Synology’s Photo Station is one of the great apps which helps you organise your photos and has lot of cool features as well.  It works perfectly well when the Synology is NOT attached to a domain and user accounts are all local. However, it has a few glitches when you attach the Synology to a domain.  The issue manifests itself as the domain users not being able to access the “photo” folder which the Photo Station maintains.  Although, the correct access privileges have been set in the photo station application, the domain users will not be able to access the photo directory (for example, using the Finder app on Mac).  And no matter what you do (restart the disk station or restart the computer),  it doesn’t resolve the problem reliably.   There are also not many blogs or forums where this problem is discussed and solution is looked into.  I did come across 1 or 2 forum posts where the problem is highlighted but no reliable solution discussed.

Nonetheless, upon lot of probing, I discovered 2 approaches which fixes the issue.  Before I dwell into the 2 approaches, the exact reason for the problem is not known precisely but I think by default the photo station enables access only to the local user accounts.  And domain users end-up having issues with regards to access.  It’s better to clarify that if you access the photo library using the web GUI then there’s NO problem.  And all the right access privileges are set without any issues.  However, the issue only comes when you try to access the photo library using the SMB protocol by using the Finder App (as an example) on Mac.

2 approaches to fix the access issue

Restart the photo station manually

Yes, that’s a simple trick to fix the issue.  Restart the application fixes the problem based on the testing I have performed.  Please note that restart of the NAS itself doesn’t resolve the problem.  And one has to restart the photo station alone to fix the issue.

• The first thing is to logon to the disk station manager using admin credentials
  

  DSM Login

• Open the Package Center and search for the “Photo Station”

Package Center -> Photo Station

• Click on the Photo Station Icon (Do Not hit the “Open” button”).  And then select “Stop” from drop down menu (click on the arrow next to “Open”).  This will stop the Photo Station App

Stop the Photo Station

• The status now should show as “Stopped”
  

  Photo Station Stopped

• Now, hit the “Run” button to start the service again.  The status should now show that it’s “Running”.
  

  Photo Station Running

• This should resolve the access issue.  In order to check this, you could open the “Finder App” on your Mac and try accessing the Photo directory (assuming that you have mapped the server already).  And you should be able to access it now without any issues.

Schedule Restart of the Photo Station using Task Scheduler

If your server is scheduled to restart or shutdown for a few hours everyday then every time the server restarts the photo station will end up having the accessibility issues for the domain users.  And yes, you need to restart the photo station post every restart of the server.  This can be done manually (as outlined before) or you could schedule it automatically every day using the “Task Scheduler”.  My server is set to shutdown for 2 hours every day so as to increase the reliability of the server.  Therefore, I created 2 tasks to restart the “Photo Station” every day post the server comes back from the shutdown.  This way, you don’t need to manually go and restart the “Photo Station” everyday.

• The first step is open the “Task Scheduler” using the control panel.  And then select Create->Scheduled Task->Service
  

  Creating Tasks using Task Scheduler

• Now, we’ll define 2 tasks 1st one to stop the “Photo Station” at a specific time (in my case it’s at 5:35AM) and the 2nd one is to start it at a specific time (5:36AM in my case)
• In the General Tab given the name for the 1st Task
  

  Photo Station Stop Task – General Tab

• Now go to the Schedule Tab and specify the time at which this task needs to be performed
  

  Photo Station Stop Task – Schedule Tab

• Now go to the “Task Settings” tab and specify which service you want to stop (in our case it’s the Photo Station)
  

  Photo Station Stop Task – Task Settings Tab

• Now hit “Ok” to save the Task
• Repeat this whole process again but this time you would name it as “Photo Station Start” and check the “Start Service” option under the “Task Settings” tab
  

  Photo Station Start Task – General Tab

   

  

  Photo Station Start Task – Task Settings Tab

   

  

  Photo Station Start Task – Schedule Tab

   

• After you hit “OK”, you should see now 2 tasks created and listed
  

  Task Scheduler Showing the 2 created tasks

   

• You should be all set now.  This will automatically restart the Photo Station everyday at the specified time.

This worked at my end to fix the access issue for the domain users.  Please test it and see if it works at your end too.  Feel free to like and give a 👍 if you like the post!

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