Lightroom Classic 11.x terminates on start under macOS 10.15.7

[alfa149]

Background:

On October 11th, LRC 11.5 failed on startup and has continued to fail ever since. It was working fine on October 10th.

I'm reporting this problem here because the chatbot was of no help and this was the only Adobe-recommended non-phone channel for reporting problems.

• LRC: 11.5
• MacOS 10.15.7
• MacBook Pro (Retina, 15-inch, Late 2013) -- 16 GB -- 500 GB (145 GB free)
• Bitdefender 9.2.0.12
• BlockBlock 2.1.4
• Little Snitch 4.6.1
• Locale: NZ

I have been using LRC for years. I was using it the night of 10th October, left it running overnight. Shut it down on the morning of the 11th. When I went to start it up again later that day it would not start -- the menu bar (I have turned off the splash screen) would briefly show then would disappear a second later. I tried various things to get it to work (including downgrading to LRC 11.4), all failed. There have been no recent MacOS updates, CC was being automatically updated.

Eventually, I used "AdobeCreativeCloudCleanerTool" to completely remove both LRC and CC from my computer. I then found all files in /Applications,  /Library and ~/Library which had "Adobe" or "adobe" in the file name and removed those files/directories. I then cleared all Adobe entries from the keychain. I.e.: I cleared out every Adobe-related resource that I could find on my computer.

I then did a completely clean install of the CC app. I then used that to install LRC 11.5. I then tried to run LRC and got the same failure to launch as previously (except that the splash screen appears). I then disabled all of the security apps -- Bitdefender, BlockBlock, Little Snitch -- and tried running LRC, with the same result.

Note: at this point, LRC is not trying to access any catalogues.

Reviewing the console logs, I can see that LRC is establishing network connections during the 1-2 second startup period, and then fails with "UNIX error exception: 17". I note that Little Snitch (when enabled) was showing successful connections to various Adobe-related domains -- see attached screenshot.

Request:

I'm pretty certain that there is not a fault locally with either LRC, or MacOS, as both were working less the 24 hours previously. I believe that the issue is to do with LRC "phoning home" for validation before completing its startup, but I don't have the knowledge to successfully diagnose that, or even have an idea as to what the specific problem could be.

So I'm reaching out to any Adobe support personnel who might be able to assist with getting LRC working again.

It's been 20 days since I was able to use LR -- I was holding off in the hope that a server configuration might be the cause and be rectified in the meantime; but apparently not. This has pretty much put a halt to my photography; while I am only a recreational photographer, I have been using LR since its beta days and am totally, totally reliant on it.

Attachments:

• Multiple extracts from the console showing system messages for "Lightroom Classic" during failed startup.
• Screenshot of Little Snitch monitor showing domains that LRC accesses on startup

[GoldingD]

Using Finder, locate the catalog. In the folder the catalog is in, does a lock file exist? (it should not if LrC was properly closed). Delete the lock file if it exists (careful). Double click on the catalog (.lrcat)

https://helpx.adobe.com/lightroom-classic/kb/lightroom-error-catalog-cannot-be-opened-lrcat-lock.htm...

Also, should that not be it, have you tried signing out of the Adobe Creative Cloud Desktop App, then signing back in?

[alfa149]

Thanks for the suggestion, but no dice. I checked that there were no ".lock" files. Anyway, LRC terminates before prompting for a catalogue.

One curious thing I am investigating is: Little Snitch can do network packet capture of nominated processes. I set it to capture LRC, started LRC, and checked the capture file when it terminated -- there were no network packets sent. I checked packet capture with another app (Trello) to confirm that Little Snitch packet capture was working; now I am going to investigate why LRC appears not to be doing network traffic, which is inconsistent with the diagnostic messages in the console. It might be that LRC uses a proxy for its, network traffic, I don't know at this point.

[alfa149]

More research:

• I quit the CC app (not just logged out, quit)
• In Little Snitch Network Monitor (LSNM), I deleted all entries that referenced Adobe
• I started up CC and logged back in
• I noted and "approved" all the new entries in LSNM that were associated with Adobe
• I started LRC via the CC app and waited for it to terminate
• I noted and "approved" the new LRC entry in LSNM
• I started packet capture on the LRC entry
• I started LRC via the CC app and waited for it to terminate
• I confirmed that some packets had been captured then stopped the capture
• I opened the capture file with Wireshark and confirmed a total of 38 packets had been exchanged with two remote IP's:
  • 192.147.130.166 (crlog-crcn.adobe.com)

  • 3.220.9.154 (ec2-3-220-9-154.compute-1.amazonaws.com)

• I reviewed the console log and confirmed the capture traffic was consistent with the console errors - LRC is failing due to a "phone-home" communications error during startup. The network connection is not being blocked, so the problem appears to be between LRC & the Adobe servers.

I've attached a copy of a packet capture from an LRC starup and the console messages for the same startup.

[alfa149]

Final thing: I attempted to start LRC again today. No updates to MacOS, no updates to LRC, and it started!!!!  

I was able to access and review catalogues and edit images. I now just need to reinstall all my plugins 💆🏻‍:male_sign:

I guess I will be renewing my licence after all.

[alfa149]

Of course that only lasted one day, then it all went back to failing. Which is interesting in itself because there were clearly no updates either to the OS or to LRC itself that could account for the change in behaviour.