Would it make sense to add an Upload Request feature?

[Gregor1996]

I was thinking about a feature in Immich Public Proxy that would allow a user to start an Upload request by loading pictures to Immich Puplic Proxy, through a configurable storage on the IPP machine itself, without modifying the Immich library in any way, and sending a notification to the Immich library owner somehow.
The library owner could then decide to upload the photos to his Immich library!

I think a method similar to this could preserve the IPP isolation functionality, give the ability to upload files, and keep the Immich library owner under full control of everything. All this could be achieved without any API key or anything else that would expose the Immich library to the web!

[alangrainger]

This is a possibility as it doesn't require any write access to Immich.

What would be an example of a use-case where you'd want this upload to be part of IPP rather than a dedicated drop-site or something like Memtly?

[kyearb]

I'm interested in this feature as well.

I think the benefit for me is that all the photos are in immich. With something likely Memtly, I would have to add my own photos there when I already have everything backed up in immich, meaning there are duplicates. Since I normally create albums in immich anyway, not having to use yet another service for the shared album is the most ideal.

I recently shared an album (without IPP) with my girlfriend (who has an immich account) and a friend (without an immich account) who was able to upload photos and look at/download photos as well. I made the link temporary and added a password to increase security, but having the upload option directly in IPP would be more secure.

[Gregor1996]

For me the primary benefit of such a solution is that it allows people that you shared the photo album with to directly send you pictures back, without having to search for another way to share back pictures with you!

Additionally in the long term an IPP management service that allows you to upload the shared back photos to Immich and adding them to the shared album with one click, only accessible from the inside and not from the internet, could be implemented!

Sorry for the late reply, I thought I already had!

[mdbdb]

I came across IPP today and installed it on a trial basis. For weeks, I’ve been debating whether I should make my immich instance - which is currently accessible only via the internal network - accessible from outside as well, so IPP seemed like the perfect solution.

I understand that direct uploads aren’t supported, since there shouldn’t be any write access to immich. But wouldn’t it be really great if there were an option - as mentioned above - to offer an upload when viewing a shared album via IPP, which would then be stored in a storage location managed by IPP?

[alangrainger]

Thanks all. I've been thinking about how to do this without breaking the rule that IPP never has write access to Immich and does not store any keys, and I think there's a clean way.

Feedback appreciated before building:

How it would work

• Off by default. A new ipp.allowUpload option, 1 = follow Immich's per-share setting, 2 = always.
• Viewers get a "Send photos" button in the gallery, plus drag-and-drop on desktop. Files go to a folder on the IPP host, one subfolder per share, with a small manifest recording which album or shared link it belongs to. Immich is never touched. The album share key is not stored, only the album GUID, which gives no access to Immich.
• To bring them into Immich you would run a small script either manually or on a schedule, using an API key with upload (but not read) permissions. It uploads each file and adds it to the right album by ID. Run it by hand after you've looked at the folder, or on a cron if you trust your viewers. Re-running is safe because Immich dedupes.
• Sensible limits: file size, per-share and total quotas, image and video types only, rate limiting.

What it won't do: automatically show uploads in the same gallery

I imagine this will be the first request, so here's the reasoning. Everything IPP serves today came from Immich, which you control. Showing uploads live would mean serving files a stranger chose to other strangers, under your domain, with none of Immich's processing (no thumbnails, no HEIC conversion, no orientation fix, no video transcoding). IPP would need its own image pipeline, which is exactly what Immich already is. It also makes every share a public image host that anyone with the link can post to, with you finding out afterwards.

If you want uploads to appear quickly, run the import script on a cron. They'll show up in the share a few minutes later, processed by Immich, with the option to review still there.

┌─ Internet ───────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐
│  Viewer's browser: IPP gallery                                                   │
│    [Send photos] button, or drop files onto the gallery                          │
│    local previews only, one POST per file, client-side size and type check       │
└──────────────┬───────────────────────────────────────────┬───────────────────────┘
               │ GET /share/<key>                          │ POST /share/<key>/upload
               ▼                                           ▼
┌─ IPP host ───────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐
│  IPP (public; no API key, no write access to Immich)                             │
│    resolveShare: key checked live against Immich, expiry and password enforced   │
│    upload gate: ipp.allowUpload (config)  x  share.allowUpload (Immich toggle)   │
│                                                                                  │
│    READ PATH (today)                        WRITE PATH (new, write-only)         │
│    GET /shared-links/me?key=…               stream → temp file → rename          │
│    key-scoped, read-only                    size, quota, type and rate limits    │
│    gallery built from Immich only                      │                         │
│                                                        ▼                         │
│                                             uploads/                             │
│                                               <albumId>/          album share    │
│                                                 .ipp-share.json                  │
│                                                 uploads.jsonl                    │
│                                                 20260912-143501_IMG_0042.jpg     │
│                                               <sharedLinkId>/     ad-hoc share   │
│                                                                                  │
│    IPP never lists or serves this folder                                         │
└──────────────┬───────────────────────────────────────────┬───────────────────────┘
               │ read-only, key-scoped                     │ volume, read by the owner
               ▼                                           ▼
┌─ LAN / owner ────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐
│  Immich  ◀───────────────────────  ipp-import  (one POSIX sh script: curl + jq)  │
│    POST /assets                                                                  │
│    PUT /albums/{albumId}/assets      in the image                              │
│    PUT /shared-links/{linkId}/assets   docker exec -i ipp ipp-import < key-file  │
│                                        IMMICH_URL and path from container config │
│                                        key on stdin, in memory for the run only  │
│                                                                                  │
│                                      or the same file on any machine             │
│                                        IMMICH_URL env, uploads path as argument  │
│                                        key file there; never touches the IPP host│
│                                                                                  │
│                                      review the folder first, or run on a cron   │
│                                                                                  │
│  Imported assets now belong to the album or link, so they appear in the IPP      │
│  gallery through the normal read path on the next cache refresh                  │
└──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘

[Gregor1996]

@alangrainger I really like this design, but I have a few suggestions that could make it better!

Add upload notification service

Instead of relying on running scripts on a cron job, which could be rather risky, I would suggest on providing something like an email notification service when a user uploads some photos!
The owner will get immediately notified when a user uploads some media on IPP, in this way he can chose to immediately upload pictures to Immich if that is relevant to him for that album.
At last on the email notification the commands that the user must run to import the selected pictures can be inserted!

Open topics

• If Immich would offer the option to mark those pictures users shared back with you with something like the owner etcetera it would be really awsome!
• When uploading shared back media there might be the need of running Immich cron jobs to properly display the shared media on IPP, maybe the upload job could handle even those!

[alangrainger]

Thanks for the reply. Good news for both points:

IPP will send a webhook whenever someone does an upload. Point it at ntfy, Gotify, Apprise, Home Assistant, etc and you get email or push notification from there.

The import script will take an optional --tag so uploaded assets can be easily identified later.

[Gregor1996]

Thanks for the reply. Good news for both points:

IPP will send a webhook whenever someone does an upload. Point it at ntfy, Gotify, Apprise, Home Assistant, etc and you get email or push notification from there.

The import script will take an optional --tag so uploaded assets can be easily identified later.

Perfect!!
Will it make sense to request the name of the uploader, or something similar, to fill up that tag if one desires then?

Anyway, you are doing such an amazing work!!
Thanks a lot!

[alangrainger]

Uploads are added in 4.0 :)

https://github.com/alangrainger/immich-public-proxy/releases/tag/v4.0.0

They run in a separate, optional container (immich-public-proxy-upload), so IPP itself stays read-only and anyone who doesn't want uploads runs exactly what they ran before. Immich's own "Allow public user to upload" option on each share decides which galleries accept photos, and uploads go straight into the album.

Setup guide: https://docs.ipp.nz/visitor-uploads

[Gregor1996]

This is amazing!!
I tested it and I can confirm it works perfectly!!

A few notes on the setup when you expose it behind a Reverse Proxy:

• I had to set up the reverse proxy target address to port 3001 because my reverse proxy is on a separate machine, so IPP is at port 3000!
• I had configure my reverse proxy service to preserve the full path, and not strip the /upload prefix, to work!

Thanks a lot!