# Unexpected error opening catalog in LR4



## Tim Bracken (Mar 28, 2012)

Hello,

I posted the same title a couple of weeks ago and worked through the issues with Adobe Chat.  Essentially I have re-downloaded and re-installed LR4 twice now and the same issue is happening.  If I close LR4 I am unable to re-open it at all.  It brings up the Unexpected Error message and that's it.  Has anybody else come across this issue? It has essentially rendered LR4 useless to me and now I have some deadlines looming but no way to access my photos.

I have tried to attach a screenshot of the error hopefully it worked.

Please help.

Cheers!
Tim


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## clee01l (Mar 28, 2012)

Have you in your workings to fix the problem renamed the .plist file forcing LR to create a new one?  Also can you force LR to open with a new empty catalog?  I suspect the problem lies in either your existing catalog (corruption) or settings contained in the plist file. 

How recent is your most recent catalog backup?  And do you have a backup of the catalog before the crashes started occurring?


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## Victoria Bampton (Mar 28, 2012)

And if the clean preferences doesn't solve it, try holding down Opt while opening LR and seeing if it will open a clean catalog.


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## Tim Bracken (Mar 29, 2012)

clee01l said:


> Have you in your workings to fix the problem renamed the .plist file forcing LR to create a new one?  Also can you force LR to open with a new empty catalog?  I suspect the problem lies in either your existing catalog (corruption) or settings contained in the plist file.
> 
> How recent is your most recent catalog backup?  And do you have a backup of the catalog before the crashes started occurring?



Hi Cletus,

I'm pretty sure that in my dealings with the Adobe people via chat that I did rename the .plist file but I'm not certain and I'm not sure at this point what I should rename it?  It does sound like I most likely have a corrupt catalog.  I do not believe I have a catalog backup since installing LR4, at least I don't recall backing it up.  I've only closed it twice and both times I was unable to re-open due to the issues I've mentioned.

I'm waiting word from the next level of Adobe support, and I have no idea what that entails.

Victoria, I have tried holding down Opt while trying to open LR but I simply get the same error message.

Any other ideas?

Thanks
Tim


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## clee01l (Mar 29, 2012)

The idea to rename your plist file is to rename it anything so that LR will not see it as the LR plist file and this will force LR to create a new plist file. 

Holding down the {Opt} key while simultaneously clicking on the LR icon in the dock cause LR to open but not to open the default catalog. Instead it shows a dialog with a list of available catalogs and an option to create a new one.   If you are not able to open LR this way is more disturbing.  

My next three recommendations are
Reboot OSX
then try the {Opt}{LR icon} to open LR with no default catalog.
If that fails then:

Change the extention on your LR4 catalog so that it no longer reads "{yourCatalogName}-2.lrcat" but instead reads "{yourCatalogName}-2.lrcatold"
Click on the LR icon on the Dock to open LR,  Your LR3 catalog should have a name like "{yourCatalogName}.lrcat" If LR4 opens then it should offer to convert this LR3 catalog.
My last suggestion.

Uninstall LR and D/L and install new copy from the Adobe site
Rename your old 'plist' file
Using the {Opt}{LR Icon} Open LR with an default catalog.

If you haven't uninstalled LR3, Open LR3 with your LR3 catalog   This should succeed. When it does, Make a back up of the LR3 catalog using the catalog setting dialog to set LR for a backup  "the next time LR exits" so that LR will test the integrity of the catalog and optimize it.  This will fix any fixable errors that LR finds when it runs the integrity test.


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## Tim Bracken (Mar 29, 2012)

clee01l said:


> The idea to rename your plist file is to rename it anything so that LR will not see it as the LR plist file and this will force LR to create a new plist file.
> 
> Holding down the {Opt} key while simultaneously clicking on the LR icon in the dock cause LR to open but not to open the default catalog. Instead it shows a dialog with a list of available catalogs and an option to create a new one.   If you are not able to open LR this way is more disturbing.
> 
> ...



Thanks when I am home this evening I will check these.  One point, I cannot even open LR when holding down the Opt key.  It simply does not open at all.  I haev also uninstalled and reinstalled two times since the initial install.  Does that change any of your recommendations?

Cheers!
Tim


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## clee01l (Mar 29, 2012)

Tim Bracken said:


> ... Does that change any of your recommendations?


 I'm new to OSX (since Feb.), It took me a while to get the knack of holding down the {Opt} Key while clicking the LR icon on the dock. This is an experienced LR user that has no trouble managing the same operation on Windows. If you have ever performed this operation before the problem we can both have more confidence that you are doing it correctly.

It is possible that you are not doing this correctly.  Without watching you or doing it for you, there is no way I can on this end of the keyboard be certain.  However, Since that part can not be proved or disproved.  I/we can only assume that you are doing this correctly and for what ever reasons, this install of LR is failing to open.  If you remove the plist and the catalog from consideration (i.e. LR does not find them and defaults to new plist and new catalog), you achieve the same (or better) position as you would by pressing the {Opt}{LR icon}.  When after doing all of these things (including the new LR install), and LR still will not open, we need to look at outside influences that might prevent LR from opening. Those outside influences can be (in some order of likelihood ):

Improper read/write permissions on the drive or folder that LR needs to access.
Critical HD space to create the necessary temporary files
Some nonstandard background program that is interfering with LR's normal operation
Parts of your operating system is corrupt
So, yes, it would help for you to try each of the three tests.  You should get LR3 to run with your old catalog. If you can't, then We will need to resolve that so that you can present LR4 with a clean working catalog to convert.


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## Tim Bracken (Mar 29, 2012)

clee01l said:


> I'm new to OSX (since Feb.), It took me a while to get the knack of holding down the {Opt} Key while clicking the LR icon on the dock. This is an experienced LR user that has no trouble managing the same operation on Windows. If you have ever performed this operation before the problem we can both have more confidence that you are doing it correctly.
> 
> It is possible that you are not doing this correctly.  Without watching you or doing it for you, there is no way I can on this end of the keyboard be certain.  However, Since that part can not be proved or disproved.  I/we can only assume that you are doing this correctly and for what ever reasons, this install of LR is failing to open.  If you remove the plist and the catalog from consideration (i.e. LR does not find them and defaults to new plist and new catalog), you achieve the same (or better) position as you would by pressing the {Opt}{LR icon}.  When after doing all of these things (including the new LR install), and LR still will not open, we need to look at outside influences that might prevent LR from opening. Those outside influences can be (in some order of likelihood ):
> 
> ...




Quick question...when I have tried opening LR while holding the Opt I have actually been opening it from within a Finder window.  Does that make a difference as opposed to trying it from the dock?  I figured I'd better ask before going any further.  How much different cna opening something holding a button be from Win to Mac?  Interesting.

I have tons of HD space, around 2GB's, but anything else listed above is possible I guess.

Again tonight when I have time in form my Mac I will try some of your suggestions.

Thanks
Tim


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## RikkFlohr (Mar 29, 2012)

FWIW, I wouldn't consider 2 GB of hard drive space - tons. I would be in a panic with that little left.


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## clee01l (Mar 29, 2012)

Tim Bracken said:


> ...
> I have tons of HD space, around 2GB's, but anything else listed above is possible I guess...


I think this may be a very important number to nail down accurately.  Can you Perform a "Get Info" on the primary HD (usually labeled 'Macintosh HD') and report the *Capacity* and *Available* values?  2GB is certainly not adequate. You should have at a minimum 10% of your HD free at all times for optimum performance.

Which Mac are you running that has 8GB RAM?  Do you know how many cores are in the CPU?

And Yes you can hold down the {Optn} key while clicking on the LR icon in the Application folder. But I have to double click to get it to work and open the "Select Catalog" dialog.


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## Tim Bracken (Mar 30, 2012)

clee01l said:


> I think this may be a very important number to nail down accurately.  Can you Perform a "Get Info" on the primary HD (usually labeled 'Macintosh HD') and report the *Capacity* and *Available* values?  2GB is certainly not adequate. You should have at a minimum 10% of your HD free at all times for optimum performance.
> 
> Which Mac are you running that has 8GB RAM?  Do you know how many cores are in the CPU?
> 
> And Yes you can hold down the {Optn} key while clicking on the LR icon in the Application folder. But I have to double click to get it to work and open the "Select Catalog" dialog.



Sorry my fault, I meant to 2TB's and not 2GB's. 

I did rename the following catalogs to "old" but I still cannot open LR at all. Does below tell you anything else about what could be going on?

Lightroom 2 Catalog Previews.lrdata
Lightroom 2 Catalog.lrcat
Lightroom 3 Catalog Previews.lrdata
Lightroom 3 Catalog.lrcat
Lightroom 4 Catalog-2 Previews.lrdata
Lightroom 4 Catalog-2.lrcatold
Lightroom 4 Catalog-3 Previews.lrdata
Lightroom 4 Catalog-3.lrcatold
Lightroom 4 Catalog-4 Previews.lrdata
Lightroom 4 Catalog-4.lrcatold
Lightroom 4 Catalog.lrcat

Thank you for all of your help so far.

Tim


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## clee01l (Mar 30, 2012)

Tim Bracken said:


> Sorry my fault, I meant to 2TB's and not 2GB's.


So you have 2TB free on your Primary HD? I really need this informatin exactly as I asked for it: "_Can you Perform a "Get Info" on the primary HD (usually labeled 'Macintosh HD') and report the _*Capacity *and* Available *values" Unless you have done some specific system work to move your TEMP (working) Storage, OSX is going to keep this on the primary HD.  LR makes extensive use of this working storage. If you have a smallish SSD that houses the OS, you might be out of space.





> I did rename the following catalogs to "old" but I still cannot open LR at all. Does below tell you anything else about what could be going on?


I'd still like to know: "_Which Mac are you running that has 8GB RAM? Do you know how many cores are in the CPU"
_
Also can you run LR3? Can you open your old LR3 catalog? 

I need to find out how to get you to run a list of all active tasks that are running when you invoke LR4.  I'm new to OSX and this is a simple thing to do and to direct someone to do running  Windows.  Let me research this part and also how to get OSX to repair itself.  Because those are possibilities that may need to be examined.  The other thing that needs examining are permissions.  I'll need you to tell me where all of the parts needed to run LR are stored. Those parts are the catalog, your master image files and your LR4 app.
 The last piece is the Folder holding ACR Cache.  Do you know how to check permissions  for each of these?  I'd like you to report the path to the catalog, the paty to the master image copies. and the path to ACR cache. 

One other thing to check would be for me to open your LR4 catalog.  Can you put a copy of it in your public folder in Dropbox and send me a link?  If I can open the catalog on my computer, then the problem is probably not related to your catalog.


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## Tim Bracken (Mar 31, 2012)

clee01l said:


> So you have 2TB free on your Primary HD? I really need this informatin exactly as I asked for it: "_Can you Perform a "Get Info" on the primary HD (usually labeled 'Macintosh HD') and report the _*Capacity *and* Available *values" Unless you have done some specific system work to move your TEMP (working) Storage, OSX is going to keep this on the primary HD.  LR makes extensive use of this working storage. If you have a smallish SSD that houses the OS, you might be out of space.I'd still like to know: "_Which Mac are you running that has 8GB RAM? Do you know how many cores are in the CPU"
> _
> Also can you run LR3? Can you open your old LR3 catalog?
> 
> ...



I can run LR3 and I am using a 3.06 Ghz Intel Core 2 Duo using 8GB DDR3.


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## clee01l (Mar 31, 2012)

I know I asked a lot of questions, but getting answers to each and every one is important to understanding your environment and helping you figure out why your Apple computer will not run LR4 when my iMac and everyone else seems to load and run without difficulty.  Do I need to ask one question per reply until I get a answer to each question the I have asked?


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## Tim Bracken (Mar 31, 2012)

clee01l said:


> I know I asked a lot of questions, but getting answers to each and every one is important to understanding your environment and helping you figure out why your Apple computer will not run LR4 when my iMac and everyone else seems to load and run without difficulty.  Do I need to ask one question per reply until I get a answer to each question the I have asked?



Sorry I've had very little time in front of my Mac as have family in town.  What questions are you waiting for the answers on?  I thought I had answered everything I had the answer to but maybe I missed something.  WHat do you still need from me and I'll ty to get you the answers today.


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## clee01l (Mar 31, 2012)

Tim Bracken said:


> Sorry I've had very little time in front of my Mac as have family in town.  What questions are you waiting for the answers on?  I thought I had answered everything I had the answer to but maybe I missed something.  WHat do you still need from me and I'll ty to get you the answers today.


Hey, Family in town takes precedent.  It is not important that you get back to us until you have time to devote to your issue.  

Here are the questions that I am looking for answers.  These are important to understanding your environment and helping you figure out why your Apple computer will not run LR4.
Can you perform a "Get Info" on the primary HD (usually labeled 'Macintosh HD') and report the *Capacity* and *Available* values?
This is the HD that usually contains your working storage
Unless you have done some specific system work to move your TEMP (working) Storage, OSX is going to keep this on the primary HD. LR makes extensive use of this working storage. If you have a smallish SSD that houses the OS, you might be out of space.
For best performance, you need to maintain at a minimum 15%  free space.

Which Mac are you running? Is it a MBA, MBP, Mac Mini or an iMac?
Can you open your old LR3 catalog with LR3?
I need you to tell me where all of the parts needed to run LR are stored. Those parts are the catalog, your master image files and your LR4 app. The last piece is the Folder holding ACR Cache. Do you know how to check permissions for each of these? I'd like you to report the path to the catalog, the path to the master image copies. and the path to ACR cache.
One other thing to check would be for me to open your LR4 catalog. Can you put a copy of it in your public folder in Dropbox and send me a link? If I can open the catalog on my computer, then the problem is probably not related to your catalog.
One thing that I haven't asked but will now is for you to open up the Disk Utilities.app found in your Utilities folder and Verify and  if necessary Repair disk permissions.
The things that I am trying to find out  are whether you have enough disk space to properly run LR4 and whether you have the right access (permissions) to the files that LR4 needs.  If you don't, then we'll set about to fix that but if you do, we'll need to investigate why your Mac is different from everyone else's.

Enjoy your family visit and when you are ready to take this up again, we'll be here.


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