Develop Presets - Cannot Delete, Rename, Update, etc. Bizzare Behavior.

[TimKamppinen]

I'm pulling my hair out trying to figure out how to fix this issue. I just moved from PC to Mac (M1 Max Macbook Pro, MacOS 12.5, Lightroom Classic 11.5) and as part of that transition I had to copy my develop presets from the PC to the Mac. I saved the .xmp files to an SD card and manually copied them into the Library/Application Support/Adobe/CameraRaw/Settings folder on the MacBook. Everything showed up in the presets panel and the presets work as they should.

The problem that I just noticed today is that if I right click on a preset, the only options I get are Add to Favorites/Apply on Import/Export. Rename/Move/Update with Current Settings/Show in Finder/Delete are all missing. And yes, these are my own presets, not the LR default presets.

Without those options, managing presets and staying organized becomes very difficult. 

If I create a new preset and then right click on it, I see all the normal options.

I don't know if this is a result of manually copying the presets over versus using the "import" function on the preset panel, but in any case I have tried everything I can think of to fix this. I have gone in to the ACR/Settings folder and deleted all the presets, thinking I could get rid of them that way and then import them from scratch. That didn't work, they are still there when I open LR again. I have checked the "Imported Settings" folder and deleted everything in there as well, to no avail. I have uninstalled LR using the Creative Cloud app, and then reinstalled it. That didn't work, so I tried doing it again and this time I used some obscure Adobe "Creative Cloud Cleaner" tool to uninstall Camera Raw as well (you can't do that from the regualr CC app). Then I reinstalled LR and found that my presets were still there. I have tried switching back and forth between the "Store presets with catalog" setting. Nothing works. I have tried importing the .xmp files from various places including copying them back into the settings folder first. When I try to import them I get one of two error messages... one says "Unable to import presets - All items were already imported". Another says "Unable to import presets - The XMP metadata for the file contained no settings". This happens in all my catalogs including a new one that I created after resintalling LR twice.

Someone in this thread from 2019 seemed to have the same issue:https://community.adobe.com/t5/lightroom-classic-discussions/can-t-delete-my-presets/m-p/9871099

What in the world is going on here???

[JohanElzenga]

You may have a permissions problem with these presets, because they were copied from another computer. Select one in the Finder and type Cmd-i to get the info. Look at the permissions settings at the bottom. I'm typing this on my iPad so I can't post a screenshot and I don't know by heart what the permissions should look like, but you can easily check that by creating a new preset and compare this one with the imported ones.

[TimKamppinen]

Ok, I checked the permissions and they are set to "read and write" for all three levels  (myself, "staff", and "everyone"). I looked at a new preset that I created today and it was only "read and write" for me, and the other two were just "read". I tried changing the old preset to match (which didn't make sense, but I figured I might as well try) and it had no effect.

Of course even if that was the issue I still don't understand how the presets are still appearing even after deleting the files and reinstalling lightroom.

[JohanElzenga]

As you are relatively new on the Mac, I wonder if perhaps you installed your presets in the wrong place. There are two Library folders (or actually three, but the third one can't be the issue) on your Mac. There is Macintosh HD/Library/Application Support/Adobe/CameraRaw/Settings, which is always visible, but is not the one you should use for custom presets. It's where default presets are stored, so it would explain what you see. And then there is Macintosh HD/Users/YourUserName/Library/Application Support/Adobe/CameraRaw/Settings. That is the one that you should use for custom presets, but this user Library folder is hidden by default. Maybe you used the other folder because of it. This is how to unhide the user/Library folder: 

http://osxdaily.com/2016/12/12/show-user-library-folder-macos-sierra/

[TimKamppinen]

THANK YOU! I must have mistakenly copied all my presets into the default folder when I first got my Mac. At some point I learned about "unhiding" the user library and forgot about the original place where I put them. They were still there despite having uninstalled/reinstalled LR multiple times, so they kept showing up even after clearing out the "user" folder.  I deleted them and when I reopened LR (with the presets in the user folder) it was reading them from that location and all of the rename/move/delete/update options are showing for me.

Again, thanks for the help, I never would have figured that out.