Evidently some/many have found that Photos actually did duplicate the iPhoto library, rather than only fixing a hard reference. See http://9to5mac.com/2015/05/07/how-to-shrink-mac-photo-library-delete-duplicates/. This is my experience.
iPhoto '11, OS X Yosemite (10.10.3)
A hard link is indistinguishable from a regular file. Have you compared the inodes of the originals in the iPhoto Library and the migrated Photos library?
For all iPhoto libraries I migrated the migration created hard links between the the original files in the iPhoto Library and the new Photos library and thus saved space. The new library and the original Aperture library had roughly the same size, but the free storage on my Mac did not decrease much.
Thanks for your quick response, léonie. My old iPhoto library had/has 400 GBs, while the new Photos library has a bit more (due to recent additions). It seems to me that they are duplicates, because when I migrated, suddenly my 1 TB HD was dangerously close to full, and my automatic cloud back up (Mozy) went way over capacity. This would appear to corroborate the experience of the writer whose article I linked. Yet, there are contradictory views expressed in Apple communities and elsewhere (see the comments in the linked article I refer to). In short, I have to either increase my HD capacity (internal or external) or delete a duplicate library, and I'm at a loss to know what to do when the tech experts and pundits disagree.
Thanks for your attention to this. Much appreciated!
Depending on the size of your originals the disk space should increase by no more than about 20% of the size of the original library.
You can check, if the files are linked or not with a simple test in the Terminal:
If two files are hard linked, the inode numbers will be identical, when you list the file with the ls -li command in the Terminal:
For example, looking into the packages of an new migrated Photos library and the original iPhoto Library. Everything looks duplicated with the same size:
The Terminal is showing this, when I type "ls -li " into the Terminal and drag one of the master files behind this command:
Hermione:~ dreschle$ ls -li /Users/dreschle/Pictures/Photos\ Library\ 2.photoslibrary/Masters/2015/05/28/20150528-184932/IMG_0966.JPG
39167952 -rw-r--r--@ 3 dreschle staff 1283723 25 Mai 12:00 /Users/dreschle/Pictures/Photos Library 2.photoslibrary/Masters/2015/05/28/20150528-184932/IMG_0966.JPG
Hermione:~ dreschle$ ls -li /Users/dreschle/Pictures/iPhoto\ Library.migratedphotolibrary/Masters/2015/05/28/20150528-184932/IMG_0966.JPG
39167952 -rw-r--r--@ 3 dreschle staff 1283723 25 Mai 12:00 /Users/dreschle/Pictures/iPhoto Library.migratedphotolibrary/Masters/2015/05/28/20150528-184932/IMG_0966.JPG
In both libraries are the files listed with the identical inode number 39167952, meaning they are linking to the same physical file in the file table. For the Finder both files are separate, regular files and so it is reporting the size twice.
When I compared the used space on my hard drive right after migrating the test library with 40 photos, the used storage had not been increased much:
and my automatic cloud back up (Mozy) went way over capacity. This would appear to corroborate the experience of the writer whose article I linked.
Your cloud backup may not be able to recognize the hard links and treat them as new files, because they are in different folders.
The document you linked to "Photos saves disk space by sharing images with your iPhoto or Aperture libraries" has been written by Apple and describes how it is supposed to work, and for my libraries I can confirm this. Here is another independent author describing the same: Six Colors: The (hard) link between Photos and iPhoto
If your library uses referenced originals, the new library will cause an enormous increase in storage used, because Photos will create additional auxiliary files, that are not present in the original iPhoto Library. Or, are you perhaps using iCloud Photo Library?
Wow, you're amazing léonie! It took me a bit of time to get to where and how you sent me to check (I'm not a techie), but you are right! The inode numbers are the same. So deleting my old iPhoto library won't make much difference. I need more storage space. Thanks so much!
You're welcome, Tim! 🙂
I was actually referring to the article I linked within my first post http://9to5mac.com/2015/05/07/how-to-shrink-mac-photo-library-delete-duplicates/ who says that Photos makes a duplicate library. However, with your assistance, I see not that that is not my case. It likely isn't his either; he needs to do the inode numbers comparison that you instruct. Thanks again!
One more quick question:
My old iPhoto library is ~400GB, and the new Photos library is ~410GB.
My 1TB HD shows as getting close to full.
Either the true size of my pictures is the sum of the two libraries, or my iMac is fooled by the hard linking.
What do you think?
Danke!
The storage you are seeing in the menu > About this Mac panel > Storage is pretty accurate with respect to the total. The categories are not always accurate. Check what else may be taking up storage on your Mac.
You will gain some free space by moving the old iPhoto Library of your system drive to a backup drive, but not all of the 400 GB. But you can recover the space needed for the faces thumbnails and for any previews of photos you edited after the migration, because editing will cause new previews to be created and that breaks the links.
The mystery is the "other" category, so I used "omni disk sweeper" which shows a very different picture.
Would you recommend a more specialised app like "Photo Sweeper"?
Thanks again!!
The "Other" content is explained in this document: http://support.apple.com/kb/HT6047
The other category might be incorrect, if you have many files in sections of your drive, that you are not allowed to read. If your Mac is a portable Mac it also may be local Time Machine snapshots, that are created, when your mac is not connected to your Time Machine volume. Or the Spotlight index of your Mac may need rebuilding. See this discussion:
https://discussions.apple.com/thread/6381847?answerId=26125513022#26125513022
Thanks so much léonie! The documentation you linked was helpful. This is an iMac, not MacBook.
I suspect that my old iPhoto library's internal trash is large. However, I can't open it to permanently delete. Since migration, the old iPhoto app is unavailable, and version 9.6 (which many say is needed to continue to use iPhoto post-Photos) is not available.
I tried compressing the iPhoto library but there's not enough HD space. The prep process showed many many more docs than I have pics; thus my conclusion that the internal trash is huge.
Once again, thanks so very much!!
I suspect that my old iPhoto library's internal trash is large. However, I can't open it to permanently delete. Since migration, the old iPhoto app is unavailable, and version 9.6 (which many say is needed to continue to use iPhoto post-Photos) is not available.
It is still possible to update to iPhoto 9.6 by reinstalling, provided your iPhoto version is associated with the AppStore.
See this user tip: Get iPhoto 9.6.1 if you didn't update before OS... | Apple Support Communities
i had tried this a month ago, but my iPhoto's not in purchased apps, neither visible nor hidden.
Which version of iPhoto do you have?
iPhoto to Photos: duplicate library
