iPhoto sort order changes on iPad/iPhone when photos are edited

Here are my latest findings to add to my other posts which require a little history:

There are now two iMacs in the house and up to this morning running the latest software updates minus the November iPhoto update (9.4.2). Both iMacs streamed iPhoto pictures in the correct order to an ATV as well as two iPads. All sorting was correct being the same as in iPhoto. This morning there was an OS X update to 10.8.3. I did my wifes first and streamed to the ATV, sorting was the same (correct). So I updated my iMac to 10.8.3 and checked again. The streaming to the ATV was still correct. So I updated my wifes iPhoto (Novemeber 2012 update 9.4.2) and tried it again. The sorting on the ATV with the latest iPhoto update buggers up the sorting again. The iPhoto (Nov) update did change the event sorting to how it is sorted in iPhoto but the pictures within the event are still screwy. So both iMacs are up-to-date except mine still has the old iPhoto 9.4.1 pre November 2012 and displays the photos on the ATV as on the iMac. So given all this, as far as I'm concerned, iPhoto 9.4.2 is broken. A couple of weeks ago I phoned Apple Care and went through all this with them. Their final stand was, if you are not going to update to the latest software we can not help you. I told them that if I updated both puters to the latest they both would be buggered and I wasn't going to do that. So there it stands. My wife's is on Apple Care right now, and screwy with the latest update, so I may (when I get half a day to waste) call them again. Stand by 😟

After several attempts to answer these questions from Apple, the final conclusion is that iPhoto for iPad is severely limited and you CANNOT change the order of the photos are they are displayed.

You can create and send a slideshow from an Album, but it becomes a movie, takes a lot of space, and still you can't change the order, and the music you choose from iTunes doesn't come through.

I've tried this and it works(around) 🙂 :

1) For photos within Albums:

Engineering is aware of reports that photos within albums that are sorted by date will not retain their order when synced to an iOS device. There is a workaround for this which is to sort the album in iPhoto on the Mac manually. Specific steps I'd recommend would be:

- Open the album in iPhoto on the Mac

- Select View > Sort Photos > By Date (Ascending or Descending as desired)

The album will now be sorted by Date. Next:

- Select the first photo in the album so it gets a border around it

- Drag this photo to the space after the 2nd photo in the same album

All we've done is swap the order of the first two photos in the album. However, now if View > Sort Photos is selected the check mark will be next to Manually instead of Date. Manually sorted albums do not exhibit this behavior. Next:

- Select the current first photo in the album so it gets a border around it

- Drag this photo to the space after the 2nd photo in the same album

All we've done is swap the order of the first two photos in the album again so that the order of the photos is back to the way it looked when View > Sort Photos > By Date was selected but View > Sort Photos will actually still show Manually. Repeat these steps for each album to workaround the current behavior.

2) For photos in Events:

Engineering is aware of reports that photos within events do not retain their sorting either in the iPhoto window or when synced to an iOS device. There are no identified workarounds for this behavior currently other than organizing photos using albums and if necessary work around around the sort by date behavior as described above.

Wish i'd seen this post before i manually renamed 60 photos in an album so i could sort alphbetically. Good info to have. At least we know Apple is aware of it. No eta on a fix though, I assume?

The solution by Tevseric didn't work for me. An album using sorting by date won't allow you to manually reposition a photo. But I found a similar solution. Click on Events. Manually resort an album from one position to another. Then put it back. Quit iPhoto. iTunes should be sorted out. (When the bug shows up, the album that is being sorted incorrectly in iTunes shows the wrong beginning date underneath the Event in the Event pane.)

I have found another way to fix this, but I like the above solution better. It's more fiddly, but faster. At any rate, option two: Quit iPhoto. Hold down option+command while relaunching iPhoto. Select any repair option. Once it is finished, quit iPhoto. iTunes should now show the proper sort order.

I have never enjoyed how poorly updated iLife apps are. Such bugs…

Per my post above. I got knowwhere with Apple Care unfortunately.....butttttt the latest iTunes update (11.03) fixed the issue. All of my devices sync the sort correctly and iPhoto will hold the sort I gave it rather than default when shut down and reopened. Finally! This has been going on since November. Our iPhones, iPads and Apple TV all work the way they should....or the way I want them to. Happy Happy 🙂

I am still having the same issue. It really is frustrating because I tend to show people my pictures within this app. And I know that after picture A has to come picture B and am already talking about picture B, but then there is picture C 😟

B comes approx after 10-15 images (after J).

Please fix

I've been banging my head against the wall about the sort order in iPhoto on my iMac and found something that might be affecting the order on my iPad and iPhone. Not sure at this point but this was worth the try. If you are using iPhoto on a Mac and sync your iPad or iPhone to that mac with iTunes then I think it might be of some help. My sort order kept showing the same pictures at the latest position when sorted by date and decending. Nothing seemed to change it. Finally a friend said to try and rebuild the iPhoto database. Using the option + Cmd when starting iPhoto and you get a menu that allows for rebuilding the database as well as three other things that might need fixing. It worked for iPhoto. After syncing, I'll see what, if anything, it does for my IOS devices.