iOS app does not detect date

Please fill out the following sections to the best of your ability, it will help us investigate bugs if we have this information at the outset. Screenshots are especially helpful, so please provide those if you can.

Platform (Android, iOS, Website): iOS 15.3.1

App version number, if a mobile app issue (shown under Settings or About): 3.2.4, version 648,

Browser, if a website issue (Firefox, Chrome, etc) : n/a

URLs (aka web addresses) of any relevant observations or pages: n/a

Screenshots of what you are seeing (instructions for taking a screenshot on computers and mobile devices: https://www.take-a-screenshot.org/):

Description of problem (please provide a set of steps we can use to replicate the issue, and make as many as you need.):

When I try to add observations from the camera roll, the app does not detect the time and date information from the picture. I checked and this information is present on the picture, but somehow the app fails to fetch it. This is something new, I took about 50x pictures in the same day but the issue appeared after I uploaded about 10.

Step 1:


I upload the image as usual but the time/date is not showing
Step 2:

If you take a look at the picture info, it does have the time/date info.
Step 3:

1 Like

That does seem pretty strange, that it stopped including the date after uploading 10 pictures. Did restarting the phone help? There are some other potential remedies for iOS upload issues, but I cannot recall them off-hand. :woman_shrugging:

Can you please send a full-sized copy to help@inaturalist.org so we can take a look?

So you imported photos already taken with your camera into the iNat app and started uploading them? Did you quit the app at all? Just trying to make sure I can try to reproduce the replication conditions as closely as possible.

Hi Tony! @tiwane I did business as usual: went to the field and took a lot of pictures with the phone. I don’t use the app to add direct observations when I’m out as the phone GPS usually fails providing the exact spot, so I always want correct it manually, and also the app consumes more energy and I don’t want to run out of battery.

That night I uploaded a few observations and suddenly and after submitting a few as always, I got an alert that I hadn’t provided a date for one. I added it manually, but the same repeated in the following tries. I reinstalled the app and restarted the phone and still I got the same problem. When I add an observation directly by taking a picture with the app, it does provide a date. I will send this same text by email, but leave it here just in case someone had the same issue.

Thank you!

2 Likes

I’m having the same issue! Did you find a solution?

Please fill out the following sections to the best of your ability, it will help us investigate bugs if we have this information at the outset. Screenshots are especially helpful, so please provide those if you can.

Platform (Android, iOS, Website): iOS

App version number, if a mobile app issue (shown under Settings or About): 3.3.6

Browser, if a website issue (Firefox, Chrome, etc) :

URLs (aka web addresses) of any relevant observations or pages:

Screenshots of what you are seeing (instructions for taking a screenshot on computers and mobile devices: https://www.take-a-screenshot.org/):

Description of problem (please provide a set of steps we can use to replicate the issue, and make as many as you need.):

Step 1: attempt to upload image as usual; click observe ->photo library ->select image

Step 2: observation is created but the date and time is no longer included. I tested with many different pictures, both on inaturalist and inat next and both had this problem that they’re not importing the date and time anymore. Location and accuracy are fine but for some reason I now have to manually enter the date and time for each observation which is super inconvenient. I don’t see anyone else complaining about this so maybe it’s something I did wrong? But I didn’t change anything, the apps are all up to date, I didn’t change the app permissions - location data is still included. Any idea what could be my problem here and now to fix it? If no one else is having this issue suddenly?

I just tried making a new observation with a photo I took several days ago, and it imported the correct date, time, and location. Maybe try reloading the app again?

We get intermittent reports of this happening in iOS but I’ve never been able to replicate it or get details from useres experiencing it that allows me to investigate very much.

Are you able to open up this photo in your Photos app and swipe up on to reveal its info and share a screenshot of that info here?

I’ve deleted and reinstalled the app and that didn’t help.

This shows the date and time of the photo.

Again I’ve tried with multiple photos, even some I took the same day, and it didn’t work.

For people with the same issue in the past, did it eventually resolve?

My problem is persisting, do you have any advice? How was this resolved in the past?

At the moment I do not, I’m sorry. Are you able to send a screen recording of the entire process to help@inaturalist.org?

Also, are you able to download iNaturalist Next from the App Store and see if the problem also persists with that app?

I tried with inaturalist next and I had the same issue! I will record and send the full process to that address. Thank you.

1 Like

Thanks.