this post was submitted on 21 Jul 2024
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Why is Google takeout so bitchy? (self.selfhosted)
submitted 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago) by gedaliyah to c/selfhosted
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Sorry but I can't think of another word for it right now. This is mostly just venting but also if anyone has a better way to do it I wouldn't hate to hear it.

I'm trying to set up a home server for all of our family photos. We're on our way to de-googling, and part of the impetus for the change is that our Google Drive is almost full.We have a few hundred gigs of photos between us. The problem with trying to download your data from Google is that it will only allow you to do so in a reasonable way through Google takeout. First you have to order it. Then you have to wait anywhere from a few hours to a day or two for Google to "prepare" the download. Then you have one week before the takeout "expires." That's one week to the minute from the time of the initial request.

I don't have some kind of fancy California internet, I just have normal home internet and there is just no way to download a 50gig (or 2 gig) file in one go - there are always intrruptions that require restarting the download. But if you try to download the files too many times, Google will give you another error and you have to start over and request a new takeout. Google doesn't let you download the entire archive either, you have to select each file part individually.

I can't tell you how many weeks it's been that I've tried to download all of the files before they expire, or google gives me another error.

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[–] [email protected] 4 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Have you tried mounting the google drive on your computer and copying the files with your file manager?

[–] [email protected] 12 points 3 months ago (2 children)

From a search, it seems photos are no longer accessible via Google Drive and photos downloaded through the API (such as with Rclone) are not in full resolution and have the EXIF data stripped.

Google really fuck over anyone using Google Photos as a backup.

[–] gedaliyah 5 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Yeah, with takeout, there are tools that can reconstruct the metadata. I think Google includes some JSONs or something like that. It's critical to maintain the dates of the photos.

Also I think if I did that I would need double the storage, right? To sync the drive and to copy the files?

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 months ago

From what I've read, I would not trust any process other than the takeout process. Do the album thing to split it up.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 3 months ago

Yeah, they really want to keep your data.