🖼️📂 Limit Photos to a single folder + subtree

[dermalikmann]

I think it would be really nice to create an option where the user can select a single folder (like /Photos) and the app only scans this folder and its subfolders.

I have tons and tons of images all over my nextcloud, but only in /Photos are my, well, photos. And it's kind of a tedious task to create always a .nomedia file in all other directories.

• Add Support to additional folders by changing reworking "Choose another folder" to "Add folder" #2343

[skjnldsv]

@jancborchardt ?

[jancborchardt]

Yes, @Mikescops and I briefly talked about this at the Contributor Week as well. What we could go for:

1. We look for a "Photos" or "Pictures" folder in the root. If it exists, we take that.
2. We should also account for translations, ideally following the xdg-user-dirs translations.
3. If no such folder exists, we fall back to root.
4. We show a settings area in the bottom left with:

Showing files from Photos
and a button: ( Change folder )

That way it’s an automatic setup process but can still be adjusted later.

[skjnldsv]

I would say it doesn't cover my needs. I have multiple folders with pictures that I want to be shown. Android is using all available photos, no idea for other galleries. Could be nice to check what users expect before pushing such drastic changes :)

Also, just having a setting to include/exclude some folders is probably the easiest/most universal way to do? 🤷‍♀️

[Mikescops]

@skjnldsv the point of @jancborchardt during our discussion was to have the most easy and transparent way to have the folder setups. I agree include/exclude would be the prefered way (as it is done on the sync for desktop client) but Jan thought choosing a single folder and having a per default on the Photos folder is the easiest way.

[skjnldsv]

Defaut is indeed always preferable, I'm not arguing this part.
But a default automated config needs to be relevant. I'm not sure this is relevant to use a default Pictures or Photos folder.
Even our Nextcloud client have the default autoupload set to the InstantUpload folder, so we would not be compliant to our android setup :)

[Mikescops]

Let's take root folder but provide an option asap to restrict it to a given folder

[thutex]

same issue here that i am getting things like icons and unrelated artwork pictures in the photo app.
i suggest maybe copying the music app option to specify the path to your picture collection, and only if left empty use the root?