P: Moving files, resulted in deleting the files

[jkborys]

I am using Mac OSX and LR CC 2015.

I have a workflow that involves importing thousand of raw photos and then sorting them. In order to sort them, I take a group of photos of the same subject and move them to a temp folder and then repeat until all the photos have been moved to sub categories based on there names. I then move the photos out of the temp folder into the original folder and delete the temp folder.
While attempting to move the folders containing the photos, one of the folders and the 97 photos under it was lost. There is also a descrepancy in the number of photos copied 97 vs 76. And I can no longer find the photos on my hard drive. i did NOT delete the photos. LR seems to have deleted them. This is a HUGE problem. KimBenchProblem_inline-81a5d584-d717-4e35-ac1b-a8c550acdee7-631396214.jpg

[johnrellis]

Dominik Busch has identified at least one cause of errors moving folders: Selecting a folder and its contained subfolders and dragging all of them to a new location can cause LR to get confused, moving the subfolders into wrong locations and reporting spurious errors.  To reproduce on OS X:

1. Download and unzip this folder: https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/21811200/LRmovebug.2017.03.20.zip

2. Place the unzipped folder "LR move bug.2017.03.20" on your Desktop.

3. Start Terminal and execute these commands:

cd ~/Desktop/LR\ move\ bug.2017.03.20
sh build.sh ~/Desktop/root 5 5 3

This will create a nested folder tree containing 125 copies of a 44 MB DNG.

4. In LR, import the folder ~/Desktop/root using the Add option.

5. On an external drive, create a folder "dest", add a dummy pic to it, and import "dest" into LR using the Add option.  Then, delete the dummy pic from the catalog and disk.

6. In the LR Folder panel, option-click the triangle next to "root" to expand the tree completely. Then select "root" and all the nested folders:



7. Click and drag "root" to "dest".

8. A number of spurious errors will be reported that look similar to:





9. All the files got copied, but the folder structure was scrambled:

[Rikk Flohr: Photography]

Using your instructions and test files, John, I was able to duplicate this issue.  A bug has been filed against this thread. 

Thanks to you and Dominik for the instructions. 

[johnrellis]

Very good.  This has been a long-standing issue very hard to nail down, and perhaps this is a source of most or all of the reports over the years.

[FeedbackCommunityMember]

1. change to Library mode -> Grid view (press 'g')
2. select > 10 images
3. drag and drop images into any folder - notice the image that is highlighted!
4. error dialog "Error While Moving Files" is displayed that the highlighted image was unable to be moved - see screenshot #2
5. manually drag and drop last file into folder :(

This is not 100% reproducible but on my current system (i7, SSD, 12gb RAM) when sorting panoramas into sub-directories, I get this error about 75% of the time. Also on my old system (AMD Phenom x4 w/ 6gb RAM) I would get this error even more frequently.

Win7 x64. Lightroom v3.4.1 (however this bug has been around since at least v2).

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[Alex Petrenko]

It's a separate issue. No files deleted in this case.

[J453]

Good morning. We'd like to invite you to our prerelease if you're interested in evaluating a fix for this issue. Let us know and we'll get you added.

[FeedbackCommunityMember]

Sure I will volunteer as beta tester!

[jkborys]

yes. please invite me.

[lambertwm]

sure, bring it on 😉

[Alex Petrenko]

If it for disappearing files bug or not moving files bug?

[FeedbackCommunityMember]

Please Invite.  LR just lost 600 files.  Thankfully, I backed them up first.

[Rikk Flohr: Photography]

Lightroom CC2015.12/6.12 was released today and should address this issue.  Please update your Lightroom to the latest version and let us know if you continue to see the issue. Thank you for your patience.

http://blogs.adobe.com/lightroomjournal/2017/07/lightroom-cc-2015-12-now-available.html

[Alex Petrenko]

Issue of incomplete move of files not resolved yet?

[Alex Petrenko]

Oh yes... Till last moment I had some hope...

[Alex Petrenko]

Usually bugs don't live for 6 years...
https://feedback.photoshop.com/photoshop_family/topics/multiple_image_move_operation_bug_since_at_le...

[Rikk Flohr: Photography]

Oleksandr, 

Go to Help>System Info and verify your Lightroom version is either 6.12 or CC2015.12. If it is not, please update your Lightroom installation. 

If it is, then you will need to provide very detailed step-by-step instructions for creating this issue again. Based upon the original poster and then John Ellis' additional instructions we were able to reproduce and fix this issue. If you are still experiencing this issue, we need to know very specifically what you are doing when this occurs.  Without that information, I cannot reopen the bug. 

[Alex Petrenko]

Not that much changed since original poster of the issue Glenn Bristol posted it 6 years ago.

1. change to Library mode 
2. select images (I usually use "Ctrl+A" in filmstrip) 
3. drag and drop images into any folder 
4. error dialog appears - see screenshot

LR is updated this morning. Just to check if it will be able to move.

[dj_paige]

Sometimes the updater doesn't update properly, so you need to confirm, by looking in Help->System Info, that you have Version 6.12 or CC 2015.12, and state affirmatively that you tried this procedure with version 6.12 or CC 2015.12.

Also, no screen capture appears in your message.

[Alex Petrenko]

I've checked the version before posting the message above.
Screen capture is in the second reply to the announcement (above). 

[FeedbackCommunityMember]

Hi Rikk, will the update be of any help if the files are already deleted. I have the same issue as most other users. I moved a folder between two external devices and all the files are gone. 9000 images of my kids. Please help!

[Victoria Bampton LR Queen]

Inka, Rikk's traveling at the moment, but I can answer instead. The update aims to prevent it happening in future. You'll need to restore the images from your backups.

[Rikk Flohr: Photography]

Correct, the update is designed for prevention - not recovery.  (And I am back...)

[FeedbackCommunityMember]

I am using the current version of Lightroom. Today I moved a file from my laptop hard drive to my external hard drive. LR gave me an error message stating that it could not move one of the file. An entire folder of images (260) is now gone. It is not on either hard drive. This is the second time this has happened. This issue is still not fixed! How do I let Adobe know this is still a problem? 

[Todd Shaner]

You may have had all of the files in that folder selected and when you did the move. Search your hard drive(s) for one of the file names you moved. They may be there, but in a different location than where you intended to move them. Can you remember any of the file names? Is the one file that could not be moved still showing inside LR?

[FeedbackCommunityMember]

Please help!

Couple of days ago I used Lightroom 5.7.1 on my Laptop with Windows 10 and tried to move a folder "2017" (containing over 9300 raw files) from computer's hard drive to the external hard drive. The Lightroom moved 19 pictures only and the rest of the files and the folder itself disappeared entirely from my hard drive and only those 19 files could be found on the external hard drive. The move process took only a minute so it looks like it did not transfer the rest of the files. Please help as it was my entire year of work and family pictures! Thank you!