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Anyone ready to move 'to the iCloud' ?

The major issue with iCloud - with the iOS devices, especially - is not being able to save multiple app files within a single folder that's part of a folder system. This alone dooms the iDevices from replacing the computer and is a recognized failure if you check the iOS forums.

For example, I have a small graphics biz with folders (and folders within folders) for each account. You can imagine the variety of apps involved in producing any number of projects. And I can't even imagine trying to pull together data from a storage system based on apps.

Because of this, Dropbox or some other 3rd party syncing app is needed for multi-computer/device syncing. iCloud isn't the answer, IMO, and it's too bad. However, even if it did, I don't want my data on a distant server for all the reasons others have listed.
 
blipmusic said:
Online-only is a no-go for may years to come. However, if Apple (or someone else) solve the problems with app-centric systems while managing to remove the barrier between online and offline, my interest will be piqued.
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I agree with everything you said, I just quoted this little bit so it isn't quite as long. Right now iCloud really needs to get closer to Dropbox's functionality.
 
I had all my important/irreplaceable documents on my iDisk in case my HDD crashed and I wasn't able to back it up in time. Now, it's all on my local disk. :rolleyes:

I want iDisk back! :mad:
 
I agree that it's time for a more innovative approach to file organization on today's OS'; however, apple's approach is simply garbage.:rolleyes:
 
Apple really needs to fix the iOS versions of iWork. It's frustrating to work on files alternately between iOS and Mac, since the iOS versions complain about needing to convert the files.

I noticed that the files bloat to about 5 times their size after being converted. I also had a problem where every single file I converted became unreadable. I opened the converted versions on my Mac, and after they were edited and saved, they became unreadable on iOS with the error "can only open iWork 09 files". Luckily, I had a time machine backup or those files would have been gone.

Let's hope iOS6 helps in some regard. That or a iWork 12.
 
Soccer5se said:
I cloud is cool but I like dropbox much better, mainly because dropbox will allow me to add more storage for free. So far I have 21GB of space. However, I will be stuck at 5GB for I-cloud forever.

Rich
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This is not true, you can buy more storage on iCloud and increase your capacity as soon as you wanted to.
 
dcorban said:
Apple really needs to fix the iOS versions of iWork. It's frustrating to work on files alternately between iOS and Mac, since the iOS versions complain about needing to convert the files.

I noticed that the files bloat to about 5 times their size after being converted. I also had a problem where every single file I converted became unreadable. I opened the converted versions on my Mac, and after they were edited and saved, they became unreadable on iOS with the error "can only open iWork 09 files". Luckily, I had a time machine backup or those files would have been gone.

Let's hope iOS6 helps in some regard. That or a iWork 12.
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Ya no kidding. Talk about false advertising here:

http://www.apple.com/icloud/features/documents.html

Apple said:
Every document, every edit, everywhere.
With iCloud, the documents you create stay up to date across all your devices — automatically. You don’t have to remember to upload your work to a special folder, or browse a cluttered file system to find it again. Your documents are right there in your app, completely up to date and ready whenever you need them. Which means you can easily access the latest versions anytime on whatever device you happen to be using at the time.
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Where is the footnote listing all the features that are not compatible with this? I'm surprised there hasn't been Class Action Lawsuits filed, given that we saw such lawsuits for Apple's use of the 4G and LTE labels on their website in other countries.
 
steve-p said:
Thing is, in your scenario Dropbox is still a better solution. You would not have to rsync anything. Dropbox is unique I believe in cloud solutions in that it also does local LAN copies if it can. When you change a file on one computer, other cloud services would have to upload the file to the cloud, and the other computer(s) would have to fetch them back again over the Internet, which is slow. Dropbox is clever enough to notice if a computer needs a file and it can be found on another computer on the LAN. So when you saved a file on your iMac, it would instantly and automatically sync to the MBP. if you happened to make a change on your MBP, it would sync back again and update the iMac. And you get the benefit of an off-site copy of everything too. I work on 3 different machines and all are kept in sync all the time without doing anything. It's more Apple-like than the Apple solution to me. It's free up to a point, too.
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wow, I never knew about that. I mean i've registered with dropbox years ago (never used it btw) but the LAN copies thing is new to me. I will check that out, thanks.
 
Tankmaze said:
wow, I never knew about that. I mean i've registered with dropbox years ago (never used it btw) but the LAN copies thing is new to me.
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iCloud supposedly does the same thing, by the way.

John Siracusa said:
File data transfer is also peer-to-peer, when possible. For example, if a Mac uploads a new file to iCloud, an iPad that's on the same local network as the Mac can request the file data from the Mac itself, rather than pulling it down from iCloud over an Internet connection.
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steve-p said:
I agree, although I would also add notes, Safari bookmarks and Photo Stream to the really useful list. I guess for everything else I find DropBox much more useful on 3 different computers, and don't need access to anything in there much on my iPhone or iPad.
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I did forget about Photo Stream -- I do find that useful. Safari bookmarks would be great too, if Safari wasn't such a horrid browser for me.

samplane123 said:
iCloud is great for everything but the document storage. The fact that documents can only be stored and seen by individual apps makes it pretty much useless.
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I agree, it is too limited to be really useful for document storage. But I also find iCloud mail to be unreliable. When I was using it, there were several occasions when I didn't receive emails for more than 6 hours after they were sent, and in some cases not at all. There's no reason for me to use iCloud for mail when there are so many more reliable alternatives.
 
When I can store a PDF in iCloud and open the SAME file in both Preview and GoodReader (on iPad/iPhone), then I'll consider it. Currently I cannot do this and that makes it worthless. Having two copies of the same file for two different applications is wasting cloud space and create a headache if I update one of the copies.

Contacts/Calendar - OK
Documents - F-No.
 
I'll be using it for things that can't be opened by other programs. 'Numbers,' for instance. I can't open those files with anything else so they might as well stay in the cloud.

But things like images or text files...yeah, I'm not so sure about those.
 
bogatyr said:
When I can store a PDF in iCloud and open the SAME file in both Preview and GoodReader (on iPad/iPhone), then I'll consider it.
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You already can. GoodReader's stored iCloud documents are indexed by Spotlight. You could also look for them directly in the ~/Library/Mobile Documents/ folder (which is slightly cumbersome I guess). Personally, I've simply put GoodReader's 'Documents' folder into the Dock, which works great for accessing the files.
 
tkermit said:
You already can. GoodReader's stored iCloud documents are indexed by Spotlight. You could also look for them directly in the ~/Library/Mobile Documents/ folder (which is slightly cumbersome I guess). Personally, I've simply put GoodReader's 'Documents' folder into the Dock, which works great for accessing the files.
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Thanks for the tip. That does make it somewhat workable though the fact it is hidden leaves me wondering if it'll disappear later on. I still don't like the way they did iCloud. There should just be a central way to access ALL iCloud documents in a VISIBLE location that is documented.
 
richest said:
Can you store jpegs and videos?
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You sure can.

bogatyr said:
Thanks for the tip. That does make it somewhat workable though the fact it is hidden leaves me wondering if it'll disappear later on. I still don't like the way they did iCloud. There should just be a central way to access ALL iCloud documents in a VISIBLE location that is documented.
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I agree. It's basically a workaround to achieve some functionality that Apple doesn't seem to think they need (or should) expose in the GUI at this point. I'm hoping for the same thing you are. For the time being, a smart folder works for me though.
 
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