iPhone photos saved on NAS

mattx38

Dabbler
Joined
Apr 3, 2021
Messages
27
Hello,
After having struggled with the nexcloud plugin behavior, I'm looking for another solution to save my photos from my iPhone from my LAN directly to my TrueNAS.
Did someone managed this ?
Thank you for your advices.
 
Joined
Oct 22, 2019
Messages
3,581
If you're up for a less elegant alternative, you can use the iOS app FE File Explorer. It's actively being developed and maintained, and supports SMB, SFTP, FTP, WebDAV, among other protocols.

In the app, you create an entry for an SMB share (such as mainpool/iphone-photos, hosted on your TrueNAS system), while also giving File Explorer permission to access your Photos. You can then transfer photos from FE File Explorer to your SMB share. There's more to the app, as it supports a few other features and nifty conveniences. The only issue is that it does not track what photos were already transferred. (Unless there's a way to keep Photos in sync with the SMB share, but I have yet to discover that.)

The Pro version costs $5 (one-time purchase, no monthly membership nonsense), which allows you to create multiple entries without a limit for only one SMB share. If you try the app out, play around with the free version before you commit to anything. I went ahead and dropped $5 for the Pro version since I use it for many things, not just Photos.
 

diedrichg

Wizard
Joined
Dec 4, 2012
Messages
1,319
Emby, the home media server, can automatically backup your photos. Just install Emby in a jail, mount a dataset as for the storage
 

ceesb62

Cadet
Joined
May 9, 2021
Messages
1
Google translate (sorry)

Have been using Acronis Image Backup for years, from version 2017 the product can also backup mobile devices (iOS and Android) to MAC or Windows or NAS share. You start the backup either from MAC and Windows or from the mobile device. This has the advantage if the children forget to make a backup you can start the backup remotely in case the continues backup option is not set. Obviously, Acronis and the mobile devices must be accessible via WiFi. You can also backup directly to the Acronis cloud if you are on the go and want to secure stored photos, documents, contacts.

My setup Acronis installed on Windows. As soon as the mobile devices come within WiFi range, a backup is made to Windows. Acronis creates an Acronis Drive folder with a subdirectory for each mobile device. Every day a differential Acronis image backs up from the Windows PC to a backup share on TrueNAS. So the mobile backups are in this image backup.

Tip: use a separate backup account under which Acronis runs, not the account with which you log on to MAC or Windows. Give this account read and write rights on the TrueNAS backup share. All other accounts get read rights. This prevents peripheral malware from encrypting your share, as you only have read rights. No rights may be placed on the share itself, it is open to everyone. You always arrange permissions at OS level, and by means of a - in this case - a backup group! In the group are the accounts that are allowed to do something. So don't cross link all kinds of user accounts together, that's not how it works under FreeBSD, Linux and Windows.

Acronis is more than a backup tool, maybe a little too much in the latest versions, but this can be turned off. Unfortunately Acronis is not free, but it has proven itself over the years with a complete PC restore or recovery of files. Good luck!
 

mattx38

Dabbler
Joined
Apr 3, 2021
Messages
27
If you're up for a less elegant alternative, you can use the iOS app FE File Explorer. It's actively being developed and maintained, and supports SMB, SFTP, FTP, WebDAV, among other protocols.

In the app, you create an entry for an SMB share (such as mainpool/iphone-photos, hosted on your TrueNAS system), while also giving File Explorer permission to access your Photos. You can then transfer photos from FE File Explorer to your SMB share. There's more to the app, as it supports a few other features and nifty conveniences. The only issue is that it does not track what photos were already transferred. (Unless there's a way to keep Photos in sync with the SMB share, but I have yet to discover that.)

The Pro version costs $5 (one-time purchase, no monthly membership nonsense), which allows you to create multiple entries without a limit for only one SMB share. If you try the app out, play around with the free version before you commit to anything. I went ahead and dropped $5 for the Pro version since I use it for many things, not just Photos.
This method works well, and the app can also convert HEIC iPhone photo format on the fly.
There is a photo browser directly available in the app, so I can select the photos I want to transfert and copy it to the SMB folder of my choice on the NAS ; can also add favorites folders to quick access to it.
Without installing other jail plugin, this is a good solution for my need.
Thank you.

I think that Emby could has been a good solution if I didn't have installed Plex yet.
 

adrianwi

Guru
Joined
Oct 15, 2013
Messages
1,231
Nextcloud works perfectly for me in achieving exactly this. Just don't use the plugin version!
 
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