Hello there.

First, I want to specify that I use Lychee-Docker and that’s the only experience I have with Lychee.

I’ve been using it for some time to share family pics with family members and it’s been great. However, with v5, I’ve noticed some issues that are making things a bit challenging. I appreciate some of the good ideas that came with the new update, but in my opinion, there are also quite a few bad decisions that have been made.

For example:

  • Can’t import photos / videos from server anymore. I sometimes used to drop files directly in a location of my server and then use the UI to import them. Convenient on mobile or with large number of files.

  • Can’t upload large files (LycheeOrg/Lychee#2207, LycheeOrg/Lychee#2129)

  • Can’t remove single / several photos from an album anymore. You need to delete the album and re-upload

  • Can’t obtain shorter link to a gallery anymore with the “share” button they removed a while back

  • The new “+” menu should have a background for legibility

  • There is a HUGE useless empty space at the top of galleries now

  • Had to tinker with config like adding TRUSTED_PROXIES=* to fix a thing and was told to keep it anyway but the reason why and how to properly do it are not documented

  • Had to temporarily fix my Nginx config but it seems like it has become a permanent fix, but it is not documented

But at the same time I LOVE these options for public albums:

  • Original: Anonymous users can behold full-resolution photos.

  • Hidden: Anonymous users need a direct link to access this album.

  • Downloadable: Anonymous users can download this album.

  • Password protected: Anonymous users need a shared password to access this album.

Actually, those 4 options are all I need. But I need the tool that provides them to work…

They said “the team is so slow that we don’t have anybody to review complex pull requests.” That makes me sad. I wish I had the time to learn how to code and help out, but I can’t. And even if I could, I’d probably end up building my own tool in the end.

I am not looking for a google photos replacement. Immich is great but that is not what I want to use.

I have tried several known alternatives but I’m curious to hear your thoughts on Lychee in its current state and if you have any suggestions for other tools that could serve a similar purpose.

  • Mike Wooskey@lemmy.d.thewooskeys.comEnglish
    5·
    8 months ago

    I currently use Photo structure, which is good, but its not open source and the one guy behind it, Matthew, is quite slow with progress. He’s super friendly and helpful, and bug fixes are pretty quick. But feature additions are glacial.

    I was considering switching to photoprism but was turned off by the attitude of some of the developers. The product looks prery good, though.

    I’m pretty sure I’m going to switch to Immich, which is also really good.

    A friend uses Piwigo which is decent and has good features, though I find it’s very ugly regardless which skin you use.

    • herrfrutti@lemmy.worldEnglish
      5·
      8 months ago

      Immich is very cool. Be carefull to read every release note and do not auto update. There are can be breaking changes! In total im happy with immich!

      • Nibodhika@lemmy.worldEnglish
        3·
        8 months ago

        I needed this comment a few weeks ago. Updated it and everything broke, still haven’t been able to recover from it. I’m considering moving to a different software just because it’s absurd that it breaks so completely if you don’t thread very carefully, most software I have ever worked with has migration protocols for when there’s db changes to avoid this sort of thing.

        • herrfrutti@lemmy.worldEnglish
          1·
          8 months ago

          I’m sorry to hear that. But the dev points that out very clear on the docs etc.

          From what we self hosters are used to, this does not happen often, but it can.

          Hope you can recover!

    • Tiritibambix@lemmy.mlOPEnglish
      2·
      8 months ago

      I gave Photoprism a shot a while ago when it was still in its early stages. Just revisited it recently, and I must say it has definitely matured and become more appealing. However, I did notice that it’s missing a few options that I really enjoy using in Lychee.

      I’m already using Immich for photo backup, but that serves a different purpose.

      On the other hand, Piwigo felt a bit outdated to me - almost like stepping back in time 20 years.

      Still on the hunt for a good Lychee replacement.

    • Im_old@lemmy.worldEnglish
      1·
      8 months ago

      I tried immich, photoprism and piwigo. I settled with librephotos. Iirc it was because of the face recognition capabilities and read the photos from my nas.

        • Im_old@lemmy.worldEnglish
          1·
          8 months ago

          sorry for late reply. So far is great. I can feed it custom paths on my NAS and it doesn’t touch the pictures/import them/etc. (which was the main requirement for me). It just works with what you feed it. Face recognition is good. Search is good. The 3rd party app (uhuru photos) is not great, but still under development. But the mobile interface works anyway well enough.

  • MangoPenguinEnglish
    5·
    8 months ago

    https://immich.app/

    Been using this for quite awhile now and it has been great. It can share with a link, downloads and/or uploads can be enabled if needed, and a password can be added.

    The mobile app works very nicely, and you can upload photos from the app, webUI, or by scanning a directory on the server.

    • Tiritibambix@lemmy.mlOPEnglish
      2·
      8 months ago

      As mentioned in my post, I already use it for backing up my mobile pictures. I really want to draw a line between my personnal pics and my photo work, but I might reconsider it, as Immich is great indeed.