I see questions like this constantly. 1- understand how Lightroom interacts with the file system BEFORE you do something and then have to figure out to fix it.
2- when you don't understand something, ask questions BEFORE you try things. 3- when you're learning stuff, make a small, temporary catalog folder and image file repository to experiment with BEFORE you apply actions to your large working catalog to be sure it operates as you expected from your understanding. Your image files are not in the LR catalog. The catalog *references* your image files wherever you happen to put them in the file system. So let's say you have a LR catalog on your home drive and you import a bunch of files on an external drive "in place".. that is, without copying or moving them. The LR catalog now knows about those files and let's you work on them, with them, but *the files themselves have not moved and by working with them, they themselves are not changed*. All that happens as you work on them is that LR records what you did, adding those instructions to the catalog entry for the images you touched, and updates the previews it uses to display your work in the .LRDATA file in the catalog folder. Presumably, you have a backup system that backs up both the original files on the external drive and the catalog folder to another, separate hard drive. Now, let's consider what happens if/when the external drive containing the imported files breaks and you lose it. You get another new external drive, you go to your backup drive and copy the image files onto it. Then you run LR and, WITHOUT reimporting anything, you right-click on the folder that contains your image files in the Folders panel and choose the command to "update folder location". Once you do that, LR updates all the catalog entries so that it now understands all the new locations where the files are located. You're done, just keep on working. Let's next consider what happens if the opposite occurs—namely, the disk containing the catalog folder breaks. If it's the startup drive, of course you replace it, reinstall the OS, configure your account, and install LR. Then you go to your backup, copy the LR catalog folder that your work is in to the new drive, and open it with LR. Then you do exactly as you did above: WITHOUT reimporting anything, you choose the "update folder location" command and choose the folder on the external drive where your files are located. You're done again, just keep on working. If you reimport things erroneously when trying to recover from a hard drive failure, you get duplicated info in the catalog and it's hard to determine whether the dataset is complete. To clean it up first requires that you think: - knowing the above about how LR works, what exactly did you import? - Where are the image files located? - When you look at the files in LR, are all your modifications in place? - Which of the entries in the Folders panel point to old information that is no longer valid, or no longer points to the actual files Once you have the answers to those questions answered, select the obsolete duplicate information in the LR catalog and delete it. G >>> On Sun, Nov 8, 2015 at 1:15 PM, Eric Weir <eew...@bellsouth.net> wrote: >>> >>> On Nov 8, 2015, at 11:10 AM, David Parsons <parsons.da...@gmail.com> wrote: >>> >>> In the Library module, right click on the folder, and select Remove. >>> It will tell you that the folder will be removed from Lightroom, but >>> the files will remain on the disk. >>> >>> If you are moving things around outside of Lightroom, don't keep >>> importing them, update the folder locations in Lightroom by right >>> clicking on the folder in the Library module and select Update Folder >>> Location and point it to the new spot. This way all the work you've >>> done on the files will move over and be associated with the files >>> correctly and you won't have duplicate file entries. >> >> Thanks, David. Now I’m a bit concerned. First, the reason for the first move >> was failure of the hard drive on which I was keeping my photos. The switch >> to the other drive involved importing the database on the backup drive, >> which I believe—though I am now a little uncertain—was up-to-date. I >> purchased and installed an 8 TB WD My Book Duo (two 4 TB drives), I have a >> copy of the backed up database on one of the new drives, and would like to >> use it as the original location of the database. >> >> Something else that may be relevant is that in the process of getting the >> new setup configured the way I wanted it copied the original backup of the >> database to one of the new drives so I could reformat and reparation my >> original backup drive. In the process I renamed the drive (My Book from My >> Book 2, because there was now only one My Book). So my concern: Have I lost >> the data on my edits of images in the process of doing what I just described? >> >> Second, right clicking the folders in LR has no effect. Is that because LR >> is not currently connected to the database? If so, given what I described >> above, I am going to have to reimport the database? -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List PDML@pdml.net http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow the directions.
