mcs37

Q: Perpetual "Photos are being imported" dialog

I installed iLife '11 last week and was excited to finally organize my photos from iPhone using iPhoto. It worked brilliantly for the first few tries, but then I couldn't import photos from my device anymore. Sometimes I could when I launched it, but then after a few minutes when I tried to import more photos I would get the "Photos are being imported to the photo library" popup (with "Please wait for import to complete" sub-text). It never goes away! I will wait like 15-20 minutes, try again.... still it shows that. I don't see any progress bar or status panel saying that it's importing nor did I tell it to. What's the deal? I'm using 9.1.

13" MacBook Pro, Mac OS X (10.6.2)

Posted on Nov 11, 2010 8:00 PM

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Q: Perpetual "Photos are being imported" dialog

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  • by Craig Stanton,

    Craig Stanton Craig Stanton Nov 11, 2010 9:40 PM in response to mcs37
    Level 1 (25 points)
    Nov 11, 2010 9:40 PM in response to mcs37
    Have you tried using Disk Utility to fix permissions? My iPhoto was stuck like yours and that fixed most of it. I still can't sync with Facebook but I can import from SD cards and my iPhone
  • by Jan Martin Kuitert,

    Jan Martin Kuitert Jan Martin Kuitert Nov 12, 2010 11:30 AM in response to mcs37
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Nov 12, 2010 11:30 AM in response to mcs37
    same here, would be nice to know how to solve this,
    i don't have a backup and every time i start iphoto the same spinning indefinetly
    9.1 ...
  • by mcs37,

    mcs37 mcs37 Nov 14, 2010 12:54 PM in response to mcs37
    Level 1 (1 points)
    Nov 14, 2010 12:54 PM in response to mcs37
    I haven't used disk utility but that doesn't seem like a very Apple design workflow:

    1) Launch iPhoto
    2) Hook up your iPhone
    3) Launch Disk Utility
    4) Click Device -> Permissions -> Edit
    5) Change permissions to xyz
    6) Click Apply
    7) Return to iPhoto
    8) Unplug your iPhone
    9) Plug your iPhone back in
    10) Use iPhoto

    What's bizarre is that it works sometimes and then not other times. It seems like this would be a very standard use case, and it's not like I'm on old hardware. My MBP is under 12 months old, I'm on the latest Snow Leopard, and I'm using an iPhone 4 on the latest software with the latest version of iPhoto.
  • by Swaabi,

    Swaabi Swaabi Nov 21, 2010 10:34 PM in response to mcs37
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Nov 21, 2010 10:34 PM in response to mcs37
    I have had exactly the same issue and found the answer in Apple support article TA24412 (http://support.apple.com/kb/TA24412) headed "Unimported photos found in library when iphoto is launched"

    Basically it is saying to move the "import" folder from the iphoto library folder to the desktop and then relaunch iphoto and try importing again.

    The import process creates this folder and then deletes it when it is finished. If for some reason it is not deleted, it thinks it has already imported the current photos.

    This worked for me. So hopefully it will fix your issue also.

    Cheers
  • by rohtakdev,Helpful

    rohtakdev rohtakdev Jul 8, 2014 7:56 PM in response to mcs37
    Level 1 (5 points)
    Jul 8, 2014 7:56 PM in response to mcs37

    I was able to solve this issue by doing a "Force Quit" (using Activity Monitor) )of iPhoto app and then restarting it. When you restart it's going to import the photos stuck somehow and get over with it.

     

    Hope this helps someone.

  • by Brian Glover,

    Brian Glover Brian Glover Oct 25, 2014 9:40 AM in response to rohtakdev
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Oct 25, 2014 9:40 AM in response to rohtakdev

    The "Force Quit" solution worked for me as well. I could not locate an Import folder.

  • by purple zain,

    purple zain purple zain Oct 28, 2014 10:31 PM in response to rohtakdev
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Oct 28, 2014 10:31 PM in response to rohtakdev

    Thanks. This solved the dilemma!

  • by mlowickr,

    mlowickr mlowickr Feb 18, 2015 4:54 PM in response to Swaabi
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Feb 18, 2015 4:54 PM in response to Swaabi

    Hi, would you help me find the import folder? I've tried everything and nothing works, I'm going nuts! Thanks!!!!

  • by LarryHN,

    LarryHN LarryHN Feb 18, 2015 7:55 PM in response to mlowickr
    Level 10 (84,190 points)
    Photos for Mac
    Feb 18, 2015 7:55 PM in response to mlowickr

    right click on the iPhoto library and show package contents - make no other changes as they will damage the iphoto library if yo do

     

    LN

  • by volleysyd,

    volleysyd volleysyd May 4, 2015 6:57 PM in response to mcs37
    Level 1 (0 points)
    May 4, 2015 6:57 PM in response to mcs37

    what do you do if you don't have a disk utility or am i just not seeing it help me please!!!!

  • by Terence Devlin,

    Terence Devlin Terence Devlin May 4, 2015 10:25 PM in response to volleysyd
    Level 10 (139,475 points)
    iLife
    May 4, 2015 10:25 PM in response to volleysyd

    Disk Utility is a standard part of every OS X install. It's in your Applications folder.

     

    However, that fix is now 4.5 years old, refers to a much older version of the OS, iPhoto and the iPhone and its OS. You might be best to seek a fix that's more up-to-date.

  • by Tracey2914,

    Tracey2914 Tracey2914 Jul 19, 2016 6:18 AM in response to mcs37
    Level 1 (4 points)
    iLife
    Jul 19, 2016 6:18 AM in response to mcs37

    I had the same problem. I tried some of the things that were posted here but nothing worked. In the end the thing that did work was unplugging and turning off my iphone. Turning off the computer by pressing and holding down the button at the back of my iMac until it turned off. I waited a minute then turned it back on. A box came up with the words 'iphoto detected a problem' and to press 'Repair' button on the screen. I pressed the 'Repair' button and it immediately went into 'Repairing Library Database' mode which took about 20 minutes (maybe because I have 23,000 photos on my computer). That did it...all is well!

  • by Csound1,

    Csound1 Csound1 Jul 19, 2016 6:24 AM in response to Terence Devlin
    Level 9 (50,245 points)
    Desktops
    Jul 19, 2016 6:24 AM in response to Terence Devlin

    Terence Devlin wrote:

     

    Disk Utility is a standard part of every OS X install. It's in your Applications folder.

     

    However, that fix is now 4.5 years old, refers to a much older version of the OS, iPhoto and the iPhone and its OS. You might be best to seek a fix that's more up-to-date.

    Sorry to be persnickerty but I think you will find that Disk Utility is in the applications/utilities folder, and the fix is still old (older in fact)

  • by Terence Devlin,

    Terence Devlin Terence Devlin Jul 19, 2016 11:07 AM in response to Csound1
    Level 10 (139,475 points)
    iLife
    Jul 19, 2016 11:07 AM in response to Csound1

    By all means be persnickerty in a timely manner. What's fourteen months between friends?

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