The Camera Connection Kit (CCK) from Apple is a really peculiar accessory… While it does allow one to connect an SD card to the iPad, it won’t necessarily read everything inside of it.
Exploration onto this began when I attempted to facilitate a transfer of image files in preparation for a meeting… on this first attempt, no matter what I did, I wasn’t able to even view the content that I wanted to transfer which really is frustrating coming from the Android ecosystem which simplifies handling of files to even USB-OTG!
I’ve almost stricken the CCK off as a file transfer device for images on iOS until I stumbled upon a post that says it even allows movies to be transferred as long as it follows a very rudimentary set of rules… it must look like a file that comes out of a camera – simple right!?!
If you take a look at the image at the top, that is exactly how I was able to get some image files quickly onto the iPad without going thru iTunes. This is the set of rules I gather from how the CCK works:
Rule 1 – The CCK will only look at the DCIM folder inside of an SD card.
Rule 2 – The file to be imported must follow one of a number of known image file names and file folder structure as generated by camera manufacturers… an 8-character alphanumeric string in the highest likelihood.
Only then will iOS allow the file be imported into the device.
As per my example above I used the Panasonic version:
SD root/DCIM/121_PANA/_2015XXX.JPG
The first four characters of the file name is actually a date stamp so it can be anything as long as its a part of the approved characters, I simply used “_2015” to denote the year…I already ate into the first character of the string allowed but its alright since I wasn’t transferring more than a thousand images.
Filename string – ABCD####.JPG many others are allowed such as DSC_####.JPG or IMG_####.JPG you get the drift ^^ The same goes for video files with ABCD####.MP4 allowing access (I haven’t tried this yet but this is sure to be a solid!)
This is a great discovery that will allow us to use the iPad more for meetings and the like… and we have two CC Kits (one 10-pin and one lightning) If there are more ways to utilize the CCK that you know of, do share in the comments below.