aperture library not showing in mail, iweb or iphoto

In doing my own troubleshooting I have found that deleting and regenerating previews has helped with Mail and Firefox. Safari still can't come up with my whole library. I only see one project, album, etc... Is this a Safari / iLife Sharing thing?

Whenever the file *Aperture Library/iLifeSharing/ApertureDatabaseTimestamp* reappears in my system, then the sharing of photos from my Aperture Library implemented by the iLife media browser framework quits working.

This seems to have begun with the update to Aperture 3.1. Note that, while I'm currently using iLife '09, media browsing is not specific to iLife apps - for instance, my screen saver won't be able to display photos from my Aperture Library either.

When iLife media browsing quits working, I get console messages of the form:

10/30/10 8:54:06 AM iWeb[2092] ILLogger ILAperture31Plugin: Error in _loadDataThreaded: -[NSNull timeIntervalSinceReferenceDate]: unrecognized selector sent to instance 0x7fff7026d000

issued from whichever application - iTunes, iPhoto, iDVD, System Preferences, or in this case iWeb - that's trying to use iLife media sharing to browse through my Aperture Library. If I remove the ApertureDatabaseTimestamp file, browsing starts working again, but I seem to have to restart the app in question.

I haven't quite figured out exactly when ApertureDatabaseTimestamp gets recreated; I have opened and closed Aperture after having made modifications and deleted versions, and run it with *Aperture->Preferences->Share Previews with iLife and iWork* set both to "When quitting Aperture" and "Always" but I haven't been able to catch exactly when or force it to happen.

Update: Generating any new version image in Aperture will cause ApertureDatabaseTimestamp to be recreated. Regardless of whether you have *Aperture->Preferences->Share Previews with iLife and iWork* set to "Always" or "When quitting Aperture" it will be recreated only when you Quit Aperture and see the progress bar:

*Updating information for sharing previews...*

ApertureDatabaseTimestamp is literally a timestamp of zero length, so there is no possibility of a corrupt file structure or the like; you can recreate the symptoms yourself by renaming any file to ApertureDatabaseTimestamp (with no file extension) and placing it in the iLifeSharing folder.

I did it the same way and deleted the file over and over. But it didn't solve the problem. I then tried creating a new library as I exported from my main library some projects into a new libary and violá, I could that libary in all iLife apps. Switched back to my larger main libary, it doesn't show up I get the spinning wheel in iLife apps.

Conclusion: There is something wrong in my main library. Repairing permissions and database couldn't solve that, but I did not try rebuild library option – does that help?

Adrian - I can save you the trouble of rebuilding your library. I tried this myself but it did not solve the problem.

The only solution I have found which works reliably is to delete the ApertureDatabaseTimestamp file and then set permissions on the iLifeShared directory to Read Only so that ApertureDatabaseTimestamp doesn't keep on getting recreated.

I've been using this work-around for a couple of weeks now without any apparent adverse side-effects

The trick is (well, at least a workaround for now) to change permissions on the folder that this file resides in, I have set mine to 'Read only' for all users. It has stopped the file being recreated, and I have been able to use the media browser in all my apps after many uses of Aperture.

Cheers

Andy.

I tried Rebuild Library and that's what helped me. DO NOT RULE IT OUT UNTIL YOU'VE TRIED IT.

It appears that there are various problems that can cause the loss of proper syncing between the iPod and Aperture, or between Aperture and the Media Browser, and one of them clearly is some corruption in the Library, which can be fixed by rebuilding the Library.

Much later I found there to be problems that I believe will require a fix from Apple. I can replicate the problem in the iLife apps, as well as in iWorks apps. Yet the A 3.1 Library works in iTunes 10, and its assets can be seen with the Apple TV version 2 after choosing in Home Sharing.

I have experimented with a drastically smaller Aperture 3.1 Library, and the Photo Browser still cannot load the photos. This includes when accessed from Mail (although I never do that, opting instead to send photos from Aperture to Mail to be sent, which still works just fine.)

Another interesting side issue, is that with the Apple TV, and iTunes 10.0.1, only the last Library to be accessed in Aperture will be presented for Home Sharing or syncing. Thus the use of multiple libraries in Aperture (and I suspect in iPhoto) will impact what will be presented in the Media Photo Browser and for sharing with Apple TV.

For me this issue (hopefully temporary) mainly would impact accessing photos for use in iWorks apps, as I do not rely upon either iPhoto or iMovie for taking photos from my Aperture Library.

One might presume that the update to iLife '11 would possibly correct this, but that would not have a clear implication to correcting for media browsing in the iWorks apps, unless the Media Browser is corrected for both iLife and iWorks suites by the update of iLife, which I doubt?

Ernie

Dear topic contributors:

- deleting the file ApertureDatabaseTimestamp in the iLifeShared foder and
- changing iLifeShared folder permissions to read only

worked fine for me.

Now I can access all Aperture 3.1 projects as screensavers. This workaround (at least) temporarily solved my issue, which I posted first on 17-Aug. I will add a link there to this helpful post.

Thanks all.

Add me to the list of those that have struggled with this. For me is started with the Aperture 3.1 update. Biggest issue is that the screensaver stopped accessing the Aperture images.

Repaired permissions, repaired library, rebuilt library (big library-- 80K images. Thank goodness the i7 flies). Only thing that worked is to delete the ApertureDatabaseTimestamp file and change permissions to "Read Only". Restart and all works.

Any one know the implications of this workaround? Are there hidden consequences?

Many thanks for the help getting this working again!

In a test User Account I have, there is a Library that was not yet upgraded to 3.1. I opened Pages, and then in the Media Browser confirmed I could access the Aperture Library images. I then closed Pages, opened Aperture and allowed the library to be upgraded to 3.1. Relaunched Pages, and the Media Browser continued to be able to see the images in the A3.1 Library.

This is a very small Library, so size and/or complexity seem likely to be related to the problem.

Ernie

I don't believe in workarounds. I only believe in something working the way it should. And this has only been an issue since the A3.1 update. My photos will show up for a second in iDVD, in incorrect order mind you, and will disappear from use just moments later.

When will A3.12 be available to fix this?!

Apple tech support helped me to find out, why my main library does not show up in media browser of iLife apps.

They took a look at my libary and found out, what going wrong:

+There are 6 .tiff images in the Aperture library with a null image date which is causing the problems sharing Aperture photos with other iApps.The file names for these images are as follows:+

+Go to the Metadata tab in the Inspector and note that each image has no Date associated with it.+

+For each image, go to Metadata>Adjust Date and Time. Type in the correct date for the image, turn on the 'Also change master file' option and click Adjust. Each image should now have a Date associated with it.+

I did as they told me and yes, my whole libary shows up in media browser as before.

Message was edited by: Adrian Wackernah

Well there's a big problem in my view. You had a deficiency with respect to six images and that killed the whole Library as far as the Media Browser was concerned. Why isn't the application set to give you what is good and then you can find out where the problem is. If you had noticed the six images were missing, you could have gone to them and fixed them. The way the thing works now, only a powerful expert can find out what's wrong. Not very friendly.

That's a fantastic find! I had a similar issue back in Aperture 2; it didn't manifest itself in that way but I had these exact null file problems. Not a clue how they got there, but if I recall correctly it also was tif files, meaning (in my case) they were all files that had been externally edited with a plugin.

Anyway, thanks for posting that find. Awesome.

-Joseph @ApertureExpert
ApertureExpert.com