Keywords not syncing properly with iCloud Photo Library

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Keywords not syncing properly with iCloud Photo Library

I have three devices, a Mac Mini, an iPhone and an iPad. All are up-to-date (Mac Mini is on the 10.10.4 first beta) and all have iCloud Photo Library enabled and Photo Stream disabled. The Mac Mini is where all my photos are stored, so I have 'Download entire library' or whatever enabled. The iDevices are both switched to 'Optimize storage'.

I am going through the process of updating keywords on the photos on the Mac Mini so that I can get rid of the concept of albums and just search by keyword and location. This works fine (although after half an hour of doing it, adding a new keyword tends to make Photos hang for a minute or so until I close and reopen the program).

The issue I have is that these keywords aren't being updated on my iPhone (new photos sync eventually, but not as fast as on the iPad). So if I search on my iPhone for a keyword I've added since I switched on iCloud Photo Library, it doesn't show up in the results. Everything is fine on the iPad; things are updated immediately and I can search by any keyword I've added, even if I only added it in the past 24 hours. So I'm guessing the issue is with my iPhone.

I've already disabled and re-enabled iCloud Photo Library twice and it seems to update the keywords to that point, but then any new keywords I add won't sync.

Does anyone else have this issue or know how to solve it?

iPhone 6, iOS 8.3

Posted on May 13, 2015 4:48 PM

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Answer 1

OOOwen

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May 22, 2015 6:13 AM in response to gnhill_nz

That's interesting that keyword search is working on your iPad. I've switched both of my devices to use iCloud Photo Library. I have uploaded a lot of photos to iCloud that I know have keywords in them. Searching on the iPhone by keyword doesn't work for me either. I'll check my iPad when I get home and see if it works there. I really need this functionality to help search for a particular photo on the phone (I have 6000 on the phone now). I've also put in a request to Apple to fix the keyword search problem on the phone and a feature request to be able to add keywords from the phone directly. I use the phone as my main camera on trips and vacations and being able to add keywords on the fly and then search by them later would be very useful.

iPhone 6 Plus, 2nd Gen iPad, latest IOS on both.

OS

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Answer 2

gnhill_nz Author

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May 24, 2015 12:10 PM in response to OOOwen

I think the issue was just a general sync problem with my iPhone. Possibly because some photos on the phone were from before I enabled iCloud Photo Library, but I don't know the exact reason. My iPhone

I managed to fix it by making sure all my photos from my iPhone were on my computer, disabling iCloud on my iPhone completely, erasing all remaining photos on my iPhone (had to select one by one because iOS lacks a 'Select All'), and then resetting my iPhone. Then I activated iCloud, enabled iCloud Photo Library and left it to sync.

Now when I change keywords on the Mac Mini it updates almost immediately on my iPhone. Occasionally it gets stuck on 'uploading' for a while, but it gets there after a few hours. I think that's just a general issue with the speed of iCloud though.

I agree that Apple need to add the ability to attach keywords on iOS. It seems like basic functionality, but then you can't even view the time a photo was taken, so they've obvioualy got something against dealing with metadata in iOS.

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