How to use Lightroom with photos on NAS for both Windows and Mac?

[yodobe23]

I have Lightroom CC installed in Windows 10 and Mac. Each system has the identical catalog located locally. (It gets synced via Google drive and is only opened one at a time). The photos are stored on a NAS drive. In Windows it's referenced like:

//readyshare/path/to/photos

On Mac it's referenced like:

smb://readyshare/path/to/photos

The original usage is on Windows and now when I open the catalog on Mac the photos on the NAS drive show a question mark, saying unable to locate. Do I have to do locate files each time I switch from Windows to Mac and back or is there an easier way? Note that I am mapping to the network drive directly rather than via a drive letter so I thought it would be mapped identically in Mac and Windows.

[Abambo]

I suppose smb: is the problem. You're really adding a level of complexity by using an unsuported configuration and networking different OSes. Good luck with that!

[yodobe23]

Why is smb an unsupported configuration? That's how macs connect to network drives according to this page:

How to connect with File Sharing on your Mac - Apple Support

[Abambo]

It's not unsupported. It's different. 2 Windows machines or 2 Macs would be fine. Using a Google drive is unsupported.

[yodobe23]

Why do you think 'a Google drive' is unsupported? Do you know what 'a Google drive' is? In my initial post I wrote that the catalog is located locally, so it is irrelevant that the local folder is synced to a cloud service. If I stop syncing the local folder the same issue remains, which is about referencing a NAS drive using a Lightroom catalog using // UNC syntax. I thought that a UNC path is the same on Windows and Mac but maybe that's not the case.

[Abambo]

yodobe23  wrote

Why do you think 'a Google drive' is unsupported? Do you know what 'a Google drive' is? In my initial post I wrote that the catalog is located locally, so it is irrelevant that the local folder is synced to a cloud service.

The problem with this is: it works, but it is an unsupported option, because Lightroom can not assure that the synced data is current. Not more, not less. I know Dropbox, OneDrive, iCloud, Google Drive: They work all the same. Locally synced data to the cloud. It's not relevant how syncing is done.

But this is not your problem here. The problem here is, that the access path to your data is stored in the Lr database and the paths are different on your Mac and on your Windows computer. How do you think Lr could manage this? Lr is not aware that it runs on 2 different architectures accessing the same data.

yodobe23  wrote

which is about referencing a NAS drive using a Lightroom catalog using // UNC syntax. I thought that a UNC path is the same on Windows and Mac but maybe that's not the case.

Obviously, the difference is smb://ready... against //ready...! It's the same phenomena you get, when Windows decides that your HD drive is now called L: instead of K:. Lr does not find back the data.

Either you find a way to harmonize the access paths (symbolic links? Path substitution done by the OS) or you need a script that changes the access paths in the database, when you change the machine.

[johnrellis]

Do I have to do locate files each time I switch from Windows to Mac and back or is there an easier way?

I don't know what's tripping up LR here. But you can make the locate go much faster: Right-click one of the top-level folders in the Folder panel and select Show Parent Folder.   Keep doing that until you get to the root folder.   Right-click the root folder and do Find Missing Folder.

[yodobe23]

I did that and it seemed to work for the thumbnail photos being found. However, in the left panel there is a question mark next to each folder and although the parent folder has the correct count the child folders show a 0 count.

[moritzw]

looking for a solution to the same problem. did you find a good approach?
Symbolic links MIGHT be a solution, but probably still tricky to even get local paths to match 100%...

[Rikk Flohr: Photography]

See: https://community.adobe.com/t5/lightroom-classic-discussions/an-internal-error-has-occurred-invalid-...

You’ve posted to a very old thread. It is highly unlikely that the issue described in this thread, though not impossible, is the same issue which you are currently experiencing. Rather than resurrect an old thread that is seemingly similar, you are better posting to a new thread with fresh, complete information including system information, a complete description of the problem and step-by-step instructions for reproduction. 

In the unlikely event the issue is the same, we will merge you back into the appropriate location. 

Thank you!