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"The iPhoto Library is locked, on a locked disc, or you do not have permiss

***? Never had this happen before. Can anyone help? What can I do?

iMac (Late 2007), Mac OS X (10.6.4), 2.0 Ghz/4GB RAM, Wireless Magic Mouse/Keyboard

Posted on Oct 21, 2010 7:17 PM

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9 replies

Oct 24, 2010 3:31 PM in response to Harper101

iPhoto 09 (and probably 08 as well) places a "lock" file in the iPhoto Library directory whenever it's running, to prevent another computer from accessing the library while you work with it.

When the iPhoto program abruptly crashes, or you Force Quit the running instance, the lock file remains in the iPhoto Library directory. With a normal termination iPhoto would cleanup that file before it exits, but when the process dies before it had a chance to clean up you get this orphaned lock file lingering. Now whenever you try to restart iPhoto, it sees that lock file and thinks another process is working with the library and has locked it.

To remove the lock try this:

0. make sure iPhoto is not running.
1. Launch the Terminal application from the Applications folder
2. in the Terminal window type:
cd Pictures/iPhoto\ Library
ls -l iPhotoLock.data
3. If you see something like "-rw-rw-rw- 1 skenderov staff 1 Oct 24 13:19 iPhotoLock.data" type:
rm iPhotoLock.data
3. Try starting iPhoto again

This should help

Regards
Stoyan Kenderov

Message was edited by: skenderov

Nov 3, 2013 11:44 AM in response to skenderov

I see I am not the only one getting locked out iPhoto. I am trying to use your solution, but I'm doing something wrong because all I get is "no such file" or "command not found." I copied and pasted the command line in your explanation, and that didn't work. Launching iPhoto with Option & Command keys depressed didn't work. Can you suggest something? I appreciate your help.

"The iPhoto Library is locked, on a locked disc, or you do not have permiss

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