When does MAC OS X finally allow to identify iPhone as USB-stick resp. as external hard-drive??? Would make life much easier!!!

There is no accessible file management in iOS as part of the security design of the system. I would say the chance of a change is nil.

With IOS in general, I am as ignorant as I am naive, but isn't this kind of what "AirDrop" is for - file transfers? - ÇÇÇ <😕

There are lots of ways of moving files.

iPad to your computer via USB

-- "iExplorer's disk mounting features allow you to use your iPhone, iPod or iPad like a USB flash drive."

http://www.macroplant.com/iexplorer/

A simple and popular way to copy files and share files among your devices.

https://www.dropbox.com/

"Box lets you store all of your content online, so you can access, manage and share it from anywhere. Integrate Box with Google Apps and Salesforce and access Box on mobile devices" Rated the most secure cloud storage by SkyHigh Networks. You can buy a license to run box one of your servers.

https://www.box.com/

Using iTunes to transfer files:

http://support.apple.com/kb/HT4094?viewlocale=en_US&locale=en_US

Files Connect -- "Cloud Storage services like Dropbox, MobileMe iDisk, Google Docs/Picasa, Facebook photos, FTP, SFTP, WebDAV ... AFS (Apple File Shares) SMB (Windows shares) protocols"

https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/files-connect/id404324302?mt=8

Windows File server

http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/filebrowser-access-files-on/id364738545?mt=8

"The kiteworks mobile file sharing solution provides secure creation, viewing, and sharing of enterprise content on smartphones and tablets while providing IT and security teams the administrative controls to manage user privileges and access rights necessary to ensure enterprise security and compliance." " Includes choice of private cloud on-premise."

http://www.accellion.com/solutions/mobile-enablement/mobile-file-sharing

"Dukto is a simple application that allows you to share files between devices connected to the same (wireless) LAN network."

http://www.tidal.it/?page_id=309&lang=en

http://www.msec.it/blog/?page_id=11

You could look into Apple's airdrop.
"To share content with AirDrop, both people need one of these devices using iOS 7 or later, or a Mac with OS X Yosemite"
Use AirDrop to wirelessly share content - Apple Support

I think apple wants to move in the direction of auto syncing across all of your devices. Flash drives are so yesterday. Look into iCloud. I do not use iCloud so don't know the details.

Suggestions on transferring...

documents -- what documents types and app type are we talking about transferring? Use apps that integrate with dropbox or google cloud.

photos, videos -- I think apples intent is to you iPhote to sync these. Dropbox works well for syncing these. Photo are shared read only to all apps.

and musik -- Apple intends for you to use iTunes and more recently iClould to share all you music. Music will be shared to all your devices.

There are many more apps like iExplorer. Find them will be left to the reader.

I think apple choose to make the iPad act like a camera when connected to a computer by default. At least that is the way it works when connected to windows 😉.

Have you looked into iCloud?

Robert

PS. I use dropbox and email. 😀

photos, videos -- I think apples intent is to you iPhote to sync these. Dropbox works well for syncing these. Photo are shared read only to all apps.

Everyone will need to rethink and relearn their photos/videos methods when this is released:

http://www.apple.com/osx/photos-preview/

Fortunately for me, I don't use iPhoto or the cloud, and I won't be using the new Photos. I like being able to quickly find mine and not have to worry about updating/incompatible libraries or losing them.

up1nw wrote:

Thank you very much for these comprehensive recommendations of which I already tried some but didn't find even one comparable to the simple way to recognize iPhone as USB-stick.

I will try, though, the other ways you recommend for file transfer and maybe .....

Kind regards

Uwe from Germany

(and a little slow because of

his age of almost 80 ys. 😀)

There are a couple of good reasons that Apple doesn't allow access to the file system on iOS. The most important one is security. Each application on iOS is given its own memory area, and cannot access the memory of the operating system or of any other applications. This has worked amazingly well, because in the 7 years that iPhones have been around there have not been any viruses that have infected non-jailbroken iPhones.

USB sticks are also a primary way of spreading viruses and trojans (collectively malware). For example, the Stuxnet virus that got into Iran's computer control systems and destroyed 1,000 centrifuges originally arrived on a USB stick. For this reason most large companies (and many small companies) no longer permit the use of USB sticks with company computers. If the iPhone could be used as a USB stick those companies would ban the use of iPhones on premises.

This is something to consider when you use a USB stick. Apparently millions of them contain malware from before they leave the factory, because the manufacturer's systems have been hacked. So they aren't really safe for anyone to use for anything.