Feature request: option to write PhotosApp-assigned geolocation into original files

[Sufentafix]

First of all thank you for the great work.

It would be great if I could use GeoTag to write the geolocation that I assigned to photos within the Apple Photos app into the Exif section of the original files (e.g. by using ExifTool). I have thousands of old pictures that I added geolocation to within the PhotosApp, so batch processing would be essential.... 😬

I can not use the Photos app to do that since I do not allow to copy files to the Photos Library during import (did that mistake once and paid dearly!).

Christoph

[marchyman]

Hello Christoph,

Apple does not provide an approved way to change the original file. If I hack my way around their limitations I’d not be allowed in the app store.

But I may not be up to date with Photos... how do you use Photos to assign a location to an image without putting the image in your library?

My recommendation is to where possible update locations before importing images.

[Sufentafix]

Hello Marc, thank you for your super quick reply. As long as the image files are not "physically" imported into the library they stay where they are and they are being referenced by Photos. All the editing-changes that take place within Photos (including the assignment of a location) have no "physical" effect of the referenced files, the files remain unchanged.

When I load pictures from my Photos library into GeoTag via the library button in GeoTag, they already show the location I assigned to them within Photos. However, this information is not stored within the physical files themselves but only within the Photos library. Hence my feature request.

I do understand that being kicked out of the app store isn't worth it. Out of curiosity: Would it be possible (= ok for apple) to implement this feature only in the dmg-version that can be downloaded from snafu.org and is not on the app store?

Christoph

[marchyman]

I'll have to play with Photos in the mode you are using. Any Apple limitations would only apply to images stored inside the library, I believe. If the images are stored elsewhere and the user gives the app permissions to access all should be fine.

Having the same version in the app store and on my web site is for my convenience. It lowers the effort needed to test and release new versions.

[Sufentafix]

👍🏻 Thank you!

[marchyman]

Christoph -- can I assume what you have done is gone into settings and unchecked the "Copy items to the Photos library" when importing option?

[Sufentafix]

Correct.

[oPromessa]

First of all thank you for the great work.

It would be great if I could use GeoTag to write the geolocation that I assigned to photos within the Apple Photos app into the Exif section of the original files (e.g. by using ExifTool). I have thousands of old pictures that I added geolocation to within the PhotosApp, so batch processing would be essential.... 😬

I can not use the Photos app to do that since I do not allow to copy files to the Photos Library during import (did that mistake once and paid dearly!).

Christoph

While searching for something else I bumped into this question. Check osxphotos and the push-exif option which allows you to "push" from Photos into the actual files via exiftool on disk attributes like date/time and location.

[Sufentafix]

While searching for something else I bumped into this question. Check [osxphotos](https://github.com/RhetTbull/osxphotos) and the push-exif option which allows you to "push" from Photos into the actual files via exiftool on disk attributes like date/time and location.

Thank you very much. This is quite a powerful software. However, one downside is that one can not easily (or at all?) select individual, or a list of pictures/files to be updated (push-exif). I ended up updating all the files of the library and then restoring the files from backup that already had the location embedded within the exif section before (to keep them unaltered). Now I have several thousand geolocation-updated files 👍🏻😀

However, having this option in GeoTag would make it much easier to deal with only some individual/selected files ...