Photos 8.0 "Another import session is in progress. Please try again when the current task is complete." error

SOLVED

For posterity: reformatting my external drive from exFAT to APFS solved the issue

My steps

1. Borrow another external drive (it was the older OSX Extended Journaled)
2. Copy "Photos Library.photoslibrary" from drive which was not working after the Ventura update to the borrowed drive
3. Use OSX's DiskUtility.app to erase and reformat my drive from exFAT to APFS
4. Create a directory (I created one called "Pictures" to mimic the path if it were on my internal iMac drive)
5. Copy "Photos Library.photoslibrary" from borrowed drive back onto original drive to your new directory
6. Photos.app will open and because the drive format has changed, not be able to find the library, so you must click the dialog it presents to select the "new" directory location of "Photos Library.photoslibrary"

Cheers -

A previous system version may have not checked the format of the external drive and allowed you to store the library on an unsupported drive. But using Photos in an unsupported way may break after a system upgrade, when the system upgrade has added more security checks. So you'd better check again, if the external volume is meeting all requirements described here: Move your Photos library to save space on your Mac - Apple Support

Say what now?

The library is on an ex-fat drive. The simple solution is to copy the library elsewhere and then reformat the drive. Then copy it back. There is no secret here. There is no bad programming. There is user error. Apple have said since the launch of Photos that it should be on an appropriately formatted disk - I posted a link to the relevant article earlier in the thread.

The relevant paragraph from the link posted by Yer_Man:

"Make sure that your external storage device, such as a USB drive or Thunderbolt drive, is formatted for Mac: either APFS format or Mac OS Extended (Journaled) format.

You can't store your library on a storage device used for Time Machine backups. And to avoid possible data loss, don't store your library on a removable storage device like an SD card or USB flash drive, or on a device shared over your network or the internet, including over a cloud-based storage service."

And don't fool yourself, that the recent update may have fixed it, if your library is on an incorrectly formatted volume. You are putting your photos at risk, and the library may get silently damaged in the background, until it is damaged beyond repair.

Hello and welcome to Apple Support Communities, Shooters95,

We understand you're having trouble importing photos in the Photos app on your Mac. We'd be happy to provide information to help you address this.

Test to see if restarting helps. If it doesn't, test to see if this same issue occurs in safe mode:

How to use safe mode on your Mac - Apple Support

Regards.

fedupwithapple574 wrote:

But why such an obtuse error message??? FFS Apple developers, this sadly is just another example of obfuscation.

You seem to have made several attempts to import new photos, which got stuck, because the external drive is unsupported. The import is running in the background, and may continue after quitting Photos. And when you tried again, you got the message, that the previous import is still not complete.

It would have been more helpful, if you got an error message directly, when you start an import, telling you to move the library to a location, where it can be used safely. Or directly, when you try to open a library on an unsuitable volume.

What format is the external drive? It needs to be formatted Mac OS Extended (Journaled) or apfs.

Can you access the material with Image Capture (in the Applications Folder)?

two things here a) WHERE do they state that it has to be on their specific drive format? many people share drives between different formatted computers.

b) it appears to have solved itself with the latest OSX update - all the above is now irrelevant

say what indeed.....

There's no rug and nothing has been shoved anywhere. Apple have been saying for years that iPhoto, Aperture and Photos libraries need to be on disks formatted Mac OS Extended (Journaled) or apfs. If your disk is on an in appropriate disk then you risk these sorts of issues as well as dataloss due to library corruption.

Here:

Move your Photos library to save space on your Mac - Apple Support

for a start.

Don't do this without backing up your Library. Get another drive.

I moved my library to this external drive months ago, and have been importing and editing and exercising all functions of Photos from that SSD without issue until the upgrade to Ventura, so I'm ruling out a format issue.

Image Capture triggers the same response from Photos as other means of import (either via the Photos|File|Import... menu or via drag 'n drop from Finder, i.e. the first import does not appear to do anything, and a subsequent attempt results in the information dialog stating that "Another import session is in progress..."

Drive is ExFAT, Yer_Man

Happy to convert it (if possible to do so in-place as I don't have alternative storage where I can back up the Photos library - does Disk Utility do it?) but I remain curious why it's worked just fine for import/export and general Photos library use in the months I've owned it.

Sorta makes sense that Monterey might not have the same issues as Ventura (also partly perplexing).

Seems I'm stuck doing a risky partitioning my 2T SSD into a 1+1 where the 869GB library remains on one terrabyte as ExFAT, the new partition is erased and reformatted as APFS, I move the library to the APFS partition, delete the ExFAT partition, and resize the APFS to consume the old partition to get me to a full 2T APFS formatted situation. But I'm no OSX sysad.

Risky without having somewhere to back up my library.

I wanted to copy some photos from library A to library B to keep file sizes down - this used to be REALLY simply but ive had to resorting to a) Create a new library C, copy the files i want from Library A to the new library from my exfat drive, then import the complete librbary B contents into the new library as well - takes an age but sorts it. I will get another hard drive at somepoint im sure but its an expensive way to deal with bad programming. What makes it really rubbish is apples insistence that we have to work all this rubbish out ourselves