My iPhoto '11 won't let me sort ALBUMS manually. How can I fix this?

Keep us posted on your progress.

Hello to All Those Interested....

It appears that Fat Cat's new versiono of iPhoto Manager, upon doing a 'rebuild' from within iPhoto Manager will fix the album sorting problem.

Unfortunately, the album I am having the trouble, aparentely, with the size of the Library (69GB). It takes about 6 hours just to prepare it for the rebuild, then after roughly 12 hours or 'rebuilding', something always seems to happen to cause it to crash, with only about 1/8 of the library sucessfully rebuilt.

BUT... the portion of the Library that it did manage to rebuild/repair was in fact fixed of the 'album-sorting' problem.

So, I'm going to try ONE more time to run the rebuild again. If that doesn't work, I'll split the Library into at least 2 if not 3 smaller libraries (which will all have the problem), but purhaps, I'll have better success and getting each of them to rebuild if they are smal

I will keep the 'progress reports' coming... but it's looking promising.

Unfortunately, the album I am having the trouble, aparentely, with the size of the Library (69GB).

Care to explain what this sentenance means? If it just one album that's giving you problems mark them with a keyword or flag, delete the album and recreate it Then repopulate it with the photos you marked.

Sorry for the messed up sentance that didn't make any sense.

The Library that I am having trouble with is approximately 69GB. That's not HUGE, but it's not small... and when I try to run the new iPhoto Manager 'Rebuild' on it, the first time it appeared to have done it's work (much quicker then I had expected) but when I went to open the new 'rebuilt' Library, it was completely empty. I am guessing this is because I did something wrong.

So I started from scratch and all was going well, expect it was taking a long time... 6-8 hours just to prepare the new Library. Then after about 12 hours after iPhoto Manager had started to actually rebuild the Library, something happend, and it froze up. At that point it was about 1/8 of the way through rebuilding the Library. The part that was rebuilt, opend and functioned as it should (including reparing the ability to manually place Albums)

I am currently trying yet another full iPhoto Manager 'rebuild'. And trying very had to not touch or do anything that might cause it to crash.

I have considered 'recreating' the Library by hand, as you suggested, but it would take a very long time and not just with my computer doing all the work. It would take ME hours/days to move and reoranize the Library the way it is now.

If this turns out not to work, I'll just continue to work around the problem. I may try to split the album in to 2 or 3 smaller albums and see if I can fix each of those using iPhoto Manager's 'rebuild'.

Unfortunately, it's starting to look like my most recent attemp to run a 'rebuild' has become 'stuck' again. But I'll give it a few more hours to see if there has been any progress before I decide what to do.

Thanks

Be sure to turn off the Energy Saving in the System preference pane when running a long process like that.

Old Toad.... Thanks! It briefly crossed my mind that I should to that, but I never did... very possibly one of the reasons this rebuild is taking so long and the other problems.

Now I just hope that things speed up a bit and run smoother.

Hi gospyro, please check version you downloaded. It should be 4.0.4. If anything else it has a BUG that causes it to crash per the Fat Cat Software release notes: http://www.fatcatsoftware.com/iplm/Help/release%20notes.html

My library was over 213 gig and other than it taking a long time never crashed using version 4.0.4. The older versions crashed twice in different places cost me hour of time.

Old Toad is right on regarding turning off energy saver as that also cause issues. I also turned off Time Capsule until I was finished rebuilding.

my two cents.

Littlerockeagle... I did download the newest version if iPhoto Manager (4.0.4) and I did turn off the 'energy saver'... yet, as of this morning, it looks like iPhoto manager got about 1/3 of the way threw the process of rebuilding my Library and has locked up again.

I assume you are familiar with how Manger, opens and closes and opens and closes iPhoto. It appears to be 'stuck' trying to 'close' iPhoto.

Given the size and time that it took to rebuild your Library (which is about 3x the size of the one I am trying to rebuild) it seems that there is something else wrong on my end. My Library is only 68GB and yet after about 12 hours is only about 1/3 done (and has not locked up)

The only think I can think of that appears different is that the iPhoto Library that I am trying to rebuild is on a external HD (and the new 'rebuilt' Library is on the same external drive.

I'm going to make one more attempt, after moving the 'broken' Library back over to my actual computer, and try and repare it there.

Just have to wait and see. Any other suggestions would be appreciated, but I don't know what else to add, since, by all accounts, this should have worked, and in a fraction of the time.

Update... sort of....

Even though my iPhoto library was only 68GB, I decided to make it into two 34+GB iPhoto libraries, since the 68GB one was taking forever and kept crashing, even after I had turned off the 'energy save' limtes.

But, it appears that the size of the Library is not an issue. I have been running iPhoto Manager (4.0.4) for over well 12 hours now and it has only 'rebuilt' less then half the library.

At first it was running very quickly, and it appeared that things would be rebuilt within a few hours. Then it REALLY slowed down.

Now, in addition to just running slowly, it keeps locking up when iPhoto doesn't want to close. I get a warning box, telling me that iPhoto failed to close... and if I happen to notice, all I have to do is click, 'Try Again' and it starts back to slowly rebuilding.

I know if it ever actually manages to finish, the problem (with moving Albums by hand) will be fixed, it's just that at this rate, it will take days, if it ever finishes. In my previous attempts, when it crashed, the portion of the Library that did manage to be rebuilt, worked fine. I just have to hope that I can get it to finish rebuilding the entire Library.

I have pretty much shut down everything else on my computer, and it's a realitively new iMac, so I'm not sure why it is taking so long.

I did get a message last night that there is an upgrade for iPhoto Manager (4.0.5)... but I'll have to wait for this current rebuild to either finish or CRASH, before I do the upgrade.

So, that's where I am now. I just have to check my computer every few minutes to make sure it hasn't stopped the rebuild because iPhoto failed to close. (which is a problem I have, when just using iPhoto... about half the time it takes a very long time to actually close, once I've told it to close. More often then not, I have to use 'Force Close' to get it to actually close.

More to come as things progress... assuming that they do contuinue to progress!

This has the hallmarks of a damaged photograph (one or several) in the library. A single damaged photograph can cause an entire process to stall (I'm not talking about the specific program you're using here, just any process that needs to access the damaged photographic data).

You mentioned that you split the library into two separate libraries. Have you tried running iPhoto Manager on both libraries? Do you see the same behavior on both?

Also check the Console messages for iPLM to see if it can identify what is causing iPLM to crash.

Thus far I have only tried to run iPLM on one of the now two libraries. If it makes it through this first library, it will be interesting to see if it goes faster on the second, since if the problem is in fact a damaged image, unless it's a serious, consistent problem, it's possible that the 2nd Library (or the 2nd half) might not have any damaged images/data. I can hope.

And I'll try and keep notes as to what iPLM says when it does, or fails to do something. There is definitely something funky going on here.

Starting to think that I need to run some comprehensive diagnostics on my iMac, since, even when doing other things, it seems fine/fast sometimes, and then at other times, it REALLY bogs down... taking an annoying amount of time to do something as simple as open a folder, that normally, it would to nearly instantly.

Starting to look like it's time to get my son in here. He can take one of these things apart and put it back together with his eyes closed.

Thanks for the input and suggestions.

iPLM finally managed to make it all the way through a rebuild of my 'problem' album. It took FAR longer then I expected, which just makes me wonder if what else is wrong with that Library, or if there is something wrong with my computer.

One consistant problem, that I have had for some time and with multiuple iPhoto Libraryies, is that the won't, often take a VERY long time to close. It is a regular occurance that I have to 'Force Close' iPhoto. This became a serious issue while trying to run a 'Rebuild' via iPLM, since it needs to open and close iPhoto repeatedly during the process.

On the most recent, and eventually successful try, the first half of the Rebuild went smoothly, both 'building the preview' and even the first half of the actual 'Rebuild'. But at about the half-way point of the Rebuild, iPLM started getting hung up due to the fact that iPhoto would not close (or close quick enough) and I would get a warning/question box asking me if I wanted to 'Try Again'. After a LOT of having to tell it to 'try again' it finally did manage to finsih the rebuild.

Since I split my orginal troubled Library into two seperate Libraries, I am just now starting a iPLM rebuild on the 2nd half. The 'preview' has gone quickly and smoothly. I'll have to wait and see about the rest of the process.

But... the 1st half did make it through the 'Rebuild' and is working properly now.

Given all the troubles, with something that should run a lot faster and smoother, given the examples and times show by other users, I am wondering if there is not something else wrong with either my Libraries or with my computer itselfs

For anyone interested, I'll let you know how this final 'Rebuild' goes.

How much free space do you have on your boot drive? Also how much memory do you have installed?

Old Toad.... IF... and that is a big if... I am looking at the right drives/numbers, my iMac has a 1T HD and it is used as the boot dive. There is a little over 600GB free on the drive.
Memory, if I am reading it right, I have 4GB.

I am currently running iPLM on the second Library, and it seems to be running smoother and faster... at least so far. Keeping my fingers crossed!