cairn vs PhotoNest Backup

cairn reconciles your iPhone photo library against your own Immich server. When you delete a photo on your phone, cairn moves the matching photo on Immich to Trash. That's the whole job. cairn doesn't upload photos, show albums, edit metadata, or run AI — the Immich app already does those things. cairn closes the one loop the Immich app doesn't: photos that live on the server after you've deleted them from your phone. HOW IT WORKS — Content identity is SHA1 (the same identifier Immich uses server-side). — cairn subscribes to iOS's deletion log, so it sees soft-deletes as you make them. — A configurable quarantine window holds confirmed deletions before anything moves, so an accidental mass-offload has time to be caught. — Every run shows you the candidate list first. Nothing happens on the server until you confirm. SAFETY MODEL — Trash, not delete. cairn moves assets into your Immich Trash — Immich retains them for 30 days, and restore is one tap. — Percent cap + floor. If a single run would move more than a threshold of your matched photos to Trash, it aborts without touching the server. — Breadcrumbs. Every run is tagged on Immich (cairn/v1/run/[id]) so you can find it server-side. — Forensic journal. Local append-only log records every step — planned, tagged, trashed, restored, failed. — Exclusions. Protect specific photos from ever being flagged. — Indexing scope. Restrict cairn to a specific set of Photos albums. Photos outside the scope are silently ignored — never hashed, never proposed for trash. Useful if you want to manage just one album and leave synced family albums alone. PRIVACY — No analytics, no telemetry, no crash reporting, no ads. — No cairn backend. Your iPhone talks directly to your Immich server using your API key. — Credentials stay in the iOS Keychain. Nothing leaves your device besides requests you configured. REQUIREMENTS — An Immich server you run or control. — An Immich API key. cairn requests these scopes: asset.read, asset.view, asset.download, asset.delete, tag.create, tag.asset, tag.read. The Setup screen lists them when you paste your key. cairn is not affiliated with the Immich project. It talks to Immich over its public API; compatibility only. Source is MIT-licensed at github.com/glarue/cairn.

PhotoNest Backup copies the photos and videos from your iPhone straight to your own Synology NAS — the storage you already own and control. No third-party cloud. No monthly storage bill that grows forever. Your memories stay on your hardware, on your network. WHY PHOTONEST • Your NAS, your rules. Media is transferred directly from your device to your NAS. We never receive, store or see your photos. • A one-time alternative to renting cloud storage month after month. • Reliable transfers with duplicate detection — nothing is ever uploaded twice. HOW IT WORKS 1. Connect to your NAS (address, account and password are stored securely in the iOS Keychain). 2. Choose the destination folder. 3. Tap Back up now — or let PhotoNest Pro do it automatically in the background. FEATURES • Photos and videos at original quality • Smart deduplication — the same item is never uploaded twice • Clear file naming and date-based folders • Pause, resume or cancel any backup • Honest progress: see exactly what was uploaded, skipped or failed • Handles large videos without exhausting memory • Backup history, so you always know what is safe PHOTONEST PRO Upgrade to Pro to unlock: • Automatic backups — runs in the background; set it once and forget it • iCloud originals — downloads iCloud-optimized photos, then backs them up too • Full history — keep your complete backup activity, not just the recent 150 Pro is available as a monthly or yearly subscription (with a 7-day free trial), or as a one-time Lifetime purchase. REQUIREMENTS A Synology NAS with File Station enabled and reachable from your device. Privacy Policy: https://swift2geek.github.io/photonest/privacy.html Terms of Use: https://swift2geek.github.io/photonest/terms.html PhotoNest Backup is an independent app. It is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or sponsored by Synology Inc. "Synology" is a trademark of its respective owner.