Google testing Picasa for Mac beta

[AppleInsider]

Long the domain of Linux and Windows users, Google's Picasa photo management tool is currently being tested for Macs, AppleInsider has learned.

People familiar with the matter say the search engine giant has just begun internal beta testing for the Mac-native version of the software.

While its proximity to a final release is still unknown, Picasa for Mac would serve as one of Google's few fully offline Mac apps and has often been one of the most conspicuous omissions on Apple's platform from a company otherwise known for its cross-OS friendliness in programs like Google Earth and SketchUp.

The company has previously made gestures towards integrating the app with Macs, including iPhoto and web plugins to upload images to Picasa's Web Albums service. To date, however, most observers have seen Picasa's basic organization, editing and sharing features as making the app a direct competitor to iPhoto that hasn't been as necessary as on Linux or Windows platforms, which have generally gone without rough equivalents.

A representative for Google did not return emails seeking comment.

[ View this article at AppleInsider.com ]

[Ensoniq]

Having used Picasa for Windows, I think it's the best simple image editing and viewing program for the PC world.

That said, I don't see the point in releasing a version for the Mac. Because frankly, iPhoto is just much better.

[whatisgoingon]

Originally Posted by Ensoniq

Having used Picasa for Windows, I think it's the best simple image editing and viewing program for the PC world.

That said, I don't see the point in releasing a version for the Mac. Because frankly, iPhoto is just much better.

While the iPhoto plugin to send photos from iPhoto to Picasa works great and is pretty straightforward to use, that was as far as my dad could readily get (he wanted to make some pictures available just to my brother and I). He couldn't figure out that he had to sign onto the website, then navigate into the specific albums and send a link for each one of them to us. And there is just the manual process to get pictures from Picasa downloaded into iPhoto, which is also something my dad couldn't figure out.

If the standalone app makes these two things easier to do, lots of people will find Picasa much more usable.

[noriyori]

Originally Posted by Ensoniq

Having used Picasa for Windows, I think it's the best simple image editing and viewing program for the PC world.

That said, I don't see the point in releasing a version for the Mac. Because frankly, iPhoto is just much better.

Agreed. I think an iPhoto plugin for picasa would be more appropriate.

[SpamSandwich]

Originally Posted by noriyori

Agreed. I think an iPhoto plugin for picasa would be more appropriate.

A Picasa uploader plug-in for iPhoto has been available for some time now.

http://picasa.google.com/mac_tools.html

[webfrasse]

...possibly have any idea about that? You have no idea how Picasa would work on the mac. Maybe the Google guys are smart, just maybe, and leverage on what iPhoto already does and integrates/improves what it does today. A lot of what Picasa does is provide integration with backend services (online publishing, printing using local services around the world) on the Google platform. iPhoto does nothing of that.

Originally Posted by Ensoniq

Having used Picasa for Windows, I think it's the best simple image editing and viewing program for the PC world.

That said, I don't see the point in releasing a version for the Mac. Because frankly, iPhoto is just much better.

[JeffDM]

Originally Posted by Ensoniq

Having used Picasa for Windows, I think it's the best simple image editing and viewing program for the PC world.

That said, I don't see the point in releasing a version for the Mac. Because frankly, iPhoto is just much better.

Picasa does have some nice stuff that iPhoto doesn't have or doesn't do as well. Swap the names and the same is true of other features.

[mania]

iPhoto better? its terrible (slow, makes copies of all your photos for no good reason, cant burn a cd that you can read on windows).

expression media is way better. would like to see picasa since its free and has got to be better than iphoto.

[JeffDM]

Originally Posted by mania

iPhoto better? its terrible (slow, makes copies of all your photos for no good reason, cant burn a cd that you can read on windows).

expression media is way better. would like to see picasa since its free and has got to be better than iphoto.

Given that Expression Media is $199, a valid comparison would be against Lightroom or Aperture, not much cheaper low end programs like iPhoto or the free Picasa. Even then, it looks to be its own category.

[mesomorphicman]

I only have a MacBook Pro at my job, and it does not have iPhoto installed. My home computer is an HP and Picasa is very useful with great features. Personally I will welcome with a big when Picasa hits the Mac. I need a way to organize the photos on my work Mac and Picasa will do it nicely. I am amazed it's taken Google so long for this, seeing that they are partners with Apple.

[JeffDM]

Originally Posted by mesomorphicman

I only have a MacBook Pro at my job, and it does not have iPhoto installed. My home computer is an HP and Picasa is very useful with great features. Personally I will welcome with a big when Picasa hits the Mac. I need a way to organize the photos on my work Mac and Picasa will do it nicely. I am amazed it's taken Google so long for this, seeing that they are partners with Apple.

The thing is that every Mac is supposed to have iPhoto included. There is no comparable default install with Windows computers.

In your case, it was either given a clean install of a new OS (retail box doesn't include iLife), rather than the included discs. The discs included with the computer would have iLife.

Anyways, Picasa fills a rather large need for Windows users. iPhoto pretty much does 90% or more of Picasa, to most users it would look redundant.

[g3pro]

Sorry, but iPhoto is pretty much a piece of crap wrapped in fetid, steaming garbage. ANYTHING is better than iPhoto.

The great "features" of iPhoto:

Slow as hell
Slowness is proportional to number of photos
The more you use it, the slower it gets
File system is HORRIBLE
Horrible interfacing with online applications

Did I mention that it's slow as hell?

[Lifino]

I was stuck in the PC world for a few years and rather happy with Picass. It made Sharing media so easy, and with no advertising (flipvideo? Watch a commercial before watching my kid eat dog food? Puhleez)


But since returning to Apple I was very sad to learn that there wasn't any way to upload video to my Picassa acct. That was a deal breaker. I don't know if they have since added this feature... Doesn't matter for me now. I've got mobile me acct. Which is difficult for my PC family to use, and often leaves me appologizing.

[JeffDM]

Originally Posted by g3pro

Sorry, but iPhoto is pretty much a piece of crap wrapped in fetid, steaming garbage. ANYTHING is better than iPhoto.

The great "features" of iPhoto:

Slow as hell
Slowness is proportional to number of photos
The more you use it, the slower it gets
File system is HORRIBLE
Horrible interfacing with online applications

Did I mention that it's slow as hell?

Of course it's going to be slow on a G3. On a normal computer, it's plenty fast, and I had 15k images in the program.

[another_steve]

Originally Posted by g3pro

Sorry, but iPhoto is pretty much a piece of crap wrapped in fetid, steaming garbage. ANYTHING is better than iPhoto.
Slow as hell

Hmm.... maybe you should try upgrading from a G3 to something newer...

Seriously, your claim is simply unsubstantiated for any machine that shipped in the past 5 years or more. I just retired an old dual G4 and it was running iPhoto 08 just fine with thousands of photos in the library.

You say it's slow, but compared to what? What function is slow? Importing photos? Scrolling through photos? Editing photos? Do you have any benchmarks to compare it to, especially with Picasa? No?

I always recommend Picasa for people who don't have Macs. Picasa is a decent program, but frankly, it falls quite a bit short of iPhoto, particularly with regard to the overall interface. Further, there are many programs outside of iLife that integrate well with the iPhoto library.

[lkrupp]

Originally Posted by g3pro

Sorry, but iPhoto is pretty much a piece of crap wrapped in fetid, steaming garbage. ANYTHING is better than iPhoto.

The great "features" of iPhoto:

Slow as hell
Slowness is proportional to number of photos
The more you use it, the slower it gets
File system is HORRIBLE
Horrible interfacing with online applications

Did I mention that it's slow as hell?

You do realize, don't you, that actual iPhoto users are laughing hysterically at your irrational FUD?

[pt123]

I have been waiting a long, long time for Picasa to become available on the Mac. iPhoto is good but it does something strange on photos with auto rotate. And when the next release of iPhoto becomes available, Picasa will still be free. Also, choice is good especially for those that don't want to do thing the iPhoto way. Yeah, hard to believe there are not everyone wants to handle photos the same way, via iPhoto.

[webfrasse]

Originally Posted by g3pro

Sorry, but iPhoto is pretty much a piece of crap wrapped in fetid, steaming garbage. ANYTHING is better than iPhoto.

The great "features" of iPhoto:

Slow as hell
Slowness is proportional to number of photos
The more you use it, the slower it gets
File system is HORRIBLE
Horrible interfacing with online applications

Did I mention that it's slow as hell?

I use iPhoto as my main storage and for 2008 the Library is now at about 100GB. No speed problems at all...NONE. I run it on a MacBook Pro with 2GB ram. To edit the images (all raw) I use NX2 configured as external editor.

The only time I saw iPhoto slow down was when I had mistakenly set edits to be saved internally as TIFF images. Changed the setting, removed the TIFF versions and everything was back to normal. It's no less responsive than LR or Expression Media running on the same laptop cataloging the same Library.

File Systems...iPhoto uses the same filesystem as Mac OS X....you sound like non technical jerk to me.

[kerryn]

Originally Posted by g3pro

Sorry, but iPhoto is pretty much a piece of crap wrapped in fetid, steaming garbage. ANYTHING is better than iPhoto.

The great "features" of iPhoto:

Slow as hell
Slowness is proportional to number of photos
The more you use it, the slower it gets
File system is HORRIBLE
Horrible interfacing with online applications

Did I mention that it's slow as hell?

Are you using the latest version with recent hardware? I used Adobe Elements 4 on a PC for a while and it had its quirks. But now I have a 1 year old MB with iMovie08. Compared to before iMovie08 rocks. I added Keyword Manager to it and with the Events the organization of of iMovie is really great.

My Wife will holds onto the PC and recently we dumped Elements for Picasa as my wife wanted an easier way to share photos and she could never figure out the Adobe software, I do not like Picasa and find iPhoto so much easier for organization, but Picasa does have better editing (I added Aperture2 to my Christmas list to compensate for iPhoto's short comings).

I have found the Picasa plugin of iPhoto to work very well and actually I find using iPhoto with the Picasa plugin a faster solution for publishing photos than using the Picasa for Windows.

If Picasa for Mac is a replacement for iPhoto I will not be interested, If it is enhanced seamless integration with iPhoto then sign me up.

[g3pro]

Originally Posted by lkrupp

You do realize, don't you, that actual iPhoto users are laughing hysterically at your irrational FUD?

I use iPhoto on a G4 that was made 2.5 years ago. My iPhoto library is less than 10 GB. You do realize that Apple still made G4s up until 2.5 years ago, right? You do realize that 10 GB is not a huge amount for an iphoto library, right?

Do you even know what the hell "FUD" is?

You need to shut the eff up before you start accusing people who have been using Apple products (including iPhoto) far longer than you've probably been alive.

[g3pro]

Originally Posted by another_steve

Hmm.... maybe you should try upgrading from a G3 to something newer...

I did!! I have a G4 now, it's the NEXT generation of PowerPC processors!

[mdriftmeyer]

Originally Posted by AppleInsider

Long the domain of Linux and Windows users, Google's Picasa photo management tool is currently being tested for Macs, AppleInsider has learned.

People familiar with the matter say the search engine giant has just begun internal beta testing for the Mac-native version of the software.

While its proximity to a final release is still unknown, Picasa for Mac would serve as one of Google's few fully offline Mac apps and has often been one of the most conspicuous omissions on Apple's platform from a company otherwise known for its cross-OS friendliness in programs like Google Earth and SketchUp.

The company has previously made gestures towards integrating the app with Macs, including iPhoto and web plugins to upload images to Picasa's Web Albums service. To date, however, most observers have seen Picasa's basic organization, editing and sharing features as making the app a direct competitor to iPhoto that hasn't been as necessary as on Linux or Windows platforms, which have generally gone without rough equivalents.

A representative for Google did not return emails seeking comment.

[ View this article at AppleInsider.com ]

Sorry, but the Linux version requires Wine. When Google provides a GTK2.x version I'll then look at it. It's not as if they don't have the GTK and Qt staff, on hand.

[RichL]

Originally Posted by mdriftmeyer

Sorry, but the Linux version requires Wine. When Google provides a GTK2.x version I'll then look at it. It's not as if they don't have the GTK and Qt staff, on hand.

Ah, I assumed that Picasa used Qt like Google Earth. No wonder there's no Mac version yet.

[Zauner]

if you are a fanboy of iphoto please just stop defending your app in this thread. Or are you scared there could be another app better than your iphoto?

I love apple, so I'm very happy to finally get picasa:

picasa permanently searches the hard drive for new pics and automatically adds them to its preview library. no blown up picture library, the pics stay where you'd put them.
no manual importing, copying or adding to libraries.

image editing is non-destructive or destructive, just the way you like it. NO additional folders with "edited" pics etc.

it has a very effective time line and search for viewing

it lets you scroll though your whole library very similar to the iphone scroll mode. smooth and easy.

useful and cool image editing options eversince - uh, even lossless rotating has been there for years.

it's lighting fast, wether with 10 or 10.000 photos, with a slow or fast processor.

so why not trying to be open to a new software and start to criticize or love it after you've used it for SOME WEEKS, not for 10 minutes. well, that's a new concept for apple fans and probably most of them will never find out the benefits of it...

[alexius]

Originally Posted by Zauner

if you are a fanboy of iphoto please just stop defending your app in this thread. Or are you scared there could be another app better than your iphoto? .

I won't touch your clear ignorance of iphoto features, but I will show this forum why I'm not confident about Picasa. I present one of the worst desktop mac apps, brought to us by google:

http://www.macupdate.com/info.php/id...adwords-editor

[JeffDM]

Originally Posted by g3pro

I use iPhoto on a G4 that was made 2.5 years ago. My iPhoto library is less than 10 GB. You do realize that Apple still made G4s up until 2.5 years ago, right? You do realize that 10 GB is not a huge amount for an iphoto library, right?

Exactly what other photo program did better on the same computer? I wouldn't expect any other program to do a whole lot better.

Frankly, G4s were getting long in the tooth when Apple quit selling them.

BTW: I had a 90GB iPhoto library and the program was fine.

[elmsley]

Regardless of what features picasa for mac can provide, iphoto can easily do better. With an update or upgrade, Apple has control of the 'feature' side of things. Google/Picasa needs to solve a couple of things:

1) Would they convert / use inplace the entire pictures folder I currently have or copy them and handle them separately? Unfortunately many applications that use the 'media chooser' to integrate and is aware of iphoto's 'Events' organization.

2) How will yet another free piece of software earn them money? I suppose it's through their ties into 3rd party services for on-line publishing, but I can usually export the PDF (in iPhoto) and send it somewhere else if I want. I've been quite satisfied with Apple's services.

Seeing as how I believe Mac users may sometimes be poor (but not CHEAP) students, most folks will be more than happy to buy the next iLife upgrade to benefit from the innovations that Apple could deliver.

But somehow I'm getting flashbacks of MS IE's embedded browser that people didn't want installed for some reason.

J

[cameronj]

Originally Posted by Zauner

picasa permanently searches the hard drive for new pics and automatically adds them to its preview library. no blown up picture library, the pics stay where you'd put them.
no manual importing, copying or adding to libraries.

image editing is non-destructive or destructive, just the way you like it. NO additional folders with "edited" pics etc.

it has a very effective time line and search for viewing

it lets you scroll though your whole library very similar to the iphone scroll mode. smooth and easy.

useful and cool image editing options eversince - uh, even lossless rotating has been there for years.

it's lighting fast, wether with 10 or 10.000 photos, with a slow or fast processor.

This is a good summary of what I feel about the two. I help my customers with both, and I can tell you that my Mac user customers have much more trouble with iPhoto and bemoan those missing capabilities than PC users with Picasa. I'll be very happy to finally have Picasa to install on Macs.

[cameronj]

Originally Posted by elmsley

Regardless of what features picasa for mac can provide, iphoto can easily do better.

I think I should have stopped reading when I read this....

Originally Posted by elmsley

1) Would they convert / use inplace the entire pictures folder I currently have or copy them and handle them separately? Unfortunately many applications that use the 'media chooser' to integrate and is aware of iphoto's 'Events' organization.

If the PC side is any indication (and it should be) then Picasa will leave the pictures where they are.

Originally Posted by elmsley

2) How will yet another free piece of software earn them money? I suppose it's through their ties into 3rd party services for on-line publishing, but I can usually export the PDF (in iPhoto) and send it somewhere else if I want. I've been quite satisfied with Apple's services.

What does what they charge have to do with anything? Picasa lets you send to online photo services, email, or print to PDF if you really think that's a good way to distribute pictures.

Originally Posted by elmsley

Seeing as how I believe Mac users may sometimes be poor (but not CHEAP) students, most folks will be more than happy to buy the next iLife upgrade to benefit from the innovations that Apple could deliver.

You're hallucinating if you think people would rather pay for software than get it for free, all other things equal.

Originally Posted by elmsley

But somehow I'm getting flashbacks of MS IE's embedded browser that people didn't want installed for some reason.

What does that have to do with anything? There is no embedded IE in Picasa??? Talk about a non sequitur ....

[JeffDM]

Originally Posted by elmsley

Regardless of what features picasa for mac can provide, iphoto can easily do better. With an update or upgrade, Apple has control of the 'feature' side of things. Google/Picasa needs to solve a couple of things:

1) Would they convert / use inplace the entire pictures folder I currently have or copy them and handle them separately?

Have you even used Picasa at all?

I think this is the opposite of what you are thinking. Picasa can use an existing folder as-is. It's iPhoto that has a tendency to make copies of everything to make its own directory structure. It looks like maybe it offers a way to leave an existing folder arrangement as-is, but I can't tell for sure.

Unfortunately many applications that use the 'media chooser' to integrate and is aware of iphoto's 'Events' organization.

This doesn't make sense. It doesn't look like a complete sentence.

[elmsley]

Originally Posted by cameronj

I think I should have stopped reading when I read this....

If the PC side is any indication (and it should be) then Picasa will leave the pictures where they are.



What does what they charge have to do with anything? Picasa lets you send to online photo services, email, or print to PDF if you really think that's a good way to distribute pictures.



You're hallucinating if you think people would rather pay for software than get it for free, all other things equal.



What does that have to do with anything? There is no embedded IE in Picasa??? Talk about a non sequitur ....

And I didn't think I'd get beat up for expressing my opinion.

I fully understand that Picasa can read pictures in-place. What I'm saying is that (correct me if I'm wrong) most users will use iPhoto because it came with their box and need a migration path to Picasa. Because iPhoto has an un-user friendly directory structure, to me this would be a pain to see all of the strange directories to go and find them to import into Picasa. If Picasa could somehow symbolically link the directories or provide a migration path, then they'd be on to something.

Hallucinating, eh? I don't know where you got your Mac for free, but grab one for me too. Actually when I became a convert years ago, things started making sense for me in terms of 'ease of use' and paying for it. You can get all the PC crap you want, but when you even think about installing anything on my Mac it better be good, otherwise it's gone. And when developers make stuff on a Mac for "the other 10%", they try and do it with quality and purpose (don't get me wrong, there is Mac shareware garbage too, just less). But for $79 to upgrade from iLife '06 to '08 to get stuff that I ACTUALLY use, I'd say that's money well spent. I didn't post here to argue with tightwads because I'm sure we all have a little bit of that in all of us. But if I had to install something on your grandma's Mac, you'd know what I'd do..

I know there's no IE. I was talking about the fact that new Macs come with iPhoto, so it trains people to use it and think there is nothing else like Microsoft's approach. Read between the lines.. sheessh. And no I'm fully aware that this is not a fair comparison.. gimme a break.

[elmsley]

Originally Posted by JeffDM

Have you even used Picasa at all?

I think this is the opposite of what you are thinking. Picasa can use an existing folder as-is. It's iPhoto that has a tendency to make copies of everything to make its own directory structure. It looks like maybe it offers a way to leave an existing folder arrangement as-is, but I can't tell for sure.



This doesn't make sense. It doesn't look like a complete sentence.

Sorry for my grammar. I realize this forum is anal about those things.

What I mean to say is that if you use, say Mail, and you import photos it will pop up that window.. You know the one I'm talking about (in my non-tech speak). -the one that lets you drill down one of your albums or choose an event where your photos are kept. There was some defect awhile ago that made it difficult to find the photo because this interface was not there. Anyways, they fixed it (a bit better). I foresee some integration quirks with that if I'm solely using Picasa and not iPhoto.

(And don't whine and say you should use gmail blah blah.. I already do.)

J

[JeffDM]

Originally Posted by elmsley

Sorry for my grammar. I realize this forum is anal about those things.

I don't tend to say anything unless it's an impediment to communication. I usually don't complain if it's just a typo other error that's easy to understand what is meant.

As for integration, we'll have to see. The problem goes both ways. iPhoto only integrates with a small set of programs, they pretend that Thunderbird doesn't exist, but still supports obsolete programs such as Eudora. As flawed as Thunderbird is, I have more issues with Apple Mail.

[elmsley]

Originally Posted by JeffDM

I don't tend to say anything unless it's an impediment to communication. I usually don't complain if it's just a typo other error that's easy to understand what is meant.

As for integration, we'll have to see. The problem goes both ways. iPhoto only integrates with a small set of programs, they pretend that Thunderbird doesn't exist, but still supports obsolete programs such as Eudora. As flawed as Thunderbird is, I have more issues with Apple Mail.

Well, I think that brings into question what is the application that Google is trying to position on the Mac platform so that it can pull down it's entire Suite of products. Is Picasa that app? Probably not, although I do love the album uploader, for both cost and performance reasons. I mean, maybe Google says they are trying to be a web platform, but I'm positive they'd love to anchor themselves locally and attack iLife, iWork, and Mac OS. Like everyone else, even with "open standards", it's always easier to integrate with yourself.

[jpcrockett]

Having used both Picasa, iPhoto and Aperture extensively, I can say that given a choice I would never install iPhoto or Aperature on my system. iPhoto is so slow and the file structure so poor I can't stand the program.

Picasa on the other hand.....much faster and the file structure is infinitely more flexible

of course, now that I use Lightroom, I don't have much use for Picasa....

[webhead]

Originally Posted by lkrupp

You do realize, don't you, that actual iPhoto users are laughing hysterically at your irrational FUD?

iPhoto can be slow when you have too many photos in one library, but all you need to do is create multiple libraries by holding the option key while opening iPhoto. You can then create new libraries or chose different existing libraries. Smaller libraries run faster. This is very useful for me as I organize libraries by events.

I am a professional photographer and I use iPhoto all the time. It's great for re-naming and numbering large amounts of photos as well as batch converting and resizing large amounts of files say converting Photoshop or tiff files to jpegs and resizing them at the same time. It also recognizes every RAW file I have tried (Photoshop still doesn’t do this). You can't do all this with any windows computer our of the box (I doubt you can do it with Picasa either)

Online photo programs like Picasa are more for the average person looking to share photos online and who have no desire to organize photos on their own hard drive. iPhoto fills a need between pro apps like lightroom and picasa. iPhotos calendar, card, album creation is excellent (better than aperture even), ordering photos, creating slide shows, viewing video, raw compatibility are all excellent features, but they require a bit more user experience to handle.

Love the iPhoto, can’t wait to see what new features will come next. Picasa for Mac….will never use it, it’s a Jr. app. Can’t believe that windows does not come with an iphoto equivalent (well I hear vista has something now, but I bet it’s just a bad copy of iphoto)

[Dave K.]

Since when doesn't iPhoto (or any of the other iLife apps) need competition?

Picasa will be a welcome addition to many Macs (especially for thos people who rely on Google's services more than MobileMe's services).

Dave

[cameronj]

Originally Posted by webhead

iPhoto can be slow when you have too many photos in one library, but all you need to do is create multiple libraries by holding the option key while opening iPhoto. You can then create new libraries or chose different existing libraries. Smaller libraries run faster. This is very useful for me as I organize libraries by events.

Well that doesn't sound like the user friendly Apple to me. Wouldn't it be better to have a program that performed well without knowing an undocumented trick? None of my customers knew that... I certainly didn't either.

Originally Posted by webhead

Online photo programs like Picasa are more for the average person looking to share photos online and who have no desire to organize photos on their own hard drive.

Picasa is not an online photo program. It does all the same things iPhoto does, generally.

[webhead]

Originally Posted by Zauner

if you are a fanboy of iphoto please just stop defending your app in this thread. Or are you scared there could be another app better than your iphoto?

I love apple, so I'm very happy to finally get picasa:

picasa permanently searches the hard drive for new pics and automatically adds them to its preview library. no blown up picture library, the pics stay where you'd put them.
no manual importing, copying or adding to libraries.

image editing is non-destructive or destructive, just the way you like it. NO additional folders with "edited" pics etc.

it has a very effective time line and search for viewing

it lets you scroll though your whole library very similar to the iphone scroll mode. smooth and easy.

useful and cool image editing options eversince - uh, even lossless rotating has been there for years.

it's lighting fast, wether with 10 or 10.000 photos, with a slow or fast processor.

so why not trying to be open to a new software and start to criticize or love it after you've used it for SOME WEEKS, not for 10 minutes. well, that's a new concept for apple fans and probably most of them will never find out the benefits of it...

And when you move or delete photos from your Hard Drive (by accident or intentionally) do you lose them from Picasa as picasa had a prview file only? I bet you do and that will cause a major headache.

The reason iPhoto copies full versions of photos into the library is so you never have to worry about losing and or locating the original file from your hard drive. It's better, if you ask me, to have all full versions of photos in one place, like an iPhoto library, rather than scattered all over you hard drive.

From what I've seen from Picasa the image editing is not cool, it's extremely tacky and ugly.

[Zauner]

Originally Posted by webhead

And when you move or delete photos from your Hard Drive (by accident or intentionally) do you lose them from Picasa as picasa had a prview file only? I bet you do and that will cause a major headache.

The reason iPhoto copies full versions of photos into the library is so you never have to worry about losing and or locating the original file from your hard drive. It's better, if you ask me, to have all full versions of photos in one place, like an iPhoto library, rather than scattered all over you hard drive.

Well, if I intentionally delete a picture from my harddisk OF COURSE I do want it to disappear from my picasa library, too. And when I decide to delete a preview picture I'll have to choice wether to delete the original picture, or not.

Picasa works QUITE SIMILAR TO APERTURE in the way it helps organize your photos and can be used for professional work, too, while iphoto is more or less limited to private usage (and does a good at home).