I'm noticing that drag and drop from Photos to anything does not work. Its like we're going backwards in time. It seems ridiculous that we have to go through the Export function to get images out of the application. Why Apple?
I just think that the original ask in this thread is a very reasonable thing to ask. Apple claims "drag and drop" functionality in conjunction with Photos. It works in some places, and in other places it doesn't.
As you observed - drag and drop is working for some destinations and others not.There are two major reasons for this:
Look. I'll start by apologizing. In my original comment (the one that was deleted), I was a little heated at the time, and I called the higher level posters jerks. That's probably why my post was deleted -- my bad. Let me see if I can express my observations without resorting to ad-hominems, and do so in a more constructive manner.
I just think that the original ask in this thread is a very reasonable thing to ask. Apple claims "drag and drop" functionality in conjunction with Photos. It works in some places, and in other places it doesn't. In particular, when I try to upload pictures from Photos to Facebook in Safari, drag and drop doesn't work. But the funny thing is, I can drag and drop to the desktop, and then drag and drop from there to Safari, and it works.
From my humble view as a lowly consumer, this has all the markings of a defect, and I'm sincerely surprised it hasn't been fixed yet. I realize that the moderators here are non-Apple employees, but I also realize that some of the posters here seem to indicate that they work at Apple. Maybe we can reach some of them who may be in a position to do something. (Sending feedback the "proper" way seems to be ignored ... already tried that long ago.)
The high-level posters often bring good things to the table. Highly rated implies they know what they're talking about. Their advice should be heeded. But often in this forum, these same highly-rated posters can easily come across as being condescending and attacking -- especially in this thread, which appears to be filled with many non-constructive posts. I observed that going on here, and I made the mistake of trying to stand up for the little guy, and I got slapped. My bad. I should have been more diplomatic in my wording.
I love Apple and I want to see them succeed. This is a good forum to come and get answers, but I would love it more if it weren't so hostile.
Keep in mind... the photo "object" on the desktop is not likely the same as the photo "object" from Photos.
If you were patient enough one time to use the export function from the media browser you say is slow, that could help narrow things down. That is the advocated way to insert photos from photos to app xxx. If it works, that could prove that drag and drop from Photos is simply not supported either outbound by Apple or inbound by Facebook.
I'm a developer and looked into this issue. There is no new drag and drop API for apps to support, but there is a new type of thing that can be drag and dropped.
Basically, whenever you drag an image in Os X, it tells the target app something like "Dragging an image! Can you handle this?", and then the app says "yeah sure, you can put an image here!". This is how it works in iPhoto and almost every other app when you drag an image. However, it's different in Photos. Basically, when you dragging a photo from Photos, Os X says: "There will be an image in this location for you at some future time. You should load it once it's there. Can you deal with this?" The thing that is dragged is not of type image, but a promise of an image in the future. Very few apps can deal with this - not even Apple's very own image drag and drop sample application!
I have some suspicion why Apple changed this behaviour: with Photos, it's possible that pictures aren't available locally and only stored in iCloud. Additionally, when dragging photos from Photos, some export logic is done that needs some time (eg., pictures are exported to jpg, even if the original is something else). So Photos needs time to prepare before the photos are ready for the other app. That's why Photos can't hand over photos directly when doing drag and drop.
Apple could change this, and allow "normal" drag and drop of pictures with that are available offline. But this has disadvantages: Drag and drop would, seemingly randomly, not work if pictures are not available offline. Drag and drop would also not work, again seemingly randomly, if you have images in a format that the drop destination does not work with (heic and raw formats come to mind).
On the other hand, it's a problem that it's pretty much only the Photos app that doesn't "just work". From a developer perspective, you have to add functionality specifically to enable drag and drop from Photos.
One possible solution (if anyone at Apple is reading this): When dragging photos, Photos could indicate via some progress ring next to the images that the images are being prepared. Normally, this should be fast. Once the ring is complete, photos can be drag and dropped in the normal way.
iPhoto? This is unchanged. And if you're trying to get the image to Photoshop why use drag and drop? Just set it as an external editor.
It does indeed work with Facebook when I use the media browser, but it really is slow loading -- I've done it a million times until I learned here the alternate annoying but quick method that was described earlier. I guess the slow loading issue would be another thread, so I won't pursue that here. 🙂
I suppose what I'm learning (based on the evidence) is that drag-and-drop from Photos to Safari isn't supported (that is, outbound by Apple). It's sad, but I can deal.
Have you taken the time to inform Apple that their code is bad, they are the only ones that can change their code, posting here is a complete waste of your time. Tell the people who can do something about it.
Apple Feedback Slot
When I paste into the Facebook status window, I get an interesting error message. "Error: UnadjustedNonRaw_thumb_" ... and I can't read the rest. Perhaps that's a clue behind the defect.
If you are/were trying to drag and drop in to a Facebook window, the failure would likely be Facebook's, as they have to code that in to their application.
It's just bad Apple code. I was a part of a testing team for this stuff back in the day. Why do we have key codes as well as drag-and-drop? We figured out that people approach their computing in different ways, and all of them need to be honored. You might find it useless. I find it highly useful. We both paid prime dollar for our gear. Who are the engineers to dictate methodology? That's so very MICROSOFT/old school mainframe.
Also, it was in previous iPhoto iterations. There was no reason to take it out in Photos.
It does in Sierra, as for High Sierra no one will comment until it Is released, as whatever the status is, it may change.
Nice ... I love having my comments deleted. It's clear who's in control of this forum.
Just to be clear: my earlier comments were directed at people who seem to be working for Apple -- people who might be in a position to actually do something about the OP complaint instead of coming up with excuses and defending Apple's poor decisions.
If your comments are being deleted it is because you are violating the TOU - and being fragrant since the hosts seldom delete comments even nasty ones
and not only do you not follow the TOU ut you fail to understand that NO ONE here works for aPple and NO ONE here can change anything
And no on ehere is defending anything or making excuses for anything - we are experienced users who understand that we can not change anything so we explain how the software works - if you do not like it then you need to accept it for what it is or switch to something that does what you want - nothing you say here is ever going to cause a change in the software nor is it likely that Apple will provided custom software to meet your personal desirous - that is not the business they are in
SO read and follow the TOU and stop attacking people and you will be fine - keep up the attacks and you will continue to have problems and eventually you will be gone
LN
I love having my comments deleted. It's clear who's in control of this forum.
Yes. Apple. Their yard. Their rules.
You knew that when you created a username to post here.
my earlier comments were directed at people who seem to be working for Apple
Most who post here are volunteers who answer answerable technical support questions.
Debating decisions made by Apple is expressly forbidden here.
Their yard. Their rules.
instead of coming up with excuses and defending Apple's poor decisions.
See above please.
Thanks for the response, léonie.
I could understand your first point except I'm talking Safari here. If Photos claims to "drag and drop" to everything, it seems like a bare minimum would be for it to work with other Apple products, as iPhoto used to do.
Your second point gave me a hint that I decided to try: copy and paste. But alas, it does not work with Safari (unless I'm doing it wrong). I go to Photos, and I've tried doing apple-C on both the thumbnail and the picture itself. I get the same error from both. The clipboard also says, "unknown / items." Is there another way to copy the picture from iPhoto?
When I paste into the Facebook status window, I get an interesting error message. "Error: UnadjustedNonRaw_thumb_" ... and I can't read the rest. Perhaps that's a clue behind the defect.
So far, the best advice I get from this thread is to create a folder on the desktop, drag/drop the photos into there, then drag/drop elsewhere, and finally delete the folder when I'm done. That's actually a lot faster than using Mac's Browse functionality which takes literally two minutes on my computer to load the "Picture" search results.
Yes, you could be right, but it's not just Facebook. It's also Blogger, Google Image Search, and just about anywhere I try to drag-and-drop a picture anywhere in Safari/Firefox/other. I could try bugging Facebook and see what they say ...
Actually, now to think of it, can anyone demonstrate even one website where the drag-and-drop works from Photos? If so, then I will gladly concede that the issue is on the Facebook side.
I will say that I can get one thing to work. If I drag-and-drop a picture from Photos to a Safari window (to some blank space), it will correctly show the picture in the browser window and show the file's location in the address bar, but that feature doesn't really help me.
Drag and drop from Photos? Nope.
