Photos from portion of recent import now saying "missing or on an offline volume"

[jmorg65]

I am using LrC 12.0.1 and have been using LrC for several years and never encountered this issue. I imported a few hundred photos from a recent shoot using my R5 with 15-35mm lens. Because of several persistent sync problems with LR mobile, I chose to rebuild the sync data using Preferences > Lightroom Sync > OPT + Rebuild Sync Data. This seems to have fixed the sync errors, but syncing still seems very flaky on v12 overall. Nevertheless, I then discovered that a portion of the photos I had imported this past weekend could not be "deleted". When I went to delete a file, I received the attached popup window that indicated the file is either missing or on a volume that is offline. Not sure what that means or why. Never received that message in the roughly 4 years I've used LrC. I did not do anything with these files that was different than any other photos. I have tried rebooting the computer which does not correct the issue. I also note that in the Develop tab, under History, these files all say only "Imported from LR Mobile" whereas all the other files I imported (ALL the files were imported directly to LrC from a memory card reader) say "Imported" and the date. Almost like something got confused when I rebuilt the sync data. Anyone know why I'm getting this message and how to fix the issue?

[Theresa J]

The sync issues you encountered are most likely unrelated to the delete issue. If they persist it would be a good idea to create a new post.

When you import to Lightroom Classic from a memory card, where are the photos being copied to? By default LrC copies the images to the user's Pictures folder. Many LrC users change this location to an external hard drive. What is your workflow? Take a screen capture of your Folders panel showing the location of the newest imported photos.

[JohanElzenga]

Select one of those photos and choose 'Photo - Go to Folder in Library'. Lightroom will show you where (in what folder) this image is supposed to be. That should give you a clue why Lightroom says that folder is offline right now.

[jmorg65]

Just figured out the problem. There were actually more photos scattered around in my desktop LrC catalog that had this same issue. Using Johan's comment, I selected to find them in LR which it could not. Then I selected to show in finder and it said the files were missing. As I reviewed them further, I realized they were photos I deleted on LR mobile. But, it appears the mobile app didn't actually remove them from the library. They disappeared from mobile, but the previews were still in LrC desktop. Not sure why it wouldn't work to make all that disappear given the major warning on LR Mobile of "are you sure you want to do this" and "it will delete them from all collections and the library" etc. So, the lesson for me is that I should not use the mobile app if I want to reliably delete photos from my library, only the desktop. That's a shame. The mobile version did seem to migrate back changes to ratings I'd made to photos. That was the tip off at some point for me, was seeing that several that were missing were 1 star photos and I remembered deleting a bunch on the mobile app for the first time. So, at least for me, LR Mobile does not reliably remove all occurrences of a file from LrC more broadly, only from the mobile version.

[Theresa J]

Before you start deleting images, confirm that the sync is complete. If you follow this workflow, you won't have a problem with Lr mobile images in your LrC catalog.

[jmorg65]

Not sure how long to wait. The only thing I did with LR mobile was view and then delete a few of the photos. I see from another post that deleting in LR mobile doesn't actually remove them from the library. The big warning screen that pops up when you delete from LR mobile doesn't suggest something trial like "unsyncing" but rather that things will, indeed, be deleted from the library. Since LR mobile uses the word "Delete" and the only other time "Delete" happen in LrC is when you are actually fully removing a file from the library, this is also silly and confusing. If it's only going to "unsync" then the button should be "unsync", not "delete". Using the same word to refer to two different actions will cause confusion to all non-expert users. That's part of the problem with the Adobe system in general is that it makes sense to those who are experts but rarely to those who are not.

While your guidance may be accurate to avoid sync issues, it seems very antiquated for 2022 that the app cannot sync and keep track of actions in the background that get queud to sync afterward. Shouldn't be that hard. User should not have to work to that degree to manage the software. The software should work the way the user does, not the other way around.

[Theresa J]

I completely agree with you. The Lightroom ecosystem is confusing and not very user-friendly. It's awesome when you understand how it all works, but it takes a while to get there.

[Jim Wilde]

You need to understand that if you delete images from any of the Lightroom apps, they are indeed deleted from the cloud and all other Lightroom apps, but they are NOT deleted from LrC. Instead they are simply "unsynced" in LrC (and would be removed from any synced collection that they were in).

The best process to follow if you want to delete images from your LrMobile app, and have them deleted from LrC as well, is to simply use the "Reject" flag in LrMobile. That flag will sync to LrC where you can then filter to see the rejected photos and then delete them from the LrC catalog. Doing that deletion from LrC will also delete them from the cloud.

[Theresa J]

Deleting images from Lightroom apps does not delete them from LrC if they have been completely downloaded. I suspect the missing images the OP encountered were mobile images that were deleted from the cloud before they completed the LrC sync process to a local hard drive.

[jmorg65]

Jim, Thanks for the suggested work around using the "Reject" flag. In light of the inability to actually Delete the item from the library using a mobile version of LR, that seems like a helpful and straightforward method for identifying items to delete. Much appreciated!

The term that LrC uses for adding or removing something to the cloud is "sync". Using the word "Delete" to effectively unsync in some settings (Lightroom, Lightroom Mobile) while retaining it in the library, but then using the same word "Delete" to actually remove the item from the catalog permanently (Lightroom Clasic) is confusing. I understand it now, but it makes no real sense, is counterintuitive, and will confuse the vast majority of users until they learn (perhaps painfully) through trial and error.

Using the same term within an ecosystem of apps to result in vastly different outcomes (ie; one instance removes an item from cloud sync, another instance removes the item entirely so that it can no longer be accessed) is somethign that should be corrected. On Lightroom and Lightroom Mobile, the term should be "Unsync" rather than "Delete" or the term "Delete" should be changed to something else ("Permanently Remove from Library" or similar) in Lightroom Classic to reduce confusion.

[Jim Wilde]

The term that LrC uses for adding or removing something to the cloud is "sync". Using the word "Delete" to effectively unsync in some settings (Lightroom, Lightroom Mobile) while retaining it in the library, but then using the same word "Delete" to actually remove the item from the catalog permanently (Lightroom Clasic) is confusing. I understand it now, but it makes no real sense, is counterintuitive, and will confuse the vast majority of users until they learn (perhaps painfully) through trial and error.

Using the same term within an ecosystem of apps to result in vastly different outcomes (ie; one instance removes an item from cloud sync, another instance removes the item entirely so that it can no longer be accessed) is somethign that should be corrected. On Lightroom and Lightroom Mobile, the term should be "Unsync" rather than "Delete" or the term "Delete" should be changed to something else ("Permanently Remove from Library" or similar) in Lightroom Classic to reduce confusion.

By @jmorg65

The confusion only arises because you are trying to use both LrClassic and the Lightroom ecosystem to manage the same set of images, and you are thinking of the cloud-based images and the Classic-based images as "one library" (they're not, they are two separate libraries tenuously linked by the syncing system). Using both in this way is actually contrary to Adobe's recommendation to use one or the other. So if you take LrC out of the equation, the messaging you receive from LrMobile is perfectly correct, "delete" means delete from the cloud and all the other Lightroom apps.....that's how the ecosystem is designed and I doubt very much that those messages will be changed. We complicate matters, however, when we insist on also using LrC as well to manage the same set of images. Because LrC really isn't a full member of the ecosystem, conflicts of ownership will occur as both LrC and Lightroom think they are the boss, and the messaging could then be confusing.

If you are going to go against the Adobe recommendation (lots of users do, including myself), my advice to you is you learn how syncing between Classic and the cloud works, so that you save yourself some grief further down the road. There are plenty of discussions and blog posts online about how syncing works in this shared environment, it shouldn't be too difficult to find them.