync also.

See: http://support.apple.com/kb/TS4020

The free Mercury browser app allows you to log in to iCloud.

Click just right of the Google search bar. You will get a drop down menu that allows you to select user agent Safari (Mac OSX).

Kind of slow to respond but it does work.

Selected Safari (Mac OSX) as the User Agent. No difference on my iPad. Reloading or deleting the "ipad_welcome/" results in redisplaying the same iPad welcom screen; not the OS X welcome.

It works. iPad3 and Mercury browser allow full access to iCloud through the web.

When you changed the User agent to Safari(MacOSX), did you follow the instruction displayed to open a new tab? If not, try to access iCloud.com again in a new tab.

Pics or it didn't happen? My Reminders grocery list in the Mercury browser: http://t.co/QHc2wLib

Indeed it does work -- exactly as Darwin advertises (including being kind of slow). Thank you, Darwin.

NB: Apparently I missed the instruction to open a new tab. That does make the difference.

I realize the original post is 4 years old, but I'd like to add a reply nonetheless. I had no trouble logging in to icloud.com to add a contact group using the Puffin browser on my iPad. I also use the Puffin browser to show Flash content and log in to a work-related database which would not play nice with mobile Safari.