Stock Camera or Gallery - How do I disable the "alternate" folder? - X 2014 Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting

I take pictures a lot, and when I navigate my folders to copy pictures off the phone, I've noticed that there is a folder: \sdcard\DCIM\Camera\Alternate, where other versions of pictures I've taken have been dumped into.
I understand what it's trying to do.... it's using some algorithm to determine that I took a bunch of similar photos, and it's choosing the best of them and hiding the rest. I much prefer to manually select which photos to keep, and I want to turn that feature off.
Is it a camera feature? If so, where is the setting for to turn this off?
If it is camera feature, and it can't be disabled... I know there are other camera apps... is it possible to map a different camera app to the camera-open shake? Because I use that a lot.
Thanks in advance.

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[WIP] New Gallery Application

Hey everyone,
After wrestling with the HTC Album for a while, I've got tired of it not doing what I want it to do and have therefore started developing my own. I'm still in the algorithm writing stage but it's coming along very nicely as yet.
Here's some of the features that I'm planning:
Database Backend - This will be extensible through the use of 'tagging'. You will be able to add an 'infinite' number of tags to each photo.
UI - Will allow swiping through pictures and other enhancements over the standard app.
Different Browsing Views - Can browse via the database (and tags) or the normal file based directory views.
EXIF tags - Ability to read them. Not sure on where I'm going with this feature yet.
There's no time frame when this will be first released, but it will be out when I have it in a nice stable state, and feature-wise, similar to the HTC Album. Further features will then be added in further (quick) releases. I have a name of the application in mind but I don't want to announce it yet as this application is very much in progress. I also don't want someone to steal the name.
So why have I posted this? Well I know the good people of XDA are full of good ideas so I'm asking you this: what would you want from this new Gallery app?
Reserved for future use.
will you try to add in multi touch like the demo photo app of long ago that was never refined? i cant wait for you to finish, the htc album gets on my nerves too. it always reorders the pictures as it pleases even though i have "sort by date" selected after a wipe.
yea, add multitouch
As long as there are more sorting options ill be eternally grateful
Not sure on multitouch as I don't really see a need for it (plus can't be bothered with the potential Patent infringement stuff). I will include a nicer way of zooming in and out than the simple buttons though, and I think it's more elegant than multitouch.
Regarding sorting, there will definetly be better sorting options. And i'll make sure they actually work too. This is probably the number one thing that annoys the hell out of me with the HTC Album.
Have the ability to pick a folder of images or folders.
I hate using gallery on my phone and it picks every picture on my SD card. Kinda annoying honestly, but hey it is what it is.
Also implement features such as double tap to zoom...hate using the zoom toolbar
And auto rotate with animation
Refer to app called "Picture Viewer" to understand wht i am talkin about...its a nice app just lackin features...
http://www.cyrket.com/package/rip.android.GlImageView
an idea for zooming: clockwise to zoom in and counter-clockwise to zoom out ... i dont remember where ive seen that before but just seems like a cool idea if able to be implemented
xidominicanoix said:
an idea for zooming: clockwise to zoom in and counter-clockwise to zoom out ... i dont remember where ive seen that before but just seems like a cool idea if able to be implemented
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Hmm the app i refered to in the above post has zoom in / zoom out by moving ur finger up or down
Different implementation possibilities lol
Check out the Albums program from Hero. It has some nice features: pinch zoom in/out, sd card/facebook/flicker albums, swipe to navigate, slideshow animations, autorotate animation, grid or directory view, etc.
The tags feature you are adding would be great since I have them in directories for now (basically 1 tag only).
The ability to add pictures from a remote "gallery" server (or similar remote server you can run at home) would be great since I don't put all my pictures on facebook/flicker (nor do I want to).
http://gallery.sourceforge.net/
I think a zoom feature like this would be nice if you think that you could do it. You can watch it in action if you watch the video. It two minutes and six seconds in.
http://phandroid.com/2009/03/18/androids-circular-zoom-on-the-htc-magic/
What annoys me the most is the phone generating thumbnails for all 1600 of my pictures, I have to leave it there for 10 minutes or so to let it do that. My old phone, which a dumb phone never had to do that when browsing all the pictures and was way faster.
I second SolemnWishing's request. I would like to see the thumbnail part in the default gallery done away with in the app. Are you going for a complete default gallery replacement app or will this piggyback in anyway off the default one? I would like to be able to replace it completely just like the launcher.apk and the mms.apk.
SolemnWishing said:
What annoys me the most is the phone generating thumbnails for all 1600 of my pictures, I have to leave it there for 10 minutes or so to let it do that. My old phone, which a dumb phone never had to do that when browsing all the pictures and was way faster.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Hmm yea tht is frustrating, i hope the OP finds a way around it..perhaps read the images n instead of creating smaller ones it shud just resize the images n display them or somethin....
tmjonesva said:
will you try to add in multi touch like the demo photo app of long ago that was never refined? i cant wait for you to finish, the htc album gets on my nerves too. it always reorders the pictures as it pleases even though i have "sort by date" selected after a wipe.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
There are a few great features in the demo app. If you could get a hold of the source ... WOW ... it could save you a lot of time and give you a great start on creating a kick ass gallery app. Good Luck!!
I don't agree with the request to eliminate the thumbnailing. Thumbnailing is a great feature and only happens the first time you open a particular image set - it is then databased so the thumbnails load instantly later. A more customizable approach would be a better idea, like the option to disable thumbnailing selectively.
It would be nice to have the option of EXCLUDING and/or HIDING certain paths, for example, some programs add in their own images that you most likely don't want visible in the gallery. I don't like those image hiding programs that screw with the file extensions, and suggest that password protection and obfuscation isn't necessary -- just the ability to keep the crap out.

[Q] Location of camera thumbnails

Somehow I messed up setting up my wife's new Moto X. In the past I had some tasker tasks to transfer all the photos off our phones and onto our NAS every night. In setting up the task on her new phone I deleted a slew of pictures. I know the original photos are gone and I'll face the music on that one. However, if I go to camera and swipe to the left I can scroll through all the photos. I can't email or share any because the file is gone, but if I can see the photos there must be a low res image someplace on the phone still. Anyone know how to access these and possibly get me out of the doghouse? They're not in the DCIM folder at all. I poked around in the Android/Data folder a bit, but did not find them.
On the same note, is there a way to clean these out over time? Seems to me if I have a thumbnail of every photo ever taken it would eventually fill up the storage.
Thanks
Get an app like astro file manager, or root Explorer and go to storage then DCIM and your thumbnail pics should be there.
Sent from my XT1097 using XDA Free mobile app
clskier said:
Somehow I messed up setting up my wife's new Moto X. In the past I had some tasker tasks to transfer all the photos off our phones and onto our NAS every night. In setting up the task on her new phone I deleted a slew of pictures. I know the original photos are gone and I'll face the music on that one. However, if I go to camera and swipe to the left I can scroll through all the photos. I can't email or share any because the file is gone, but if I can see the photos there must be a low res image someplace on the phone still. Anyone know how to access these and possibly get me out of the doghouse? They're not in the DCIM folder at all. I poked around in the Android/Data folder a bit, but did not find them.
On the same note, is there a way to clean these out over time? Seems to me if I have a thumbnail of every photo ever taken it would eventually fill up the storage.
Thanks
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Those are probably all cached. As for recovering them, I'm sure you can find them in the cache -- I don't know where they'd be saved (I believe there is a /cache partition but then there's also the possibility that the gallery caches those previews somewhere in /data/). It may be easier to to screen shot the ones you want.
EDIT: see above post - that's probably what you want
As for the cache growing, I'd imaging that the gallery app has some sort of maintenance. But there is always the option of using apps (I have SD Maid, personally) and/or periodically clearing the cache partition via a custom recovery
Thanks all. This was good info also. I ended up finding the files on my NAS which leads me to a whole other question which I will post seperately from this as it only related by symptoms.

[Q] Need help deleting photos.

Does anyone know how to delete photos off of the Nexus 6. Everytime I try to delete a photo from the device a warning comes up and tells me it will be deleted from Google Drive as well. I just want it off the phone to save space.
I do want things synced so for local deletes I use Quick Pic https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.alensw.PicFolder
The other thing I like about that program is all the photos snapshots videos in any directory are immediately available, regardless of whether it was synced or not. Also has better sorting options for looking at previews. I would probably delete photos app entirely if quick pics would sync to Google Drive.
I would definitely like more options or if somebody has a better solution I would like to hear it. It seems silly having to run two "gallery" programs.
Sent from my Google N6 on VZ
Is there a way to do it without having to add an app. Not being able to delete from the device seems quite ridiculous. If not possible through the photo app on Lollipop this seems like a MAJOR flaw that needs to be fixed.
Esantry78 said:
Is there a way to do it without having to add an app. Not being able to delete from the device seems quite ridiculous. If not possible through the photo app on Lollipop this seems like a MAJOR flaw that needs to be fixed.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I might have a solution for you: open your stock camera app. Instead of taking a photo, just swipe toward the left. That'll give yourself access to photos without going into the Google Photos app. You can delete photos from there. It's not as efficient as it could be, but you won't lose your photos in the Google Photos app. Good luck.

how do I prevent viber from saving pictures to gallery

In an iPhone, viber allows manual saving of images. Meaning, clicking an image to enlarge gives an option to save. In android, even with all auto download toggles off, enlarging an image automatically saves to gallery.
line messenger on Android does it correctly, offering a download icon once you enlarge an image...
Anyone know how? Or viber just somehow didn't include this option in android...
koppee1 said:
In an iPhone, viber allows manual saving of images. Meaning, clicking an image to enlarge gives an option to save. In android, even with all auto download toggles off, enlarging an image automatically saves to gallery.
line messenger on Android does it correctly, offering a download icon once you enlarge an image...
Anyone know how? Or viber just somehow didn't include this option in android...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Not using Viber may be? :laugh:
You can place .nomedia file in the folder with My Files app. Images will not show up in Gallery if that helps.
The nomedia file option is a good one. I use an app called nomedia from the play store.
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.mrck.nomedia
Works and is easy to use. I had the same problem with Whatsapp.
You can try to deny the storage permission in app settings.
Sent from my SM-N950F using Tapatalk
Viber saves the images on both devices. The difference is Viber saves images inside the app on iphone and Viber saves images inside Gallery on android. That's why when you go to settings on iphone and check the usage, you might see Viber taking high memory usage because all the photos are saved inside the app.

Change the screenshots folder because google photos

Hey all.
Does anybody knows how to change the Screenshots folder to InternalStorage/pictures/screenshots (like all the other android devices) instead of InternalStorage/DCIM/Screenshots?
In the galaxy s10 it saves automatically in the DCIM folders and Google Photos detects it like has been taken with the Camera so it automatically backups all the screenshots like normal photos. This is very frustrating.
Does anybody knows a solution for this?
I am currently using an app named "PinSync" that automatically moves the screenshots for the storage i want but it has a Cons which is that it invalid the Smart screenshot menu, it doesn allow me to edit or share directly. It's only a mending when i want a true solution.
Thanks
Try putting a .nomedia file in the folder. Only drawback is that your gallery won't show them either.
I hate this. I used Pinsync and it was cool but I need Smart Scroll too much
so I just routinely purge Google Photos backup
sigh
I may try the .nomedia file for now since I usually just share screenshots immediately and purge later
vonDubenshire said:
I hate this. I used Pinsync and it was cool but I need Smart Scroll too much
so I just routinely purge Google Photos backup
sigh
I may try the .nomedia file for now since I usually just share screenshots immediately and purge later
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I was using PinSync also, but now I dont even take screenshots anymore. I use the Smart Select edge panel and select whatever part of the screen to share (or the whole screen), and once I share it to an app and send it, I back out and the image is not saved.
Still, taking a screenshot and immediately pressing Share takes a lot less effort. I wish Samsung would just move their screenshots folder as it being in DCIM violates DCIM standards.
ryan770 said:
I was using PinSync also, but now I dont even take screenshots anymore. I use the Smart Select edge panel and select whatever part of the screen to share (or the whole screen), and once I share it to an app and send it, I back out and the image is not saved.
Still, taking a screenshot and immediately pressing Share takes a lot less effort. I wish Samsung would just move their screenshots folder as it being in DCMI violated DCMI standards.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You gave me an idea.
Can I use BXactions or something to trigger smart select? Then I don't need a screen shot. Might negate the time factor and eliminates the Google photos back up issue.
I literally just searched this forum to find out if there was an acceptable solution for this, but I realize that there is not. I will have to do some deep research on how to change the path where the screenshots are saved directly in the system.
It's stunning how a company like Samsung can manage the complexity of producing an amazing smartphone but yet is not competent enough properly configure a storage path for screen shots.

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