iphone dcim photo folders

[Point37]

i know there are a few cell phone guys on this forum so i figured i'd ask here...

i was trying to grab some photos off my phone using windows so i go into my iphone -> internal storage -> dcim and there are 44 folders and i have no idea where the photos i want to copy are located cause you can't search them by date...on my phone i have 6 folders (camera roll, favorites, videos, bursts, recently deleted and helpful)...well i did find that if you type an asterisk into the search bar in windows and it will show you all the photos and dates the photos were taken but you're still left with all the dumb folders...anyone have any idea if you can change/consolidate this?

also how do i get this sh!tty U2 music off my phone?...i tried their stupid remover but it doesn't work....every time i put my bluetooth setting on in my car that sh!tty album kicks on cause i don't store music on my iphone since i have an ipod

[SRTie4k]

Type "*.jpg" or "*.jpeg" in the searchbar, without the quotes. The * is a wildcard, so basically "*.jpg* means "search for a file with any file name (the *) of the type .jpg".

I'm not entirely sure that the iPhone saves pictures in JPG format though...you'll have to search for the file type and change it to match whatever file type it takes photos in.

[Point37]

they are jpg format but the asterisk in the search bar works great to be able to find what you want but i want to consolidate the folders somehow...how does 6 folders on my phone equate to 44 folders on my computer?...it's so dumb

[Point37]

...i tried their stupid remover but it doesn't work....

U2 removal: Remove iTunes gift album "Songs of Innocence" from your iTunes music library and purchases - Apple Support

..............

[Jim]

not sure why it keeps creating new folders. i've been experiencing that myself.
Josh's link will show you how to remove the U2 album. i actually did the same thing last month

[Point37]

Sorry, missed that. It wasn't immediate one mine, took a bit, but it did go away.

no worries...i actually just tried it again and it worked this time!...not sure why but it only shows one song on my pc but it doesn't show any on my phone...the song won't play though

not sure why it keeps creating new folders. i've been experiencing that myself.
Josh's link will show you how to remove the U2 album. i actually did the same thing last month

yea the folder problem is bothering me...why can't things be simple...i just updated itunes and i had to google how to show the side bar in itunes...pain in the ass apple stuff...i swear i will never update another operating system on this phone cause they keep making it worse

[jasnmar]

I know (almost) nothing about IOS and how stuff shows up, but for the DCIM folder...

It follows a standard created to allow basic interop of photos. A reasonably straight forward description of this can be found at Why Does Every Camera Put Photos in a DCIM Folder?

The basics of how the file system works is "supposed" to make it so that stuff isn't overwritten as new pictures are taken. In general items are arranged in sequence with the earliest things being the lowest numbers. Higher numbered folder and file names means "newer".

[Point37]

^^^not the case with the iphone...the folders are named with random numbers and letters and all the modified dates are the same on all the folders and contents of each folder...below are all the subfolders under the dcim folder...

[SRTie4k]

I guess I'm still having trouble understanding what you're trying to do. Are you trying to make it so that new folders aren't created every time you take a picture? Or are you simply trying to copy all the pictures without retaining their paths?

[Point37]

Are you trying to make it so that new folders aren't created every time you take a picture? Or are you simply trying to copy all the pictures without retaining their paths?

yes...i hate how there are a million folders when i plug my phone into my computer...and no, now that i found that search trick with the asterisk i can copy all the photos easily...it just seems dumb how the phone creates all these extra folders that have no rhyme or reason to their folder names or which photo goes in which folder...i was just wondering if there was a way to streamline it so there was maybe 2 folders, pictures and videos when i plug in my phone to my computer

[SRTie4k]

yes...i hate how there are a million folders when i plug my phone into my computer...and no, now that i found that search trick with the asterisk i can copy all the photos easily...it just seems dumb how the phone creates all these extra folders that have no rhyme or reason to their folder names or which photo goes in which folder...i was just wondering if there was a way to streamline it so there was maybe 2 folders, pictures and videos when i plug in my phone to my computer

Can't help you there. iDevices have always created unique folders for every conceivable way possible to sort a file. IMO its a stupid way to organize stuff, but that's how their media database works. It was originally done that way because MTP was previously not supported on Apple devices, it was only recently that they added MTP support.

MTP is the protocol used by Windows to display the file structure, which cannot be changed except by Apple.

[Point37]

It's because Apple refuses to acknowledge that some people might want to use something other than iTunes to access their photos. They don't think the folder structure matters because they don't expect people to see it.

^^^yea that's what pisses me off about apple...they need to take the consumers views into account...my old ipod classic is great!...it does exactly what i want it to do pretty simply...using itunes for it is a pain though...with the iphone i should have stopped updating ios after whichever update added the flip up control panel cause they haven't added anything good since that...not to mention the ios updates will sooner or later bog down the phone so much cause it won't be able to run them since they were designed for faster processors in the new phones which is basically an indirect way to force you to buy a new phone...it's aggrevating...the 3 companies on my sh!tlist are apple, comcast & verizon wireless...hate them but need them

[Point37]

Can't help you there. iDevices have always created unique folders for every conceivable way possible to sort a file. IMO its a stupid way to organize stuff, but that's how their media database works. It was originally done that way because MTP was previously not supported on Apple devices, it was only recently that they added MTP support.

MTP is the protocol used by Windows to display the file structure, which cannot be changed except by Apple.

thanks for the info...forget making it more compatible with other devices...iphones are deviceist (like a electronic version of racist, yea i made it up)...

...ipads too...no we can't have a usb port on the side of them that would make them too user friendly

[aldend123]

Did the DCIM folder structure happen with an iOS update? I'm still on iOS6.x and my folders end in 100's. Like 100, 101, 102, etc. And each one holds up to a certain number of photos before it creates a new folder. And that number is at least a few hundred photos before it moves to the next folder.

[Point37]

Did the DCIM folder structure happen with an iOS update? I'm still on iOS6.x and my folders end in 100's. Like 100, 101, 102, etc. And each one holds up to a certain number of photos before it creates a new folder. And that number is at least a few hundred photos before it moves to the next folder.

i think it did happen with an update...i believe 1 of the intermediate updates i only had a couple folders which was perfect...now it's a sh!tshow