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SubArctic
SubArctic
Participant
December 16, 2018
Question

Elements, NAS, and 2 Macs -- Possible?

  • December 16, 2018
  • 1 reply
  • 698 views

All,

I'm revisiting an issue that I've researched on this forum and elsewhere because (1) I want to be sure that I have up-to-date information and (2) I have an idea for a work-around that I haven't seen discussed.

I'm a long-time Mac user and have built up tens of thousands of photographs in my Apple Photos library.  But I've grown frustrated with both the limitations of Apple Photos and the inability to choose to work on either my iMac or my MacBook.  I've also built up such a large library that it's becoming problematic to keep it local, even on my iMac.

I'm planning on moving my photos from my Apple Photos library to folders on my NAS corresponding to my old Photos albums.  At that point, I'd like to purchase and use Adobe Elements to manage and edit--ideally from both of my Macs.

In researching the issue, it seems that (1) it would be possible to have my photos on the NAS and manage/edit with PE but (2) it's problematic for the PE "catalog" to be on the NAS.

First, I'm not exactly sure what the "catalog" means in Adobe-speak--but it seems to mean a directory file that tracks the location of the original images, organizes them into albums for viewing from PE, and tracks changes made to the original images.  Do I have that right?

Second, is the above described problem still the case today using Photos Elements 2019?  Is it impossible to keep both the media on my NAS and the catalog on the NAS that would be referenced by a copy of Adobe Photoshop Elements 19 on two different Macs?

Finally, if that is still a problem, would it be a solution to keep the catalog file on a synchronized cloud drive, such as Microsoft OneDrive?  As I understand it, that would appear as a local file on both computers but synch via a cloud server.  I would be careful to only have PE open on one computer or the other at any given time.

Thanks for your assistance.  I'd like to purchase and use PE Elements, but before I make the leap I need to understand the limitations and possibilities.  PE would be an impossible solution for me if I couldn't a least move the media to the NAS.  And, in a perfect world, I'd really like to somehow share the catalog between both of my Macs.

    This topic has been closed for replies.

    1 reply

    S
    Adobe Employee
    Somya_Agarwal
    Adobe Employee
    December 17, 2018

    Hi,

    You can keep media on NAS but its not recommended to keep the catalog on NAS as various processes like Face Analysis and Autocreations(in Elements 2019) write information in the catalog database which requires continuous syncing, and this operations breaks mid-way in case network or the hard disk gets disconnected.

    Also the thumbnails generated in People room for faces are specific to the resolution of the PC they were created in.

    Regarding your questions about what a catalog is, please refer below article for more information about a catalog:

    Create and edit catalogs in Adobe Elements Organizer

    Thanks,

    Somya

    SubArctic
    SubArcticAuthor
    Participant
    December 27, 2018

    Thank you for your reply and the link.

    This has confirmed for me that it will not be possible to keep a catalog on my NAS. 

    But I'm still curious to know if I can maintain a catalog as a cloud synchronized file that is present on the hard drives of both of my computers.  If the "cloud" activity is limited to keeping the two catalog files synchronized--and I'm sure to never be accessing both copies of the file at the same time--that should permit me to use either copy of the file to manage my media.

    Does anyone have any thoughts on this?  Has anyone tried it?

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