[Dartmoor Dave]

I'd been vaguely aware that Google+ was on its way out, and this morning I've received an email telling me that it'll shut down in April and all my photos on there will be deleted. For a couple of years I used Google+ to host the photos that I posted here on Pentax Forums, so of course that means that they will disappear from this site in April too.

I'm wondering what's the best thing to do. I personally enjoy browsing through older pages on the site and often follow the links to related earlier discussions at the bottom of threads, and it's nice when people's photos from years ago are still there. So I'd really like to move the photos that will be deleted over to Flickr and change the links in my old posts so that the shots don't disappear.

Is there a time limit for editing posts that are more than a couple of years old, or can I just go back and change the links in my posts from around 2014-2015? And if there is a time limit, is there any other option to stop the photos disappearing?

[paulh]

I've never used Google+, but I have several years worth of photos on "Google Photos" (formerly Picasa Web Albums). I'd be interested in knowing if they are the same! I have not received any emails about deletion of photos, so I'm hoping they are separate entities.

[Dartmoor Dave]

I don't know about Google Photos/Picasa, Paul, but I bet I'm not the only ex-Google+ user who will be affected.

I've just part-answered my own question. I tried to replace the link for my earliest Google+ photo from July 2014, and there is no "Edit Post" button to use anymore. So as things stand, it looks like a couple of years of my K10D Club and Takumar Club stuff is just going to disappear. I'm not really bothered about any threads other than those, but I know that those two threads in particular do tend to get people looking back through the years.

[BrianR]

Icky, this will cause a mess for some people. Hopefully Adam can let you edit old threads.

I've never used Google+, but I have several years worth of photos on "Google Photos" (formerly Picasa Web Albums). I'd be interested in knowing if they are the same! I have not received any emails about deletion of photos, so I'm hoping they are separate entities.

Google Photos shares space with your Google Drive and I've understood them to be separate services from Google+:

What is being deleted?
Any Google+ pages you created, as well as photos and videos stored in your Google+ album archive.

The deletion does not affect other Google services. Photos and videos stored in Google Photos, for instance, will not be affected.

From: Closure of Google+: everything you need to know | Technology | The Guardian

[paulh]

Google Photos shares space with your Google Drive and I've understood them to be separate services from Google+:

Thanks Brian. This doesn't help Dave too much, though . Hopefully Adam has some suggestions. Worst comes to worst you could create new posts after moving your photos to Flickr or another host...ugh.

[Adam]

Yes, there is currently a 1-year time limit on editing posts. What I can do is lift the restriction in photo-sharing sections so that you guys can make the edits. Please shoot me a reminder once you are ready to proceed.

[Dartmoor Dave]

Yes, there is currently a 1-year time limit on editing posts. What I can do is lift the restriction in photo-sharing sections so that you guys can make the edits. Please shoot me a reminder once you are ready to proceed.

Thanks Adam, that's great. I'll start uploading the photos to Flickr and let you know when I'm ready to swap the links in the forum posts.

[UncleVanya]

That is dedication. Commendable behavior guys.

[SharkyCA]

Re : GOOGLE+
Google+ Help

[Dartmoor Dave]

Re : GOOGLE+

Thanks for posting that, it's helpful info. I've just checked on Google Photos, and even though I've never actually uploaded a photo there directly all my Google+ photos are already on there. I'll wait to see what happens when Google+ shuts down, but hopefully the links here on PF will still work but just lead to Google Photos instead.

[photoptimist]

Thanks for posting that, it's helpful info. I've just checked on Google Photos, and even though I've never actually uploaded a photo there directly all my Google+ photos are already on there. I'll wait to see what happens when Google+ shuts down, but hopefully the links here on PF will still work but just lead to Google Photos instead.

Interesting!

We can certainly hope that Google will keep track of all the old Google+ URLs and automagically redirect calls to a Google+ image to the respective Google Photo resource. But given how few websites have the common human decency to create these kinds of pointers when they redo a website, I'll not be surprised if using a Google+ URL will just go to 404.

----

But maybe a solution isn't as hard as it seems....

What is the URL structure for the Google+ version of the link to a given photo and what is the URL structure for the Google Photos version of the link to that same photo? (Or can one form a valid Google Photos URL from the parts of the Google+ URL?)

If the two URLs share enough structure -- maybe differing only the prefix domain name and top-level path -- then there may be a way for Adam to find-replace all the Google+ URLs in the PF postings database with their Google Photo counterparts.

[Dartmoor Dave]

But maybe a solution isn't as hard as it seems....What is the URL structure for the Google+ version of the link to a given photo and what is the URL structure for the Google Photos version of the link to that same photo? (Or can one form a valid Google Photos URL from the parts of the Google+ URL?)If the two URLs share enough structure -- maybe differing only the prefix domain name and top-level path -- then there may be a way for Adam to find-replace all the Google+ URLs in the PF postings database with their Google Photo counterparts.

That's a good point. I've spent the past half hour trying to post the two URLs here using the various browsers that I use on this pc: Pale Moon, Brave, and Internet Explorer, and whichever browser I use the Google+ link just appears as "Browser not supported". I can get a Google Photos link okay, but that's no use on its own without the Google+ link to compare it to. And I really don't want to install any more browsers.

I'll have another go later on my Ubuntu machine, but I swear that I'm finding even the simplest internet tasks more and more frustrating these days. It's getting to the point where you can't do anything at all involving companies like Google without dropping your trousers and handing them a tub of Vaseline first. I like to think that I'm a reasonably computer literate person, and so to find myself stumped by just posting a link is tooth-grindingly annoying.

[SharkyCA]

This Google help link may be of assistance, "How to download your content".

Download your Google+ data - Google+ Help

[Dartmoor Dave]

Just to update:

It looks like the links to all my Google+ photos have been automatically migrated over to Google Photos links and are still visible here on the forum. So that's a problem avoided.