P: No photos in selected folder (Mac)

[julief57036690]

I have over 60,000 images on an external hard drive.  Today when I opened Lightroom and tried to navigate to a recent image using the Navigator Panel, the folders and subfolders are all showing the numbers of photos inside the folder, but when I click on a subfolder it says "No photos in the selected Folder".  When I check the Finder they are there.  If I go to the highest level of parent folder on that external drive all 60,000 images are showing at that level and I can scroll through them.  But when I drill down to any lower level that the very highest, they are not there.  I have not done any moving of files or folders in the last several months and up until today everything was working fine.  I have not installed any new plugins or done anything out of the ordinary with Lightroom recently.  Any idea why this is happening and more importantly how I can fix it?  I've included a couple of screenshots to show what I'm talking about.

[Sean McCormack]

Are there any filters on? 

[John R Ellis]

To build on Sean's reply, double-check that filters are disabled by verifying that the menu item Library > Enable Filters is unchecked.

If that doesn't help, try this:

1. Do Catalog Settings > General > Show to open Finder on your catalog folder.

2. Exit LR.

3. In the catalog folder, delete "<catalog> Helper.lrdata".  LR caches information about folders in that file, and it infrequently gets corrupted.

4. Restart LR. It will rebuild the "<catalog> Helper.lrdata" file, and it might take up to a minute for it to repopulate the Folders panel.

[julief57036690]

No filters on.

[julief57036690]

I tried all your suggestions and none resolved the issue.

[John R Ellis]

Try resetting LR's preferences:
https://www.lightroomqueen.com/articles-page/how-do-i-reset-lightrooms-preferences/

LR sometimes soils its preferences file, and resetting it can fix all sorts of wonky behavior. That article explains how to restore the old preferences if resetting doesn't help.

If resetting doesn't help, please do these next steps:

1. Post a full-resolution screenshot of the *entire* LR window showing one of the problem folders selected -- that might give clues.

2. Do the LR menu command Help > System Info and copy/paste the entire contents here so we can see exactly which versions of hardware and software LR thinks you're running.

[julief57036690]

I tried resetting the preferences and that did not work.  I've attached 2 screenshots as suggested.

[julief57036690]

I also tried using a backup catalogue in case the catalogue was corrupted, but still no luck.

[JohanElzenga]

I am not sure if that is related, but Lightroom should not show you disks as folders. To correct this, right-click on the '\' folder and choose 'Hide This Parent'. Then do the same for the 'Volumes' folder. You may have to restart Lightroom after that. Now Lightroom should show you the external disk as a separate device, and perhaps that also solves the problem of not seeing the images.

[julief57036690]

I do think you're on to something here, but when I right click and select "Hide this Parent" nothing happens.  That "\" folder didn't exist before and I have no idea where it came from.  The external hard drive displays as a separate device but only has the files I imported yesterday in it.  The files are all still sitting on the hard drive but Lightroom makes it look like they are elsewhere.

[JohanElzenga]

Try again, it should work. https://helpx.adobe.com/lightroom-classic/kb/volumes-drives-display-folders-lightoom.html If Lightroom shows disks as folders, then MacOS might prevent it from showing the images in such 'folders' because Lightroom has no permissions to access root folders.

[julief57036690]

I've tried it a few times, but nothing happens.  

[JohanElzenga]

I've tried it a few times, but nothing happens.  

By @julief57036690

That sounds like catalog corruption, I'm afraid.

[John R Ellis]

"That sounds like catalog corruption"

A couple next steps:

1. Do File > Optimize Catalog.  I think that rarely fixes catalog inconsistencies, but it's quick and won't hurt.

2.  Go to the catalog folder and zip up just the <catalog>.lrcat file.  Upload it to Dropbox, Google Drive, or similar and send me the sharing link in a private message (click my name at the top of this post, then click Send A Message).  If the issue occurs in my LR, that indicates catalog corruption; but if it doesn't occur, then we can look elsewhere.

[John R Ellis]

And something to try first:  Make sure LR has been granted Full Disk Access permission (not Files And Folders):

https://community.adobe.com/t5/lightroom-classic-discussions/quick-tips-how-to-give-full-disk-access...

LR has gotten better about detecting and warning users about that, but there have been a couple recent reports that it was still necessary for particular users.

[mvaeth]

Seit 12.2 werden neu importierte Ordner zwar korrekt gelistet mit der Anzahl entahltener Bilder, aber beim Anwählen des entsprechenden Ordners erscheint die Meldung "keine Fotos in Ordner". Auch der Ordner "Vorheriger Import" enthält zwar die korreke Anzahl importierter Fotos, aber beim Anklicken des Ordners kommt kurz die Meldung "Bilder werden geladen", danach bleibt nur ein leeres Anzeigefenster.

[John R Ellis]

Someone else reported similar symptoms yesterday on Mac OS:

https://community.adobe.com/t5/lightroom-classic-discussions/folder-function-not-working-in-navigato...

They already went through initial troubleshooting steps, so this may be a bug in LR 12.2. 

Try rolling back to LR 12.0.1:

https://www.lightroomqueen.com/roll-back-update-previous/ 

Does the problem still occur?  If not, then that points to a LR bug for which we can make Adobe aware.

[John R Ellis]

Moderators, @Rikk Flohr: Photography, please merge with this previous thread describing very similar symptoms:

https://community.adobe.com/t5/lightroom-classic-discussions/folder-function-not-working-in-navigato...

[julief57036690]

That fixed it!  I rolled back to 12.1 and the probem is gone.  So it must be a bug with 12,2 and the Mac OS.  I'm running Ventura 13.2.1 so must be a conflict between the two.

[John R Ellis]

@julief57036690, if you get a chance, please send me a private link to your zipped .lrcat file, as described above.  This issue is clearly not affecting most people (since there would be a flood of posts here about it), so to get Adobe to act on this, the first step is to reproduce the problem on another computer and then file a bug report.

[JohanElzenga]

I have to agree with @John R Ellis . This can't be a simple bug that affects Lightroom Classic 12.2 running in MacOS Ventura 13.23.1, because then everybody running this combination (and that includes me) should have the same problem. Clearly most people (and that includes me too) don't. That means that something else must also play a part.

[julief57036690]

I'm trying to figure out how to send that to you but it appears I can only send images or videos.  I'll keep trying to figure that out.

[Sean McCormack]

Use a service like Dropbox or Google Drive. 

[julief57036690]

I have sent you a private message with a link.

[mvaeth]

Alle Roll-Backs bis 12.0 durchgeführt, aber keine Änderung. Das Problem tauchte aber erst nach dem update von 12.1 auf 12.2 auf. Sieht für mich so aus, als ob der beim Update auf 12.2 angepasste Katalog defekt ist und nun natürlich auch in den Vorgängerversionen nicht funktioniert.
Habe einen Neu-Import versucht, dies geht auch nicht.

[Sean McCormack]

There was no catalog update in the dot version update, only the .0 release.