# The Lightroom catalog named ^[^1^] cannot be opened because another application alrea



## uncino71 (Mar 22, 2013)

Hi everybody,
then my problem. When I try to open a particular catalog it says "*The Lightroom catalog named ^[^1^] cannot be opened because another application already has it opened."* all other catalogs work fine. This happened after that I cancelled the backup that make it is made once a mounth. There have been other post about this problem, but the solution there proposed doesn't work for me. I have no .lock file so I cannot delite it. The strange thing that the file  ^[^1^]Idata has a zero byte size. 
I use lightroom 4 on a mac with mountain lion OS X


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## Tony Jay (Mar 22, 2013)

Hi uncino, wlecome to the forum.

This is easy to fix, I think.

With Lightroom closed, navigate to the folders that hold your Lightroom catalog.
You will find a file named .lrcat.lock - what comes before the first period is whatever your catalog is named.
Delete this file.
Lightroom will then open normally.

The .lrcat.lock file is there to prevent more than one user accessing the catalog simultaneously. 
It is automatically created each time you open the catalog.
This file is normally deleted whenever Lightroom is closed down normally but if for some reason it can't close normally the .lrcat.lock file may persist - as it has in your case.
It then stops you from accessing your catalog.

Let us know how you go.

Tony Jay

PS I missed the bit that said that there is no lock file but I would recheck.


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## clee01l (Mar 22, 2013)

Welcome to the forum. That is an unusual name for a file. As Tony has pointed out the file extension is lrcat (that is an L not an I). It is not clear what you are referencing when you use " ^[^1^]Idata".  If the file is " ^[^1^]Idata.lrcat" it is a catalog file. If it is a file named  "^[^1^].Idata" and "idata" is the extension, then this is not a LR catalog file.  So can you clarify?  If you do have a legitimate lrcat (with an L) file along side one with a ".lock" extension, then Tony's recommendation is the one to follow.


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## uncino71 (Mar 22, 2013)

Thank you for Helping.
The files that I have are:
nomecatalog.lrcat
nomecatalog Previews.lrdata
no file with a .lock extention


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## Hal P Anderson (Mar 22, 2013)

What happens when you double-click on the nomecatalog.lrcat icon?

Hal


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## clee01l (Mar 22, 2013)

So do you have other catalogs besides "nomecatalog.lrcat"?  Is it this catalog that gives the message when you try to open it in LR?  Can you explain what you meant earlier when you referenced "^[^1^]Idata"?


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## uncino71 (Mar 22, 2013)

clee01l said:


> So do you have other catalogs besides "nomecatalog.lrcat"?  Is it this catalog that gives the message when you try to open it in LR?  Can you explain what you meant earlier when you referenced "^[^1^]Idata"?



Hi Hal,
"What happens when you double-click on the nomecatalog.lrcat icon?" 
It says _The Lightroom catalog named_ nomecatalog _cannot be opened because another application already_ has it opened.

Hi Cletus,

no I have no other names for catalog, and the only one give this message of error. 
"_Can you explain what you meant earlier when you referenced "__^[^1^]Idata"?_" It was my mistakes I mean file .lrdara


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## uncino71 (Mar 22, 2013)

uncino71 said:


> Hi Hal,
> "What happens when you double-click on the nomecatalog.lrcat icon?"
> It says _The Lightroom catalog named_ nomecatalog_cannot be opened because another application already_ has it opened.
> 
> ...


I mean .lrdata


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