Catalog on OneDrive accessed by 2 Mac devices

[Perwinnes]

Hi all

I'm hoping for some advice please.  My partner and I both use LRC and have our own catalogs, currently on our own devices (Macbook pro and Imac).  I have uploaded all of our photos to onedrive along with each of our catalogs.  Both machines sync to the onedrive.  My thinking is that either of us can then access our respective catalogs on either machine, if for example one of us is working away with the macbook and the other wants to use the desktop. 

The plan is working partially, all the photos from both machines are on the onedrive.  The catalogs were set up and initially seemd to work as anticipated, but the catalogs are no longer syncing properly.  If photos are added to catalog A on machine 1 (catalog and photos are on onedrive, not the HD), the update to the catalog doesn't appear when loading that same catalog on machine 2 later.

I seemed to have overlooked something, but can't figure out what it is.  Can anyone help?  All suggestions gratefully received.

Many thanks

Ian

[JP Hess]

Initially you indicate that the catalogs are on the individual computers, and then you indicate that they are on One Drive. Which is it? After you import new images, do you copy the catalog from your hard drive to One Drive? I don't use a workflow like that, so I don't understand it and don't know why/how/if it is supposed to or if it is intended to work.

[Perwinnes]

Hi Jim

Thanks for getting back to me and apologies for the confusion.

The catalogs were originally on each individual device.  We wanted to be able to access our photos on either device so I have now uploaded the photos and the catalogs to onedrive and we are using the onedrive versions.  

The catalogs are backed up when we exit LRC.  Presumably as the catalog is kept on onedrive, thats where they are backed up to?  The problem is that I load catalog A on machine 1 and upload photos / folders to it.  I then close down LR and when opening the same catalog on machine 2 - the catalog hasn't updated, even with ample time for onedrive to update (days!).

I appreciate it's not you way of working, but any insights welcome.

Thanks again

Ian

[Per Berntsen]

There have been several reports of problems with having the catalog on Onedrive, even from single users.

Dropbox is probably a better solution, I have used it successfully myself on two computers in different locations.

The important thing is to let Drobox finish syncing before opening Lightroom. (and before turning a computer off)

I stopped using this workflow over a year ago, so for all I know, there may have been changes to Dropbox since then that could make it more problematic to use.

You choose the location for the backup in the backup dialog.

The default location is the same folder as the catalog. You should change that to a different drive.

[Perwinnes]

Thanks Per, I'll check out dropbox as you suggest.

Cheers

Ian

[F. McLion]

I did a similar setup with a local Synology drive and can confirm that it works to work on 2 Macs - NOT concurrently - on the same/multiple catalog.

The week point would be OneDrive in your setup.

[Perwinnes]

Thanks, I have to agree with your thoughts on onedrive.

[Jao vdL]

I would strongly advice against doing this. Even if you get it working (and supposedly OneDrive doesn't work right for this purpose) the potential for catalog corruption is enormous if you are not exceedingly vigilant in making sure the catalog is only open on one machine and that you wait for the catalog to sync over (which can take a very long time as catalog files get big).

If you want to work concurrently on the same set of images, I recommend you use Adobe Bridge and open raw images that sit on a shared network drive or a location that is synced using dropbox or similar in camera Raw from Bridge. This gives you essentially the same interface as Lightroom Classic but will (mostly) prevent loss of info. Only time you might run into a problem is if you are both working on the same image. In that case the edits will be from the one who last exited out of the image in camera Raw. Also all that needs to be synced over in this case are the tiny xmp sidecar files. Bridge is not as full featured as Classic but it is far more suited to multiple people working. You should already have it in your subscription.

[Perwinnes]

Oh dear, onedrive sounded like the ideal solution ( in my mind!).  How do you think this would work - keep the catalogs on the machines (I realise that means no sharing across machines) but storing the photos on the onedrive?  Do you think that would work - the laptop doesn't have enough storage for all the photos, and the desk top is filling up.

Thanks for taking the time to get back to me,

Ian 

[Jao vdL]

You will be able to have the images available. Thinking about it, the best solution for you might be to just buy a portable SSD drive with a USB-c connector. They are tiny and super fast and surprisingly cheap nowadays from Sandisk, Samsung, etc. Format them in Mac format (APFS is what you want for SSD disks), and store the catalog and the images on it. You can just move that between computers. Do make sure to back it up regularly.

If you go the OneDrive route, your best bet is to NOT use Classic but to use Bridge. That way you will not have to deal with catalog corruption and will still be able to edit on both machines. Different workflow. The nice thing about bridge/cameraRaw is that the workflow is based on xmp sidecar files instead of a central catalog. This makes it possible to distribute more granularly and to not have gigabytes to sync over the internet after every small change. This is the main reason why OneDrive/Dropbox, etc. do not work well with Classic catalogs. The catalog is a massive file that gets synced every time a tiny change is made. When you work with Bridge/camera raw, it is just tiny xmp sidecar files that get synced or at the worst individual images (if you take an image into Photoshop for example).

Lastly, and I don't often recommend this (most people are much better of with Classic) but you might want to look into using Lightroom Desktop (yes badly named). This stores all your images in the cloud by default and manages local disk space (it needs temporary storage of the images you are working on). It allows you to concurrently edit your images on multiple computers and as many iOS/android devices as you want. It actually works outstandingly for this purpose. Do note that you will lose some features of Classic such as virtual copies, printing directly, slideshows, Books, Maps, etc. It is very similar to the Library and Develop modules merged in one. This might work well for you if you don't print yourself and if your images fit within about 1TB for the standard subscription from Adobe.

If you stay with Classic, think about the external SSD drive option. It is the most economical solution to your problem. They are so small you can even tape one to the back of a laptop screen with double sided tape and not really notice it is there but of course since you want to move between computers you might not want to do this.

[Perwinnes]

Many thanks once again.  I think the SSD solution will work best for us, seems that will be the best solution all round.  If only I'd thought of that I'd have saved myself a lot of hassle!

Take care

Ian

[F. McLion]

Waiting for it to finish syncing is key, yes. Since the lock file is synced as well, opening the catalog on more than one PC should not happen. At least that is how it worked - and still does - on a customers setup.

However, that was with a local Synology NAS and no cloud involved.