I recently tried to backup my Users collection and realized I could do so for every field except the images. Do any of you know of a way to bulk-download images from a collection?
If this is not possible and you found it to be a problem, what was your solution? Make an Airtable collection for your images instead?
Hi @mephix,
Good question 
Something which comes to my mind is using Adalo API to access the collection. Checked the reply on some of my collections with pictures - it includes URL of the picture.
But you will need to write some kind of script to back this up… and there is a second part - restore, and I have no idea how to automate this.
Backup & restore in Adalo is an interesting question. @anon78309838 @pford @Devops @karimoo @theadaloguy - are you aware of any “best practices” for this?
Best,
Victor
Hi @Victor,
So you was able to retrieve an image-field URL asking the Adalo API? In api-docs I can’t see any field in the returned JSON for a collection that as an image attribute. I haven’t tried yet doing the actual call so…glad to know!
if this is the case, i think docs need some modifications.
Hi @Gardusio,
Well, here is what I get when requesting one of my collections (with images):
> $ curl -X GET "https://api.adalo.com/apps/03b6113d-458f-4743-8c5c-1917b0071bed/collections/SKIPPEDCOLLECTIONNAME/1" -H "Content-Type: application/json" -H "Authorization: Bearer SKIPPEDBEARER"
{"id":1,"Name":"Cattle","Photo":{"url":"https://adalo-uploads-dev.imgix.net/a993590d6830375f61b53bc958160fae6debc230478bb5576fe0d32f9c89a4d3.jpg","size":53091,"width":640,"height":425,"filename":"file.jpg"},"Photo Category":[1],"Category Search Index":"Mammals, All","Photo Categories":[6,1],"created_at":"2020-12-02T09:00:07.089Z","updated_at":"2020-12-02T13:25:19.552Z"}
HI @mephix, @Victor, I have currently no best practise for backup of images that are already in Adalo.
If you are looking for an central storage for images that you can use in Adalo and WordPress, Zapier, etc, check Cloudinary:
Should Images be saved in Adalo? What are the benefits? I have images saved in a folder on an outside domain and I link to it via url. Don’t know if this is the right thing to do.
Hi @rregueira,
I’m not sure how to allow app users to add images via Image Picker, if you’d like to store them externally…
Best,
Victor
I use imagekit.io (Similar to cloudinary), it works perfect with S3 storage, you can upload the URL automatically and no need for media in Adalo. You can achieve same with Cloudinary.
To upload images and store only URL, you will need a middleman. Integromat is perfect for this.
Hey, thanks for your clarification about this!
I am a designer and I built an app for my clients to upload high resolution photos that I need to work on and send it back to them. Adalo is compressing the high resolution images automatically, so I can’t use them.
Do you think I could have my clients upload the photos to Imagekit using Adalo and Integromat? Or what do you think is the easiest way to solve this?
My app is finished but I can’t use it, any help is greatly appreciated.
Thanks again!
Hi,
For that you would need to send directly to Imagekit, in order to bypass Adalo. That is more complicated, need to “chew” on that a little bit.
Hi @Rez,
I’ve experimented a bit with the Image Picker, Image temporary property (as a “proxy” storage for the image) and external storage (AWS S3 via Integromat). But this will not help in your case; if Adalo compresses the image after upload - then its storage can’t be used as a proxy.
Possible ways I’d look at would be:
(a) investigate if an upload could be done via some external service in Webview
(b) see of other workflow how to get images could be implemented - for example, users can send images by email to a specific address, and then Integromat can process these mails and put the images to a specific place (in turn, accessible from Adalo)
© may be it is worthwhile to use “File” property instead of an “Image” one? Files shouldn’t be compressed in any way by Adalo 
All these ways require quite a bit of time to investigate.
Also, there is a possibility to have someone develop the custom component for Image upload directly to the external cloud storage… but that’s a different story
Best regards, Victor.
@JL_LJ @Victor thank you both so much for taking the time to look at my issue and respond, I appreciate it very much.
Except for this issue, the app is pretty much finalized. Here’s a link in case you’d like to see it:
login: test@test.com
pw: test
cc: 4242 4242 4242 4242
date: any in the future
cvv: any 3 digits
Victor,
A) That can be a good option. Maybe I can use JotForm to upload the photos to Google Drive and Integromat to copy them to Adalo? I have never used Integromat before, but I am willing to give it a try.
B) This option would require me to change the flow completely, I don’t think it’s something I would consider before exploring other options first.
C) This actually might work, as long as I can still display the images. Going to give it a try as a first option.
Thank you so much, I’ll keep you posted about my findings and don’t hesitate to reach out if I can ever be a resource for you.
Best,
Rez
@Victor I was able to make it work by using Files instead of Images, thank you so much for your input, it saved me a lot of trouble, I can’t thank you enough! Is there a way to mark here as solved?
Only issue is that Adalo has a bug displaying images via the URL, I am having the same issue as this article Images from URL not showing - #2 by Victor
I wrote @anon78309838 asking for some assistance and I am waiting to hear back!
Have been stuck on this for a while, but found a solution with Zapier:
zapier will provide the end url from your prior action in adalo.
sorry! Make sure to remove “”-dev" from the https input
Hi @chadblumenthal,
One small comment: you could put image to Airtable directly - via Custom action.
Moreover, if you use “Attachments” column type, Airtable should download the image (or any file) by itself using URL you provide
Best regards,
Victor