iPhoto 11 Upgrade/Transfer Issue

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Level 1

4 points

iPhoto 11 Upgrade/Transfer Issue

Hi there,
I have just bought a new iMac and migrated over all of my content from my old MacBook where i had my Photo library installed on an external drive. This included an upgrade from Photo 9 to 11 and I installed the 9.1 update first as well.

The problem comes from the linking. When I originally started with iPhoto I imported pics into my library but had them sitting in two other folders, then after a while I put new pics straight into iPhoto itself so they were going directly into that folder.

All fine and this worked well, the problem now is since this move and upgrade all the links to the ones sitting in other folders are broken even though they still appear seemingly correct as links in the iPhoto/Masters directory. I cannot see a way of knowing exactly how many pics have broken links - it is thousands - and I can't see a way of fixing these links that is not the painfully slow one at a time method. Even this is a lot harder than it should be as I am getting constant bombardment of messages of Files Not Found for ones I am not even working on.

Any ideas?

Thanks,
Craig

MacBook, Mac OS X (10.6.4), Apple TV Airport Express 20" Cinema Disply

Posted on Dec 12, 2010 5:56 AM

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Answer 1

Yer_Man

Level 10

162,272 points

Dec 12, 2010 6:05 AM in response to CraigM68

This is one of the problems with running a referenced Library. If any part of the path to the file changes then you will find yourself relinking the files one by one.

I note too that part of your Library is Referneced and part is Managed. I think you have a recipe for disaster there and you should decide which way you want to run your Library now.

As to relinking the files: When you run a Referenced Library iPhoto creates an Alias to the actual file. [FileBuddy|http://www.skytag.com/filebuddy> was an app that would repair broken aliases, however it has been discontinued. Do you have a copy? Can you find one? Other than that, you'll be fixing them one by one, I'm afraid.

Regards

TD

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Answer 2

CraigM68 Author

Level 1

4 points

Dec 12, 2010 9:12 AM in response to Yer_Man

Thanks for the response.

You know, I wish I had made my library fully managed from outset. The reason I didn't was twofold actually, firstly I didn't fully understand the difference between the two types as I don't think it was ever really made all that clear by Apple, the import methods for both being pretty similar after all. Secondly, making your library managed meant you could not readily access the individual files which I saw at the time as a negative thing.

All the same, as Apple have always been seemingly happy to allow users to use iPhoto with any combination of managed and referenced they like then I would have thought the least they could have done is support these methods when migrating or moving your library. I have not changed anything in terms of folder structure, all I have changed is the drive yet this has broken all of these links.

Am I naive to think that iPhoto should work a bit more like iTunes where the user has an option to consolidate all of their files into a single folder from different locations? Probably like other people in my situation, to re-import all of these files into iPhoto would be even more time consuming than repairing all the links because of Keywords, Places etc. that would need to be re-done. Not that the one by one process is looking appealing at all, as I mentioned originally it is hindered by constant pop ups informing of all my missing files apart from the ones I am trying to repair. It is pretty shambolic all round if truth be told.

Craig

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Answer 3

Yer_Man

Level 10

162,272 points

Dec 12, 2010 11:24 AM in response to CraigM68

the import methods for both being pretty similar after all.

Well, in the Mananged scenario you connect your camera and click import. In the Referenced Scenario you connect your camera and then move the files from the camera to your preferred location, in a folder system you have devised. Then you import.

Secondly, making your library managed meant you could not readily access the individual files which I saw at the time as a negative thing.

Export as original... Show File... etc

I have not changed anything in terms of folder structure, all I have changed is the drive yet this has broken all of these links.

Well some part of the path to those photos has changed - the disk name? your user Name? the location of one of the folders?

Am I naive to think that iPhoto should work a bit more like iTunes where the user has an option to consolidate all of their files into a single folder from different locations?

Aperture has that. But it's a $199 app. Averaged out of the cost of iLife iPhoto is a $16 app.

Regards

TD

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Answer 4

CraigM68 Author

Level 1

4 points

Dec 12, 2010 4:35 PM in response to Yer_Man

My library and the folders containing the referenced pics were originally on an external drive in a custom folder. I dragged that entire folder over and it now sits within Places/Me/ same custom folder as before. The one user name thing which is slightly different is my user account name is different from the Places name - that uses my Mobile Me address.

I am sure that would have no bearing, after all it never lived within my home folder before anyway.

Thanks,
Craig

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Answer 5

Yer_Man

Level 10

162,272 points

Dec 12, 2010 11:08 PM in response to CraigM68

You have just described two changes to the Path

folders containing the referenced pics were originally on an external drive in a custom folder. I dragged that entire folder over and it now sits within Places/Me/

So, the path has changed from Volumes/Name of External Disk to HD/Users/Your Name/ Whatever

and

The one user name thing which is slightly different is my user account name

So, again, it's gone from HD/Users/ Your Name to HD/Users/ Your Slightly Different Name...

Those are the source of your problem.

Regards

TD

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Answer 6

CraigM68 Author

Level 1

4 points

Dec 13, 2010 3:29 AM in response to Yer_Man

It was on an external HD but not in any user folder, simply HD/6-My iPhoto / Folders now it is Mac Drive / 6-My iPhoto/ Folders. So I accept a change in drive means a single change in destination, pretty poor though I think this is.

I have also accepted that this is what it is however and have decided to bite the bullet and slowly re-import all my referenced pics to eventually make it all managed, Which has led to a new issue I will raise as a separate question.

Thanks,
Craig

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Answer 7

CraigM68 Author

Level 1

4 points

Dec 13, 2010 3:59 AM in response to CraigM68

Another thing, as a test I linked up a number of old photos to their referenced locations yesterday and looking at them again today the links have been lost again, just getting the cannot be found message.

I had no plans to upgrade to 11 personally, it came with the new machine and I am starting to dislike this new version immensely.

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Answer 8

Jan 11, 2011 3:43 PM in response to CraigM68

Craig,
Have you found an possible solutions to your problem?

I'm trying to move my referenced iphoto 09 library to my new macbook pro, but i'm running into the same hurdles regarding aliases.

I've scoured the boards and tried using Alias Herder and iphoto library manager, but neither of them was able to solve the problem. I'm resigned to the fact that I'll probably have to start a new library and import everything again.

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Answer 9

CraigM68 Author

Level 1

4 points

Jan 21, 2011 4:45 AM in response to elemenohpee

Hi there,

No, did not find a solution unfortunately. I am slowly going through and re-importing all of the old referenced pics from the folder I set aside originally for these. Painstaking work, set yourself a target of doing a certain number per day or week and you'll get there in the end!

Cheers,
Craig

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Answer 10

odendahl

Level 1

10 points

Feb 10, 2011 12:53 PM in response to CraigM68

Hi Craig

I had a similar problem these days when I tried to move referenced pictures from a network drive to my internal drive. This is the solution that worked with iPhoto'11 (v9.1.1):

You have to manipulate the paths inside iPhoto's database. This database is inside the iPhoto Library, e.g
~/Pictures/iPhoto Library/Database/Library.apdb
This file is a normal sqlite database, so open it with sqlite3 from command line, or with RazorSQL or the SQLite Manager plugin for Firefox. You need to replace the old paths inside the database file with the new ones. To look at the paths stored in the database:

select imagePath from RKMaster;

And to replace the old paths with the new ones:

update RKMaster set imagePath = replace(imagePath, '/Volumes/oldDrive/Pictures/', '/Users/odendahl/Pictures/');

where the second argument is the old path and the third argument is the new path.
Don't forget to make a backup of Library.apdb first.
The "Masters" folder or "Originals" alias inside iPhoto Library was not needed at all in my case, so I simply deleted those. The Masters folder was recreated, but doesn't contain any files at all.

Everything is now back to normal. Hope this helps you too.

Stefan

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Answer 11

KevinN

Level 1

0 points

Sep 12, 2011 9:17 AM in response to odendahl

I'm so glad that I found this tip. Thanks Stefan! It worked as explained.

My situation is a little unique as I had my masters stored on a windows file server previously, and now they are on a Mybook NAS.

One issue I'm having is that iPhoto continues to pop up a warning that it cannot reach the Server where my masters used to be located. I have gone through the RKMaster table in Library.apdb again just to be sure, but there are no references to the old location. I'm wondering if there is a process that is checking for previews or thumbnails or something that has the old path or something?

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Answer 12

bryston

Level 1

53 points

Dec 14, 2011 8:49 PM in response to odendahl

Stefan --

I've been looking for this solution for months -- thank you! Finally, all of my externally referenced photos are found.

(Honestly, I don't know why iPhoto can do this automatically -- iTunes does.)

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Answer 13

Dec 29, 2011 2:51 AM in response to KevinN

I had similar issues to those mentioned here after moving my iPhoto '09 library from an iMac to a MacBook and then upgrading the library to iPhoto '11. What I had forgotten to do before the upgrade was also copy the referenced folders where many of my older pics were.

I had to go through a painstaking process of fixing the records in the RKMaster table. The problem you are getting, I believe, is because iPhoto '11 no longer uses the file aliases that iPhoto '09 used. What it does instead is store the location of the referenced file in the BLOB column fileAliasData in the RKMaster table. If you use SQLiteManager you can save the contents of a BLOB column to a file, which in this case is in plist format. Inside the plist you'll see a key called FileAlias with some base64 encoded data. That data points to where the original file is/was, which probably has a reference to your old server.

The only solution I found was:

- copy all my referenced images to the folder structure under Masters in the iPhoto Library folder

- put the correct path in imagePath in RKMaster

- set fileIsReference = 0 and fileAliasData = null in RKMaster so that iPhoto now treats the file as managed, and not referenced.

Note, that if a file is under the Masters folder structure, the path in imagePath must be relative to the Masters folder. For example, if the image file is in /Users/kevin/Pictures/iPhoto Library/Masters/2008/Christmas/img001.jpg then what you need to put in imagePath is just 2008/Christmas/img001.jpg. iPhoto assumes this is under the Masters folder for non-referenced images.

Incidentally, you can use the steps above to convert any referenced files in your library to managed, allthough it's pretty tedious. I did it, and it was worth it as I now have my entire iPhoto Library inside the iPhoto Library folder which is completely transportable.

There are 2 things which Apple could have done a lot better:

- if you're upgrading an old iPhoto library, it should warn you if some of the files are unavailable, because you won't find out about it until you try to edit one of the files (the thumbnails are still there), by which time it might be too late to recover the old files

- there should be an option for consolidating an iPhoto Library which is a mixture of managed and referenced into the iPhoto Library folder to be completely managed, just as iTunes lets you do for music.

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