P: Syncing no longer possible - sync icons do not appear

[The Keeper of the Garden]

Syncing Collections is no longer possible in LrC 13.0.1. on macOS Sonoma 14.1.1.

1. Syn is on (in LrC and in Adobe Creative Cloud app on desktop).
2. No error messages anywhere (not in LrC, not on Lightroom on the Web, not in Adobe Creative Cloud app on desktop).
3. Collections cannot sync because "Sync with Lightroom" command (on right-click) is not present/available/visible.
   
   
   

[Rikk Flohr: Photography]

I've granted access

[TDC3000]

Hi Rikk - 

I was finally able to experience the failure with config.lua placed in ~/Library/Application Support/Adobe/Lightroom/, however when I went to look in  ~Documents/Adobe after that, there's no Lightroom folder that has been created, just some other folders :

Lumetri

Photoshop Cloud Associates

Premiere Rush

dynamiclinkmediaserver

amecommand

I don't think this is what you're looking for, what do you advise at this point?

[Rikk Flohr: Photography]

Let's check to make sure your config.lua is in the right place.
At the bottom of Help>System info… do you see this line:
"Config.lua flags: None"

[TDC3000]

I see this:

Config.lua flags:
loggers.LrWF*.logLevel = debug
loggers.LrWF*.action = logfile
loggers.AgWF*.logLevel = debug
loggers.AgWF*.action = logfile
loggers.LrCatalog*.logLevel = debug
loggers.LrCatalog*.action = logfile
loggers.WFSyncAgent.logLevel = warn
loggers.WFSyncAgent.action = logfile
loggers.WF*.logLevel = debug
loggers.WF*.action = logfile
loggers.WFDocStore.logLevel = error
loggers.WFDocStore.action = logfile
loggers.WFRequestDispatcher.logLevel = warn
loggers.WFRequestDispatcher.action = logfile
loggers.WFRxHttpClient.logLevel = error
loggers.WFRxHttpClient.action = logfile
loggers.WFOzSyncPeer.logLevel = error
loggers.WFOzSyncPeer.action = logfile
loggers.WFOAuth2Session.logLevel = error

[Rikk Flohr: Photography]

That looks right. 

If no logs appear, let's try a hard restart (Power Off-Power on) for the device and see if the logs populate.

[TDC3000]

Done. Restarted. Opened Lightroom Classic, the error occurred, turned sync on and off to bring it back. Still no "Lightroom" folder in ~/Documents/Adobe

Let me know any next steps.

[Rikk Flohr: Photography]

Can you give me a screen shot of your Documents folder?

[Rikk Flohr: Photography]

@TDC3000  Thanks. I am asking the team for advice on the missing logs. 

[TDC3000]

No worries. Hopefully others are also logging!

[Rikk Flohr: Photography]

I've received one so far. The team is reviewing it.

[The Keeper of the Garden]

I really don't know why I still bother about this - perhaps only to help others who still want to use LrC. Anyway, why the endless series of tests, creating logs, and sending them in both directions if the team of engineers working on this should, in order to find the source of the problem, simply concentrate on the question, which I have mentioned before: What element of the LrC application or operating system, what file, or what piece of source code makes the difference between starting up LrC with the default catalog file opening automatically versus double-clicking on the catalog file and thus making LrC start up automatically!  In the first case, the problem arises. In the second it does not. Finding the element that makes the difference between those two cases means finding the source of the problem. 

[Rikk Flohr: Photography]

Can you add the following line to your config.lua file and try again @TDC3000 ?

Features.forceSyncInit = true

[TDC3000]

Done. Opened and ran Lightroom Classic for a few hours and no Lightroom folder is created inside ~/Documents/Adobe

Let me know if I should try something else; I don't want to hold anyone up on figuring this out if there are other people who have been able to deliver logs to you, if my system for some reason can't generate what you're looking for.

[Rikk Flohr: Photography]

@TDC3000  Thanks for the attempt. I've asked the engineering team to advise on the lack of logs appearing. Stand by please. 

[fijnheid]

What would the path be for a Windows pc?

[Rikk Flohr: Photography]

Workaround to attempt:

Our engineers have reported back and asked, if possible, for you to attempt the following workaround:

1.  Install Lightroom Desktop from the CCD App (if not installed)
2.  Launch the Lightroom Desktop Application
3.  Allow it to sync a few images
4.  Launch Lightroom Classic 

Is the sync behaving normally now? 

[Gord Webster]

(I had previously installed Lightroom Desktop.)
With Lightroom Desktop running and after some synching, I started Lightroom Classic. The sync icons were correctly shown in the Collections panel! 🙂
However, when I closed both LrD and LrC and re-opened only LrC, the sync icons were not showing in the Collections panel. 😞

Just thinking... Does this have something to do with me having a few of my images rotate through on the Splash Screen?

[Rikk Flohr: Photography]

Thanks for checking. I've relayed that to the team.

[fijnheid]

I've had this issue happen to me a bunch of times. Each time, closing and restarting Lightroom has 'fixed' the issue for me. I had assumed it to be some kind of loading issue.

After finding this thread I've been trying to repro the issue, but to no avail. Starting up lightroom after rebooting, switching between two catalogs (one of which is set to not sync) and restarting lightroom a number of times have not caused the issue for me.

I'll keep my eyes open though. If I ever encounter the issue again, I'll generate a diagnostics report from the sync activities tab. And if I find reliable repro steps I'll share them.

I've added the logging parameters to my lightroom. The only parameter I won't be using is the "force sync" parameter, because it was trying to turn on syncing for my other catalog (which has syncing disabled, and which should stay that way).

[fijnheid]

I just got the issue to happen to me. On my end, going to the right top and clicking "pause syncing" and then "start syncing" does NOT work in restoring the icons. Restarting the app would work.

I've gone into preferences and made a diagnostics report for the syncing. The diagnostics report is quite large though, at 240mb. @Rikk Flohr: Photography would you be interested in that? Unfortunately this is without the config.lua flags, as they seem to have got reset since I changed them (although I didn't do that).

[Rikk Flohr: Photography]

Without the Config.lua file running, it is of limited value - so I am going to say we don't need it for now. I will touch base next week with an update as to whether we need you to restore config.lua and run another set of logs. 

[DerekClarkPhoto]

This happens a lot with the sync icons dissapearing. I click Pause Syncing in the top right cloud icon and then click to un-pause it. That seams to work and the icons come back.

[The Keeper of the Garden]

No, no, no. It does not solve the problem, because once you restart LrC, the problem is back. Unsolved since early November 2023!

[micheloupatrick]

It stopped happening for a few weeks and then suddenly, without any obvious reason, it started happening again a few days ago.

Since restarting the app (or even pause / resume syncing) temporarily fixes the problem it's no big deal but it can be annoying.

And sorry but no time for helping debug this weird issue.