Iphone Media Archive

iPhone Media Archive

Overview

Use this skill for backup-first iPhone media archive work where the durable deliverable is a raw Finder-browsable photo/video folder on an external drive.

Never delete media from the phone until a raw archive has been verified and the user gives a separate explicit cleanup go/no-go.

Workflow

1. Confirm the external drive is mounted, writable, and has enough free space.
2. Diagnose any existing archive folders before writing into them.
3. Create or verify a pre-cleanup iPhone backup on the external drive. Prefer direct idevicebackup2 backup <external-destination> when Mac internal storage is tight.
4. Verify backup finalization before using it:
   • Status.plist exists and has SnapshotState=finished.
   • Manifest.plist is a valid plist.
   • Manifest.db opens read-only with SQLite immutable mode and PRAGMA quick_check returns ok.
5. Build a raw media plan from Manifest.db plus backed-up Media/PhotoData/Photos.sqlite.
   • Use only raw Media/DCIM/... backup files for the Finder-browsable archive.
   • Use Photos.sqlite ZASSET.ZDATECREATED mapped by ZDIRECTORY + ZFILENAME for capture-date ordering.
   • Use same-stem matching for Live Photo MOV files and AAE sidecars.
   • Treat backup file mtimes as weak fallback evidence, not capture dates.
6. Run a dry-run extraction report before copying.
7. Copy selected older media to a new date-organized archive folder on the external drive.
8. Verify count, size, extension distribution, capture-date range, and sample still/video decodability.
9. Stop for user cleanup approval. Do not clear Recently Deleted unless the user explicitly asks after verification.

Scripts

Use bundled scripts from scripts/:

• verify-iphone-backup-manifest.sh <backup-root> [out-dir]
  • Read-only backup integrity and media manifest summary.
  • Uses SQLite immutable mode for ExFAT/removable-drive compatibility.
• extract-iphone-backup-media.py --backup-root <backup-root> --dest-root <archive-root> [--older-fraction 0.80|--cutoff-date YYYY-MM-DD] [--execute] [--report <path>]
  • Without --execute, writes a dry-run TSV and copies nothing.
  • With --execute, copies selected raw files into YYYY/YYYY-MM-DD/ folders.
• verify-raw-archive.sh <archive-root> [out-dir]
  • Summarizes count, size, extensions, and sample file probes with file, sips, and ffprobe when available.

Safety Rules

• Keep backups and archives on the external drive when internal disk space is low.
• Do not reformat or repartition an external drive unless the user explicitly asks.
• Do not rely on Photos libraries on ExFAT as the primary archive. Raw files are the durable deliverable.
• Ask the user only for unavoidable manual prompts: iPhone unlock/trust, backup password, macOS privacy access, or explicit cleanup confirmation.
• Save logs, reports, and one-off scripts into the active task folder so the archive can be audited later.