# Backup to Amazon Photos Backup fails



## pete.borthwick (Aug 2, 2019)

Amazon Photos comes with a backup option allowing the backup of all files rather than just photos.
However, the backup fails because a Lightroom file (which is not always the same file) cannot be backed up because the file is constantly being updated in the background - even when Lightroom is closed.
Does anyone else have this problem? 
Can anyone offer a way round it; can I stop Lightroom background processes running when Lightroom is not open?
Thanks,
Pete


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## Johan Elzenga (Aug 2, 2019)

I’m not aware of any background Lightroom Classic processes, so I would really like to know an example of such a file, even if it is not always the same one.


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## Ed Anderson (Aug 2, 2019)

As Johan, mentioned, please give us an example or let us know the what the file name is.  I haven't had any problems uploading to Amazon Photos.  Amazon states proper file types for photos are JPEG, BMP, PNG, GIF, most TIFF, HEIF, HEVC, and RAW format files and MP4, QuickTime, AVI, MTS, MPG, ASF, WMV, Flash, HEIF, HEVC, and OGG for videos.

Additionally, Amazon gives this for incompatible files:

File names cannot contain:

Any special characters (<>:"/\|?*\) or Unicode \x00 - \x1F
$$
File names cannot end in:

CON
PRN
AUX
NUL
COM[1-9]
LPT[1-9]
A space or a period
Also, what indications do you have its a LR file? Can you post a screen shot when you get the error of why the upload failed?


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## Hal P Anderson (Aug 3, 2019)

Pete,
Does the entire backup fail, or does it just refuse to back up that one open file? If the latter, you could probably safely ignore the problem. It would help if you could tell us the name of the file in question.


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## pete.borthwick (Aug 3, 2019)

Johan Elzenga said:


> I’m not aware of any background Lightroom Classic processes, so I would really like to know an example of such a file, even if it is not always the same one.


It's usually the "root-pixels.db" file but has also been the "Lightroom catalog.ltcat".
Amazon Support say their backup is failing because they are unable to backup the file because it is constantly being updated - and I'm assuming it must be a background process because it still fails even with Lightroom not Open; is there some way I can see (on a Mac) what is changing t he file/db constantly?


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## pete.borthwick (Aug 3, 2019)

Hal P Anderson said:


> Pete,
> Does the entire backup fail, or does it just refuse to back up that one open file? If the latter, you could probably safely ignore the problem. It would help if you could tell us the name of the file in question.


The backup of everything else is successful;  the backup reports having "completed with errors".
I agree that I could ignore this file as I could re-install Lightroom and recover the catalog from Lightroom Backup if ever I needed to recover. BUT... once the Amazon backup fails it stops running - so no further backing up takes place!
There is also no option with Amazon Photos Backup to Exclude sub folders/files and as Lightroom installs in a Sub Folder of Pictures it is automatically included.
I appreciate I could move the Lightroom folder outside of the Pictures folder but I would really like to keep it in it's default  location!


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## Johan Elzenga (Aug 3, 2019)

pete.borthwick said:


> It's usually the "root-pixels.db" file but has also been the "Lightroom catalog.ltcat".
> Amazon Support say their backup is failing because they are unable to backup the file because it is constantly being updated - and I'm assuming it must be a background process because it still fails even with Lightroom not Open; is there some way I can see (on a Mac) what is changing t he file/db constantly?


Those are the database of the previews, and your Lightroom catalog. Yes, these are constantly written to when Lightroom is open, but there is no background process that writes to these files when Lightroom is closed.


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## pete.borthwick (Aug 3, 2019)

Thanks - that is what I had thought myself.
But Amazon are adamant, from their log files, that these files are constantly changing - and I'm confident that I've quit Lightroom but still the backup fails.
I guess I'm going to have to find some way of trying to find out what is changing these files or challenge Amazon again; but to be fair to them they have taken this issue seriously and been quite heavily involved at their technical team level and spend a lot of time analysing my log files to reach their conclusion.


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## Johan Elzenga (Aug 3, 2019)

I would move the Lightroom catalog folder out of your backed-up folder -so out of your Pictures folder- if you can't exclude it from the backup. The Pictures folder may be the default location, but there is no reason why you could not store it somewhere else.


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## pete.borthwick (Aug 4, 2019)

Ed Anderson said:


> As Johan, mentioned, please give us an example or let us know the what the file name is.  I haven't had any problems uploading to Amazon Photos.  Amazon states proper file types for photos are JPEG, BMP, PNG, GIF, most TIFF, HEIF, HEVC, and RAW format files and MP4, QuickTime, AVI, MTS, MPG, ASF, WMV, Flash, HEIF, HEVC, and OGG for videos.
> 
> Additionally, Amazon gives this for incompatible files:
> 
> ...


As stated in another reply Photos and videos or any/all denominations are successfully backed up. It is simply Lightroom files that fail to back up. Not a major issue as I can always re-install Lightroom and get the catalog back from Lightroom backup files.


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## JohnHemphill (Aug 13, 2019)

I think the LR catalogue is an .lrcat file, not an .ltcat file.  I use LR CC


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