back to article Get out of mi casa, Picasa: Google photo site to join Wave, Code, Reader in silicon hell

Google will shut down Picasa on May 1. Any pictures stored in the online album service will be moved to Google Photos automatically. If you don't want your snaps repossessed by Photos, the internet giant will create a read-only corner of the web to shelve your selfies, honeymoon memories and pics of your lunch and/or pets. …

  1. Jon 37

    Good replacement for the app?

    Can anyone recommend a Windows photo management program, to replace the Picasa application? Preferably one simple enough for my Mum to use.

    I've never used their online service, but their Windows app was good.

    1. Kurt Meyer

      Re: Good replacement for the app?

      I have always liked and used IrfanView as my Windows photo program. You can find it at: http://www.irfanview.com/

      Should be simple enough even for Mum. My dear old Dad used Picasa, and was a very happy fellow when I introduced him to IrfanView.

      Good luck.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: Good replacement for the app?

        Irfanview is a photo viewer, but not a manager.

        @Jon37 - The article fails to make it clear, but according to the Picasa web site, the desktop application will still exist, it's just there won't be any more updates for it. So your mum (and my dad amongst others) will be fine.

      2. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: Good replacement for the app?

        What I've loved about Irfanview is that it has a plug-in library and can take advantage of other programs plug-ins as well.

    2. colin79666

      Re: Good replacement for the app?

      The Photos app built into Windows 10 is basic but gets the job done.

      1. Kurt Meyer

        Re: Good replacement for the app?

        Colin, the Photos app might even be world class...

    3. bin

      Re: Good replacement for the app?

      Picasa will of course continue to work locally - may be worth making sure you've got the setup downloaded somewhere. If she doesn't use the web albums why worry? Ain't broke - don't need to fix it.

      If you want to change then FastStone is a very under-rated prog. It does a lot of stuff very well, but doesn't have the slick edge when it comes to organising and grouping files that Picasa does. It can be done with tags etc but that's not really what it is about - more of a viewer/enhancer/editor. I use it extensively for all sorts of stuff. It also has a resonable email interface for local clients or a good collect and zip if you're using Web-Mail.

  2. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Another vote for IrfanView. Also XNView (also free) that I use instead because it displays vector grapics too. Also the batch processing is excellent.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Personally I use both. The combination covers most situations with having to have "The Big Guns" on my lightweight machines. Saves space on the laptop for some play time items.

    2. David Pollard

      Both IrfanView and XNView are available as portable apps too, so you can keep them on a USB stick with a set of backup copies. I haven't tried (yet) but the PC versions may well work under Wine.

      1. frank ly

        @ Dave Pollard

        The last time I tried (two years ago), Irfanview worked well under WINE. Just put the folder in there and click the execurtable. Having said that, I didn't do anything complicated with it, like batch processing. Try it, the worst you can do is waste a bit of your time.

  3. mathew42
    Thumb Up

    digiKam

    digiKam is more aimed at people editing photos, but also have cataloguing features. It is possibly one of the few desktop applications that can be used by multiple computers although not perfectly.

    I'm still looking for a photo management tool that supports multiple users so that people can share photos of events (birthday party, school excursion, etc.) securely. Most parents want to see photos of their child on the excursion, not just the 'best' curated photos from the day. Preferably the tool would include a desktop application and an interactive web gallery.

    1. Ivan Headache

      Re: digiKam

      We used a mobile app at my daughter's wedding by name of WedPics.

      It allowed all the guests using mobiles (or normal cameras) to upload their images to a secure location - access by invitation and password - and similarly, allow those same guests to access all the other pictures submitted.

      A few days after the event we went in through a desktop computer and pulled out enough decent images to make an alternative wedding book.

      The wedding was in 2014 but I can still access the images on my desktop and on my phone today.

      The only down side was (is) that the facebook generation downloaded some of the pics and then uploaded them again - making for a right mess of duplication.

  4. allthecoolshortnamesweretaken

    Why silicon hell and not silicon heaven (where all the calculators go)?

    1. admiraljkb
      Pint

      "Why silicon hell and not silicon heaven (where all the calculators go)?"

      am I the only one who read that with Kryten's voice saying it in my head? :)

      1. allthecoolshortnamesweretaken
    2. Blank-Reg
      Devil

      May its google infected corpse rot in silicon hell (along with Photobucket) with all the photocopiers and fax machines

      See you in silicon hell!

  5. Kevin McMurtrie Silver badge
    Childcatcher

    ERR 13

    "Smart" TVs will be burning an error code onto the screen where the Picasa screen saver used to be. Manufacturers will suggest buying a new TV as a workaround.

  6. Mark Simon

    The decent thing …

    … is to open-source the app. I always thought that it was a pretty decent app, especially since it was free and cross platform. I only got rid of it because I hate being tethered to Google.

    It does see a bit rough to announce its demise with only a month to go. Anybody taking it seriously will need more than that to find an alternative and to transfer everything across.

    It makes one wonder what other Google services you can rely on.

    1. kurrekt

      Re: The decent thing …

      Open sourcing the app is a good idea but it may be costly for Google as it is tightly integrated with Picasaweb.

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: The decent thing …

      So you can modify it to use another service and not Photos? Google is not so stupid...

  7. Warm Braw

    Media RSS Feed?

    The last/only thing I've used Picasa for was to get a Media RSS feed for photos stored in Google Photos so they can be included within a Google Sites website. I gather that Picasa Media RSS feeds are quite widely used for plugging photos into other sites and applications, so there may be some howling to be heard if they disappear.

  8. Matthew Taylor

    Local app

    So the Picasa app will stop working for local image files too? I use it, but have never (knowingly) uploaded anything to Google's servers. Doubtless it will communicate with Google without asking, receive it's death letter, and henceforth cease to work. In its place there will be a video of a geeky 20 something against a white background, explaining with lots of Tony Blair hand gestures how my image editing experience just. got. better. A pox on the lot of them.

    I'm getting old...

    1. Tim Bergel

      Re: Local app

      Are you feeling a teensy bit paranoid today? Anyway no worries: Google specifically state that the desktop app will continue to work OK, it just won't get any more updates. Fine by me - the existing software does (almost) everything that I want.

      1. Matthew Taylor

        Re: Local app

        Ah, thanks. That's some good news. I was possibly frothing at the mouth just a little in the last post :-)

  9. MacroRodent

    Picasa vs photos.google.com

    The main problem seems to be Picasa shows a picture album overview in more useful way than Photos: the beginning of the caption is shown under the photo. I have not found a way to make Photos do this. The captions and locations are retained (as they should since they are in the image EXIF data). I guess comments are lost, but in my case that is no problem. However, one would imagine that Google could easily support comments in Photos, it is not exactly rocket science, so it is mystifying they don't.

  10. Barry Rueger

    My Tracks too

    Seriously, how long before they decide to shut down Gmail with two months' warning?

    Reader did just what I needed, and they shut it down.

    Picasa was exactly what I needed for image handling, and they're shutting it down.

    My Tracks, which was on every Android phone, was a really nice GPS tracking app that I used daily, and Google is not only abandoning it, they're actually disabling it!

    Especially given Google's insane profits I just can't understand the logic in dumping customers or users in this fashion.

    I'm not the only person watching projects like Mailpile and Sandstorm.io with an eye to jumping the Google ship entirely.

    1. Dominion

      Re: My Tracks too

      iGoogle was another really useful Google product that got binned off.

      1. tiggity Silver badge

        Re: My Tracks too

        Ditto My Tracks.

        And I was one of a (probably small) number of people who found Wave really useful

      2. Blackbird74

        Re: My Tracks too

        I've found www.ighome.com a very adequate replacement for iGoogle in case you haven't found it.

    2. bazza Silver badge

      Re: My Tracks too

      Seriously, how long before they decide to shut down Gmail with two months' warning?

      I've long since stopped using Google Services for this and many other reasons. It's hard though. I used to use Postini for spam filtering (indirectly through my mail provider). Google bought it, migrated users to gmail, changed the terms and conditions (they now snoop for advertising purposes, even though it's still a paid-for service!) and made it worse (you now cannot integrate it into Outlook). Bastards.

      The problem with Google is that they're big enough to buy anything else they like or compete against. The competition authorities are too technically ignorant to see what's happening. Truly they own too much stuff. Avoiding being forced to become part of the Borg is hard work.

    3. Schlimnitz

      Re: My Tracks too

      The Old Reader is a great replacement for Reader (if you hadn't found that out yourself already)

    4. Pirate Dave Silver badge
      Pirate

      Re: My Tracks too

      I used to be a heavy user of their SMS query service, since I am a Luddite and refuse to get a smart-phone. It was great for finding things when visiting a new city, but it got canned due to "lack of interest". I guess I was their last user...

      Can't count on anything at Google sticking around. At some point, they'll bin everything for some new latest-and-greatest whatsit. Follow the money.

    5. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: My Tracks too

      I had a survey today on whether our company would be willing to migrate from MS 365 to Google Apps. Given that Google killed the GSA last week (which we use internally and have 15+ customers using, and for which we have invested substantial development effort) and Picasa this week (which I use almost daily) my response was a hearty "fuck off".

      Google have shown all of us who have been in the industry more than a couple of years that they will kill off anything and everything that doesn't allow them to sell more advertising. Gmail will be safe right up until meaningful privacy legislation is passed is passed in the USA (which may be never), but in that case will be gone in a month or two. Same with Apps.

      Why would I *ever* trust them to keep around a useful application / service? It seems like the company is increasingly run by teenagers on behalf of teenagers.

  11. Oengus

    Typical Google

    How typical of Google to force people off of a useful working site to Google "branded" sites.

    I can see this will become a "land-grab" for the copyright of "orphan" works. My guess is that the terms and conditions of Google Photos will greatly advantage Google (even more than Picassa's Ts&Cs).

    Fortunately the only photos I placed on Picassa were landscape shots that were meant to be shared with the world. All "personally identifiable" data (EXIF information, location information etc) were removed before being uploaded.

POST COMMENT House rules

Not a member of The Register? Create a new account here.

  • Enter your comment

  • Add an icon

Anonymous cowards cannot choose their icon