Air Drop between iMac and iphone5 not working?

happy to argue the toss.....

like I said.... I was 'inferring' = reason, work out, conclude... that the iPhone is from the Apple/Mac brand.... which it is. Somehow you need to get over your semantic argument...Your quotes from me even support the reasoning that I never said the iPhone was Mac.... derrr...... however, I did post in the Mac products thread..... so I gave the Mac reference....

How do you even deduce I'm confused about which product I'm using? It's laughable.... 😁 Do you think I'd be confused about driving a car and thinking I'm driving a truck?... hang on, that takes just a little imagination.... no wonder you can't grasp it.

So maybe you are 'more' intelligent than me? I accept that each of us have different skill sets... and just because you are intelligent, doesn't automatically make you superior.... only a fool cannot learn from the foolish. You seem to be the only judge of intelligence here, so.... whatever..... you can think you're as intelligent as you like petal.....

Nope, no strange fascination with whatever defects you have?...... I asked a simple question and you chimed in with the attitude.... which makes me ask myself.... why?..... what's with the automatic 'defense'?.... What's with the, "I'm gonna teach this guy a lesson" thing?..... look up the etymology of defence, and you find..."action of guarding or protecting".... which has me wondering about whatever deficiency you might have?..... perhaps it's vitamins?

I know nothing about the Hobbit.... is he some lonely old self proclaimed 'intellectual' living on the internet taking issue with whether an iPhone is a Mac or an Apple product?....

I have the newest iPhone 5s and the newest Macbook Pro and both of these devices cannot recognize eachother Airdrop. This could be something that Apple could work on.

As we are all other users here and are not allowed to speculate on any decisions Apple may or may not make, we cannot discuss this possibility; as it stands right now: as I said on page 1, Airdrop between Mac OS and iOS is not supported at this time.

Well, since we are all discussing the apparent inability of Macs and iOS devices to communicate via AirDrop, I'll chime in with my own opinion.

I came here the same way most others did, by googling 'iPhone 5 airdrop can't see my Mac'. It looks like Apple has become the victim of their own success. Most of us expected this functionality from Apple; the feature is called "AirDrop" in both systems, so, within Apple's logic of eco-system transparency across the board, it would only be natural for AirDrop to work across all devices, just like iCloud, or Messages. I am not at all surprised at the incredulity of others here (the colloquial WTFs about the incompatibility of two different AirDrops -- iOS and Mac).

To add my own use-case scenario, the utility of cross-platform AirDrop isn't just so that you can move your files form your iPhone onto your MacBook or iMac. Many times I wanted to quickly send a file from my iMac to a friend with an iPhone (for example, I just finished a quick recording of our rehearsal and would like to send the file to all the band mates' iPhones). While there are other options here (e-mailing, sharing on iCloud, etc), AirDrop seems, at least to me, the simplest one with the lowest number of steps (drag the file onto the AirDrop -- that's it!). Similar case is when I want to give a file form my iPhone (a VoiceMemo recording, for example) to my friend with a MacBook Air. By far the most elegant and simplest way would be by AirDrop, but now I have to use various work-arounds (sharing on DropBox, having him open my e-mail message, follow the DropBox web linke, etc...).

AirDrop is an incredibly ingenious concept, and as such adds an excellent way for Macs to exchange individual files between each other (as well as iOS devices between themselves). However, its usability (and consequently the usage rate) would go through the roof it Apple engineers were to figure out a way to integrate seamlessly the two platforms.

My message to Apple's feedback link has already been sent. Perhaps they'll think about it.

How this discussion mushroomed into a ******* contest was really strange to watch. I must say, the original quesiton, while possibly phrased in a confusing way, it still valid.

Apple has delivered a timer application, but for some unknown reason has crippled it in a way. There is actually no way for an ordinary user to know that the timer can actually be set for seconds, but the only way to do this would be to talk to the phone. I had no idea until I had stumbled upon this post. And this is the fundamental point of this post -- there is this functionality in an application developed by Apple, but it is somewhat (or almost, depending on the user) inaccessible, because of the user interface.

There has been abundance of various timer applications out there since iPhone 3G. Just like there is no shortage of 3rd-party solutions for sharing files with Macs. This is NOT in dispute here.

Apple has build a reputation for simple, consistent, rich and usable user interface. These types of quirks in it elicit collective WTFs and work against that reputation. AirDrop's cross-platform incompatibility is just another one.

I have been having the same issue, so what I do is send everything via iMessage. It does the trick for me so far, once I save the files I deletes those messages on both iDevices.

Wow, this discussion has really gotten off track. The original "Air Drop between iMac and iphone5 not working" still needs an resolution.

Can anyone give any REAL help here? I have a brand new iPhone 5c and it connects to my iPad but not to my MacBook Pro. Probably the same problem as williamsfamis having.

The listed "answer" is completely false.

Can someone please help here?

The listed "answer" is completely false.

Please explain how the answer that Airdrop is not supported between iOS and Mac OS is false.

It is not supported. There is no resolution. There is no REAL help available until Apple decides to build in the support between the two operating systems.

Here is the official word from Apple:

http://support.apple.com/kb/HT5887

Which part of 'it doesn't work' is causing confusion?

Rich Rydalch wrote:

Wow, this discussion has really gotten off track. The original "Air Drop between iMac and iphone5 not working" still needs an resolution.

Can anyone give any REAL help here? I have a brand new iPhone 5c and it connects to my iPad but not to my MacBook Pro. Probably the same problem as williamsfamis having.

The listed "answer" is completely false.

Can someone please help here?

This listed answer isn't false, it's fact. There's no "REAL" help to give becuase this functionality doesn't exist. Until Apple makes Airdrop between an iPhone and a desktop Mac work there's no help to be given.

Yes, it's completely mindboggling that Apple would introduce a feature like Airdrop and make it so that it doesn't work between many of their own devices... particularly when this exact functionality (how do I move files from my iPhone to my iMac) has been a sore spot for many users for years and making Airdrop functional between iphone/mac would instantly solve that issue. I know, it makes you wonder why they rolled out this feature in the first place. But there you have it, they did, and until they fix this collosal screw up (don't hold your breath) there's nothing to be done about it, sorry.

Sorry about my comment about "false". My fingers kicked in before my brain.

I thought I had read several discussions where they had made it work. But as I re-visited those discussions I see that they were talking about Mac to Mac, not Mac to iOS. I upgraded to Mountain Lion on my MacBook Pro and saw AirDrop on there and I just presumed like many others that if it said "AirDrop" on both it should work.

Again, sorry for the missleading comments.

It's just ridiculous, right? Air Drop between macs on the same network? Why is that a "feature" at all? Isn't that exaclty what file sharing is for? I drop stuff on my wife's iMac desktop all the time, have been for years, never needed "Air Drop" for that.

And sending files between iPhones? Haven't people been using text to do that for years now? Again, why is Air Drop even needed?

But! Moving files from my phone to my iMac... now there's something that is currently not convenient at all and that Air Drop would actually be useful for... and that's the one thing it doesn't do. I just can't understand it.

Apple, aka the New Microsoft. Giving us new features we don't need and leaving out ones we want.

Micah D. wrote:

It's just ridiculous, right? Air Drop between macs on the same network? Why is that a "feature" at all?

It would be if you were right, but Air Drop does not require that both Macs be on the same network, or any network at all for that matter.

To add:

it creates its own ad hoc network (both must have Wifi active for that to work).

I see your point. But on the flip side, if two macs are close enough to each other to use Air Drop why wouldn't they be on the same network already? I guess I can see the use of this feature if there's two people, both with laptops, who want to share files but are in a place where there's no network.

But isn't that a pretty specific and unusual situation? It seems like Air Drop from iphone to desktop would be wayyyyy more useful to a whole lot more people. Why create a feature that will be used in rare situations while ignorning making the same feature useable to a lot more people a lot more often?

You don't have to use it, it is in addition to the other services.