[Bug]: Having many photos in your libary leads to crashing or not responding browser

[newr90]

⚠️ This issue respects the following points: ⚠️

• This is a bug, not a question or a configuration/webserver/proxy issue.
• This issue is not already reported on Github (I've searched it).
• Nextcloud Server is up to date. See Maintenance and Release Schedule for supported versions.
• Maps app is up to date. See Maintenance and Release Schedule for supported versions.
• I agree to follow Nextcloud's Code of Conduct.

Bug description

Having many photos in your libary leads to crashing or not responding browser.

I've got over 10k photos in my cloud. Unfortunately the newest version of maps leads to unexpected behavior of the browser and the app itself. It seems like the last versions of the app try to load all photos instantly, leading to unresponsive browsers and the webserver itself (freezing, not responding).

Last working version which I ve found working for me is 0.1.10 . It keeps reloading photos which come into view.

I've searched for this topic in here. I hope I didn't miss any already open issue.

Steps to reproduce

1.Use latest version of the app
2.Have over 10k of photos (with geo-info) in your cloud
3.Try to load the application
(Safari crashes, Firefox stops responding and takes a lot of time to load the page)

Expected behavior

The old method of preloading the photos should be used. -> Making the app usable for large photo-libaries.

Installation method

Other

Operating system

Debian/Ubuntu

PHP engine version

PHP 8.1

Web server

Nginx

Database engine version

MariaDB

Is this bug present after an update or on a fresh install of the server?

No response

Is this bug present after an update or on a fresh install of the app?

Updated from a minor version

Are you using the Nextcloud Server Encryption module?

Encryption is Disabled

What user-backends are you using?

• Default user-backend (database)
• LDAP/ Active Directory
• SSO - SAML
• Other

Configuration report

{
    "system": {
        "passwordsalt": "***REMOVED SENSITIVE VALUE***",
        "secret": "***REMOVED SENSITIVE VALUE***",
        "datadirectory": "***REMOVED SENSITIVE VALUE***",
        "dbtype": "mysql",
        "version": "24.0.6.1",
        "overwrite.cli.url": "http:\/\/localhost",
        "dbname": "***REMOVED SENSITIVE VALUE***",
        "dbhost": "***REMOVED SENSITIVE VALUE***",
        "dbport": "",
        "dbtableprefix": "oc_",
        "mysql.utf8mb4": true,
        "dbuser": "***REMOVED SENSITIVE VALUE***",
        "dbpassword": "***REMOVED SENSITIVE VALUE***",
        "installed": true,
        "instanceid": "***REMOVED SENSITIVE VALUE***",
        "mail_smtpmode": "smtp",
        "mail_smtpauth": 1,
        "mail_sendmailmode": "smtp",
        "mail_from_address": "***REMOVED SENSITIVE VALUE***",
        "mail_domain": "***REMOVED SENSITIVE VALUE***",
        "mail_smtphost": "***REMOVED SENSITIVE VALUE***",
        "mail_smtpsecure": "ssl",
        "mail_smtpname": "***REMOVED SENSITIVE VALUE***",
        "mail_smtppassword": "***REMOVED SENSITIVE VALUE***",
        "mail_smtpport": "465",
        "default_phone_region": "DE",
        "memcache.local": "\\OC\\Memcache\\APCu",
        "app_install_overwrite": [
            "occweb"
        ],
        "enable_previews": true,
        "enabledPreviewProviders": [
            "OC\\Preview\\Movie",
            "OC\\Preview\\PNG",
            "OC\\Preview\\JPEG",
            "OC\\Preview\\GIF",
            "OC\\Preview\\BMP",
            "OC\\Preview\\XBitmap",
            "OC\\Preview\\MP3",
            "OC\\Preview\\MP4",
            "OC\\Preview\\TXT",
            "OC\\Preview\\MarkDown",
            "OC\\Preview\\PDF",
            "OC\\Preview\\MOV"
        ],
        "maintenance": false,
        "theme": "",
        "loglevel": 2,
        "updater.release.channel": "stable",
        "updater.secret": "***REMOVED SENSITIVE VALUE***"
    }
}

List of activated Apps

Enabled:
  - accessibility: 1.10.0
  - activity: 2.16.0
  - calendar: 3.5.0
  - circles: 24.0.1
  - cloud_federation_api: 1.7.0
  - comments: 1.14.0
  - contacts: 4.2.2
  - contactsinteraction: 1.5.0
  - dashboard: 7.4.0
  - dav: 1.22.0
  - deck: 1.7.1
  - federatedfilesharing: 1.14.0
  - federation: 1.14.0
  - files: 1.19.0
  - files_external: 1.16.1
  - files_pdfviewer: 2.5.0
  - files_rightclick: 1.3.0
  - files_sharing: 1.16.2
  - files_trashbin: 1.14.0
  - files_versions: 1.17.0
  - files_videoplayer: 1.13.0
  - firstrunwizard: 2.13.0
  - logreader: 2.9.0
  - lookup_server_connector: 1.12.0
  - mail: 1.13.9
  - maps: 0.1.10
  - mediadc: 0.1.9
  - memories: 2.1.3
  - metadata: 0.16.0
  - nextcloud_announcements: 1.13.0
  - notes: 4.5.1
  - notifications: 2.12.1
  - oauth2: 1.12.0
  - occweb: 0.1.0
  - onlyoffice: 7.5.4
  - password_policy: 1.14.0
  - photos: 1.6.0
  - previewgenerator: 5.1.0
  - privacy: 1.8.0
  - provisioning_api: 1.14.0
  - recommendations: 1.3.0
  - richdocumentscode: 22.5.502
  - serverinfo: 1.14.0
  - settings: 1.6.0
  - sharebymail: 1.14.0
  - sharerenamer: 3.1.0
  - support: 1.7.0
  - survey_client: 1.12.0
  - systemtags: 1.14.0
  - tasks: 0.14.4
  - text: 3.5.1
  - theming: 1.15.0
  - twofactor_backupcodes: 1.13.0
  - twofactor_email: 2.7.0
  - twofactor_totp: 6.4.0
  - unsplash: 2.0.1
  - updatenotification: 1.14.0
  - user_status: 1.4.0
  - viewer: 1.8.0
  - weather_status: 1.4.0
  - workflow_ocr: 1.24.5
  - workflowengine: 2.6.0
Disabled:
  - admin_audit
  - encryption
  - recognize: 2.2.1
  - richdocuments: 6.2.0
  - user_ldap

Nextcloud Signing status

No response

Nextcloud Logs

No response

Browser Console

No response

Additional info

No response

[adi2k5]

Same here, I cannot load photos to maps since some longer time now, if I do it, browser tab completely freezes after few seconds. I'm having 70k+ photos with geotagging in them, with one of the previous versions (probably also 0.1.10 as OP stated), everything was working fine and even 70k+ photos was not a big issue.

[jacotec]

Confirmed, maps is currently unusable. Server load is insane, so that I need to disable the app until this is fixed.

[grabnab]

I also have issues with the maps app. Earlier versions where much faster.

[khlschrnk]

I am also affected. Maps is not usable anymore since 0.1.10. I currently got ~35k pictures and the number of pictures has not been sigificantly increased since then.

Additional potential helpful information:
The moment I updated to the v0.2* releases I also updated to php8.1. In the meantime I tried it with php7.4 and the problem still exists.

It is working correctly with ~3k pictures but that does not mean that this is the limit. I just want to say that I got it to run properly with significantly lower amount of pictures.

[Demian98]

Same here. I have around 30k images (per user) and the map is freezing the browser for a long time. Would live to see this fixed and make maps compatible with large libraries.

[apg1980]

for me as well 70k pictures, wheel is turning long long time, firefox is freezing the tab

[karpiq24]

Similar issue here, map is opening but it seems it tries to load thousands of photo previews at once, causing server to have a pretty bad time. Some previews load, some don't and the map is very laggy.

[Cebrain]

Can confirm, when opening maps, it is loading all photo previews and is nearly killing the server

[jacotec]

@tacruc This is really a showstopper! Maps is pretty embedded in the new "photos" app, but having it enabled with this bug kills the server (and it's unusable for the user as well).

Do you have any idea of a hotfix or workaround (except disabling the maps app)?

[newr90]

This app should be removed from the list of featured apps as it's crashing/slowing down servers and browsers. And it seems like no one is interested in making any changes. I know that it's a community project but it could be a serious issue to anyone using this in a productive environment.

[Tirpitz93]

I have not had a chance to look into the implementation in detail.
would it be possible to filter images loaded by screen bounds (plus margin) and group images serverside based on zoom level.
another thought: Would indexing images by lat & long improve performance in this case, I just noticed my DB did not have an index on these.

[Tirpitz93]

Something along the lines of:
These snippets largely coppy from similar functions found nearby, I am ny no means a PHP developer so (constructive) criticism is welcome.

PhotosController.php

	public function getPhotosFromDbInArea($lat1, $lng1, $lat2, $lng2): DataResponse {
		$result = $this->geophotoService->getAllFromDBInArea($this->userId, $lat1, $lng1, $lat2, $lng2, True);
		return new DataResponse($result);
	}

GeophotosMapper.php

	public function findAllLocalizedInArea($userId, $lat1, $lng1, $lat2, $lng2, $limit=null, $offset=null) {
		$sql = 'SELECT * FROM `*PREFIX*maps_photos` where `user_id` = ? and `lat` is not null and `lng` is not null and `lat` between ? and ? and `lng` between ? and ?';
		return $this->findEntities($sql, [$userId, $lat1, $lat2, $lng1, $lng2], $limit, $offset);
	}

GeophotoService.php

	public function getAllFromDBInArea($userId, $lat1, $lng1, $lat2, $lng2, bool $respectNomediaAndNoimage=true)
	{
		$lat1 = floatval($lat1);
		$lng1 = floatval($lng1);
		$lat2 = floatval($lat2);
		$lng2 = floatval($lng2);
		$latmin = min($lat1, $lat2);
		$latmax = max($lat1, $lat2);
		$lngmin = min($lng1, $lng2);
		$lngmax = max($lng1, $lng2);
		$ignoredPaths = $respectNomediaAndNoimage ? $this->getIgnoredPaths($userId) : [];
		$photoEntities = $this->photoMapper->findAllLocalizedInArea($userId, $latmin, $lngmin, $latmax, $lngmax);
		$userFolder = $this->getFolderForUser($userId);
		$filesById = [];
		$cache = $userFolder->getStorage()->getCache();
		$previewEnableMimetypes = $this->getPreviewEnabledMimetypes();
		foreach ($photoEntities as $photoEntity) {
			$cacheEntry = $cache->get($photoEntity->getFileId());
			if ($cacheEntry) {
				// this path is relative to owner's storage
				//$path = $cacheEntry->getPath();
				// but we want it relative to current user's storage
				$files = $userFolder->getById($photoEntity->getFileId());
				if (empty($files)) {
					continue;
				}
				$file = array_shift($files);
				if ($file === null) {
					continue;
				}
				$path = $userFolder->getRelativePath( $file->getPath());
				$isIgnored = false;
				foreach ($ignoredPaths as $ignoredPath) {
					if (str_starts_with($path, $ignoredPath)) {
						$isIgnored = true;
						break;
					}
				}
				if (!$isIgnored) {
					$isRoot = $file === $userFolder;

					$file_object = new \stdClass();
					$file_object->fileId = $photoEntity->getFileId();
					$file_object->fileid = $file_object->fileId;
					$file_object->lat = $photoEntity->getLat();
					$file_object->lng = $photoEntity->getLng();
					$file_object->dateTaken = $photoEntity->getDateTaken() ?? \time();
					$file_object->basename = $isRoot ? '' : $file->getName();
					$file_object->filename = $this->normalizePath($path);
					$file_object->etag = $cacheEntry->getEtag();
//Not working for NC21 as Viewer requires String representation of permissions
//                $file_object->permissions = $file->getPermissions();
					$file_object->type = $file->getType();
					$file_object->mime = $file->getMimetype();
					$file_object->lastmod = $file->getMTime();
					$file_object->size = $file->getSize();
					$file_object->path = $path;
					$file_object->hasPreview = in_array($cacheEntry->getMimeType(), $previewEnableMimetypes);
					$filesById[] = $file_object;
				}
			}
		}
		shuffle($filesById);
		return $filesById;
	}

[thiscantbeserious]

If I have to throw a wild guess there are some background jobs there were never updated since 3 years ago:

https://github.com/nextcloud/maps/tree/master/lib/BackgroundJob

But the dependencies were - so its likely possible that something was forgotten on that regard and the background job is silently not doing anything while it should be actually slowly pregenerating the thumbnails in the background.

[tacruc]

v0.2.5-1-nightly has some improves. It's still not perfect but on my Laptop 13k photos load and the app is usable after ca. 20s of loading.
Additonally custom maps allows to load smaller folders so reducing the problem a little.

Notice that v0.2.5-1-nightly is the first nightly version and needs lots of testing for a stable release.

[tacruc]

There are further improvements in #924
On my laptop the front end handles 13k pictures reasonably fast.
The back-end is still a bottleneck on the first load.

[newr90]

Thank your for working on that problem since NC 25 doesn't support the old version anymore.

[newr90]

I was finally able to test the nightly version. Seems to work much better. Doesn't crash the browser anymore. And the server load is much better. Thanks.

[tacruc]

Thanks for testing

[newr90]

I am not sure if you re aware of the site not working on mobile devices. In my case the browser is Safari (Iphone). It just doesnt display any content except for the background and nextcloud top bar. It used to work back in older versions, I think.

[tacruc]

@newr90 no I'm not aware. Works on my Android device with chrome and Firefox. But it is definitely not optimized for mobile usage (even more overlapping buttons).

[newr90]

@tacruc It worked really well i d say. Used it quite often.
Dont know what happened. Maybe i ve got the time to compare the Last working Version vs the nightly version.

[jacotec]

@tacruc I've also installed the latest nightly and it's not showing any photo on the map.
In the side bar it shows "My photos: 6k" which sounds reasonable (if it counts only photos with geodata), but not even one single photo appears on the map.

In this map area I'd expect >3k photos:

Do you have any idea which might be wrong?

[tacruc]

@jacotec can you check the browser console?
Maybe disable the time slider? An scan you zoom out and check if the photos are for example at 0,0?

[jacotec]

@tacruc Disabling the slider does not help ... and it adjusts fine in time range after the number of photos are shown in the left side bar.

The console shows some errors:

[tacruc]

I think your experience this issue: #947

[khlschrnk]

I also got the problem that the pictures are not shown in the map with the current version of the app. Disabling Talk does solve this. So #947 seems to be the root cause.

Anyway, speed of maps significantly improved now. I need about a minute for my 41k pictures to load. Thank you for the improvements.

[categulario]

I just tried out this extension (again) since I saw the release of the 1.0.0 version, and it still crashes my browser (or leaves it so slow I have to close the tab). I don't think it has to do with pictures in my case though. I think it is because I have 1k gpx tracks which doesn't sound like a lot but seems enough to make it not work.

I don't see any errors in the browser's console.

[tacruc]

@categulario Do you have all tracks enabled and shown? I have 700 tracks but mostly disabled, and this doesn't crash my browser?
Is there on track that is particularly long?

[categulario]

I suspect they are all enabled and shown by default and that's causing the slowdown. My tracks average 7k points each (tens of kilometers of cycling)

[categulario]

and disabling them doesn't seem to be possible because there are 1k of them and the page is already too slow to even start