HT204476: Photos saves disk space by sharing images with your iPhoto or Aperture libraries

Learn about Photos saves disk space by sharing images with your iPhoto or Aperture libraries
javaruke

Q: Recently upgraded to 10.0.3 (Photos).   Immediately started receiving shortage on disk space messages.  Finder shows 110GB in iPhoto Library, 117GB Photos Library.  What can I delete?

My wife recently upgraded her MBA to 10.10.3 (Photos).  She can't remember if there were questions about duplicating/deleting photo files in the transition to Photos.

 

She immediately started receiving shortage on disk space messages.  Finder shows 110GB in iPhoto Library, 117GB Photos Library which is 90% of my disk space.

 

Apple website says Photos should have only taken pointers to original photos, thus not increasing disk space.

 

When I double-click on the iPhotos Library, it brings up iPhoto and shows 21,118 photos at 74GB.

 

When I double-click on the Photos Library, it brings up 19,216 photos with no indication of space.

 

In any case, what can I safely delete to get her drive back in order?

 

TIA

OS X Yosemite (10.10.3)

Posted on May 8, 2015 11:28 AM

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Q: Recently upgraded to 10.0.3 (Photos).   Immediately started receiving shortage on disk space messages.  Finder show ... more

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  • by léonie,

    léonie léonie May 8, 2015 11:36 AM in response to javaruke
    Level 10 (105,761 points)
    iLife
    May 8, 2015 11:36 AM in response to javaruke

    Where are the libraries stored?

     

    Is her library in the Pictures folder, as is the default, or is the library on an external drive or in a shared folder?

    And how did she migrate the iPhoto Library to Photos?

    When Photos opens an iPhoto Library, it will create a migrated library on the same drive and share the files.  If there are permission issues, or iPhoto cannot write to the drive because of an incompatible file system, the files cannot be shared by hard links and Photos will create the library in the Pictures folder without linking to the files in the iPhoto Library.

     

    See:   Photos saves disk space by sharing images with your iPhoto or Aperture libraries - Apple Support

  • by Lexiepex,

    Lexiepex Lexiepex May 8, 2015 11:44 AM in response to javaruke
    Level 6 (10,477 points)
    Mac OS X
    May 8, 2015 11:44 AM in response to javaruke

    And if iPhoto is still in your Applications folder start it and via the menu empty the iPhoto trash.

  • by javaruke,

    javaruke javaruke May 8, 2015 11:53 AM in response to léonie
    Level 1 (0 points)
    May 8, 2015 11:53 AM in response to léonie

    Both iPhoto and Photos Libraries are in the Pictures folder on her home directory, so I don't think there were sharing issues. 

     

    Unfortunately, she can't remember what she did during the upgrade install regarding migration.

     

    Do you know why iPhoto would still be a resident application (and iPhoto library)?  I thought Photos was intended to replace iPhoto.  My inclination would be to delete iPhoto and iPhoto Library, however don't want to lose anything in the process.

  • by javaruke,

    javaruke javaruke May 8, 2015 11:56 AM in response to Lexiepex
    Level 1 (0 points)
    May 8, 2015 11:56 AM in response to Lexiepex

    Yes it is still in apps, however nothing in the iPhoto trash to empty.

  • by léonie,

    léonie léonie May 8, 2015 12:21 PM in response to javaruke
    Level 10 (105,761 points)
    iLife
    May 8, 2015 12:21 PM in response to javaruke
    Do you know why iPhoto would still be a resident application (and iPhoto library)?

    It is intentional. Photos is a very different new application.  And it does not (yet) support all features of iPhoto. You may want to continue to use iPhoto, to be able to use iPhoto for tasks that are not supported in Photos, like batch changing or adding location data to photos.

    And you may need to use iPhoto to repair or rebuild the iPhoto library and to repeat the migration, should you discover that not all photos have been migrated correctly. If the iPhoto Library has an issue, Photos may crash when trying to migrate it, and then it might help to repair or rebuild the library in iphoto and to try the migration again.

     

    Your iPhoto Library and the Photos library are sharing the original image files by hard links, so the originals are only stored once, and the second library does not need much additional storage, even if the file sizes look the same in the Finder.

     

     

    My inclination would be to delete iPhoto and iPhoto Library, however don't want to lose anything in the process.

    If the migrated Photos Library does not keep, do not delete iPhoto or the iPhoto Library, Use iPhoto to rcheck the original iPhoto Library for problems. Use the iPhoto Library First Aid Tools to repair the permissions and the database.

  • by brianvegas,

    brianvegas brianvegas May 16, 2015 3:51 PM in response to léonie
    Level 1 (5 points)
    May 16, 2015 3:51 PM in response to léonie

    It's not only the individual library file sizes that reflect two full copies but the Pictures folder info also reflects the full size of both libraries and if I go up one more level and check through get info the size of my home folder it reflects having both full libraries. If what you said is true, at what point can I trust what "get Info" says about any folder or file? This whole thing also begs the question what happens with automatic download from the photo stream? For instance, I have iPhoto setup to automatically upload to the photo stream so when I inserted an SD card with 75 pictures on it and opened if and imported those pictures, I then went to the Photos app which is also set to automatically download from the photo stream and slowly those pictures started showing up in the library. Do I now have 2 copies of those picture because it occurred after the migration or do I only have one copy of those originals? My personal opinion is that while the developers may have intended it to work like this article states, in this released version it makes a copy of the library so you actually do use twice the space if you keep the original iPhoto library. I will delete the Photos library and try and re-accomplish the migration to see if there is some way to force the correct result.

  • by léonie,

    léonie léonie May 17, 2015 12:38 AM in response to brianvegas
    Level 10 (105,761 points)
    iLife
    May 17, 2015 12:38 AM in response to brianvegas
    It's not only the individual library file sizes that reflect two full copies but the Pictures folder info also reflects the full size of both libraries and if I go up one more level and check through get info the size of my home folder it reflects having both full libraries.

    This is the magic of a hard link versus an alias or a symbolic link.

    When you create a hard link to a file, both the original and the new link will be the same file. They will show the same size in the Finder and when the storage is counted, they will both be counted. On the file system level a hard link creates a new entry for a file that uses the same inode as the original file, so both files are sharing the same blocks on the disk. When you delete the original file, the hard linked file will still work. You need to delete both the original and the linked file to free the storage.