The only way I could find to move photos from my MBP to my iPhone 4 was to sync a folder...no big deal, except that I can't figure out how to get rid of it now that it's no longer needed.

I can get to a screen with a trash can, but I can't move either the folder or the individual photos into the can, so as far as I can see, the only way for me to get rid of the folder is to reset the iPhone to factory default, which, although it will not be a hardship in my circumstances, is not a particularly facile way of accomplishing my goal.

Is there an easier way, and if not, how do I reset?

Thanks.

I always do it through iCloud. It as an absolute cinch, totally automatic, and completely invisible in operation.

I haven't tried it but try attaching your iPhone to the MBP, and see if you cannot delete the folder in iTunes.

As to how to reset Settings > General > Reset

Thanks for the quick response.

I wasn't able to find a way to delete the pics folder via iTunes, but while looking at the options that were presented I realized that restoring the iPhone from the backup that was made immediately prior to importing it would turn the trick.

Mission accomplished.

I don't have total recall of every screen on the iPhone 4, but when you get to the screen with the trash can, in the upper right corner (?) is there a choice to "Edit" or "Select"? Tap that, then choose the folder or individual photos to be deleted, then trash them.

Thanks, Ira.

The trash can is in the lower right hand corner, but as I said earlier, I'm unable to trash either the folder or the pics in it to it; I can only trash pics from my current "roll".

Anyhow, mission accomplished, although not necessarily in the most expeditious manner.

I should have clarified: after I tap "Select" I can select the pics in the folder, but the trash can remains greyed out.

If there's a way to select the folder, itself, I didn't see it.

Just out of curiosity, which folder/album did you want to delete? Not all of them can be deleted by the user.

The only way I could find to move pics from my MBP to my iPhone was to sync a folder, and /Users/artie/Pictures was the only option I was offered. (I guess I wasn't offered an option to sync from Photos because my iPhone 4/iOS 7.1.2 can't see it...doesn't even know it exists.)

It's that folder that I'm now trying to delete...but with no success. I don't know what I was looking at when I thought that restoring from a backup had turned the trick, but either the backup was made after I synced or it didn't affect the folder, and it didn't, and since I've got no inclination to wipe the phone, I guess I'm stuck with it, not that it's anything more than an annoyance.

Oh, well. :shrug:

What you describe actually makes sense. It is a folder that is now synced with your MBP. Removing it would break the "sync link". I am guessing on some of this, but…

I don't recall if you have wi-fi or text messages on your iPhone 4, but if so, in the future you could text or e-mail the photos to yourself and once retrieved on your iPhone, save them to the Photo app on the phone. Even with a lot of photos, the process is fairly quick since you can e-mail multiple photos. If I recall, the old iPhone can only handle one photo in a text message.

I'm having trouble buying into that, Ira.

If my devices were dynamically synced via the cloud it would make sense to me, but as things stand I can make one-sided changes on my MBP, so why not on my iPhone, too? Why is it married to the past when there really isn't a "sync link" in play? As far as I can tell, there's no way to delete that folder from my iPhone (other than, as joemike has suggested, via the cloud).

I could modify it on my MBP and re-sync, but while that could empty it, it couldn't remove it.

It seems like there needs to be (if there isn't already) a means to manipulate synced data (such as this, at the least) on one device without affecting it on all devices.


Good thought; thanks! My iPhone connects to the Internet, so I could have e-mailed (but not texted...I think) the pics to myself.

Actually, though, the pics are of a painting that hangs less than 10 feet from my desk, and I could have just taken new ones, but I decided to take advantage of my first opportunity to get into the workings of iOS...

I kinda feel like the coach who drowned in a bowl of chicken soup in the first episode of Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman.