amb724

Q: does rebuilding your iphoto library (when unreadable) retrieve all your old photos or clear everything to start from scratch? I really want to retrieve all my photos, all those photos are my life. help me

I tried to open my iPhoto, and this pops up: Your photo library is either in use by another application of has become unreadable. Shut down and restart your computer, and then open iPhoto again. If the problem persists, try rebuilding your photo library. To do this, quit iPhoto, and then reopen it while keeping the Option and Command keys pressed. You can also try restoring your photo library from a backup.

 

What in the world do I do! I am nervous to try the rebuilding because I am a little confused as to how that works...does it retrieve all my original photos that are in my library (before it was unreadable)...All those pictures are my life, years of photos that cannot be lost. I need help.

MacBook Pro (13-inch Mid 2012), software: Mac )S X Lion 10.7.5

Posted on Oct 26, 2014 3:05 PM

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Q: does rebuilding your iphoto library (when unreadable) retrieve all your old photos or clear everything to start from scratch? I re ... more

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  • by FoxFifth,

    FoxFifth FoxFifth Oct 26, 2014 4:03 PM in response to amb724
    Level 7 (27,303 points)
    iPhone
    Oct 26, 2014 4:03 PM in response to amb724

    The following has some information that may help iPhoto 6 and later: Rebuilding the iPhoto library

     

    I don't want to make you feel worse, so I want to emphasize that the past is past and this is for the future. If you have photos or any other data that are important to you, you really, really need to have a backup. You also need to consider that in the event of a fire or theft both your computer and the backup are likely to be lost at the same time so in addition to an onsite backup and offsite backup should be considered. That can be done by an online backup services such as CrashPlan http://www.code42.com/crashplan/ or Mozy http://mozy.com/#slide-8 or an number of others or by storing an external hard drive at work or friend's place.

  • by Terence Devlin,

    Terence Devlin Terence Devlin Oct 26, 2014 4:43 PM in response to FoxFifth
    Level 10 (139,597 points)
    iLife
    Oct 26, 2014 4:43 PM in response to FoxFifth

    Please be aware that libraries backed up to any online service have a very high likelihood of being damaged on restore. Simply, there is no reliable online back up for an iPhoto Library.

     

    Most Simple Back Up:

    Drag the iPhoto Library from your Pictures Folder to another Disk. This will make a copy on that disk.

     

    Slightly more complex: Use an app that will do incremental back ups. This is a very good way to work. The first time you run the back up the app will make a complete copy of the Library. Thereafter it will update the back up with the changes you have made. That makes subsequent back ups much faster. Many of these apps also have scheduling capabilities: So set it up and it will do the back up automatically.

     

    Example of such apps: Chronosync - but there are many others. Search on MacUpdate or the App Store

     

    As to the core issue:

     

    Option 1

    Back Up and try rebuild the library: hold down the command and option (or alt) keys while launching iPhoto. Use the resulting dialogue to rebuild. Choose to Repair Database. If that doesn't help, then try again, this time using Rebuild Database.

     

    If that fails:

     

    Option 2

    Download iPhoto Library Manager and use its rebuild function. (In early versions of Library Manager it's the File -> Rebuild command. In later versions it's under the Library menu.)

     

    This will create an entirely new library. It will then copy (or try to) your photos and all the associated metadata and versions to this new Library, and arrange it as close as it can to what you had in the damaged Library. It does this based on information it finds in the iPhoto sharing mechanism - but that means that things not shared won't be there, so no slideshows, books or calendars, for instance - but it should get all your events, albums and keywords, faces and places back.

     

    Because this process creates an entirely new library and leaves your old one untouched, it is non-destructive, and if you're not happy with the results you can simply return to your old one.  

     

    Regards

     

     

    TD