P: Ability to sync Lightroom Classic keywords with the Lightroom Ecosystem

[FeedbackCommunityMember]

Keywords do not sync correctly: When added on the mobile app (iOS), they do not appear in LR classic and not in LR Web (I deleted the new LR CC immediately, this version does not make sense to me).
Same problem into the other direction: Keywords from LR classic do not appear on the mobile app. 
Attention: At this stage the whole keywording within the iOS app should not be used!

[ethani48380925]

The closest I've seen is Mylio.  But, in order to get your metadata to sync over, it requires you to save it to the file.  https://support.mylio.com/from-lightroom/

[Califdan2]

the Adobe response is just a "we don't want to expend resources on this as we don't think it will make us any money, so just tell people that it can't be done due to different structures" response. 

 I have written the logic of how it could be done which is in this thread someplace.  Also, it seems it's not a problem for them with the first sync, but that was probably just an accident where the keywords happened to be in the Smart Preview at the time.  

[FeedbackCommunityMember]

When is going to be this possible? I think it would be very usefull for everyone

[shawnb71499088]

This decision by Adobe is baffling. I tried the keyword feature on CC and it was a nightmare. I can't see the AI keywords? I can't search even my own keywords if I don't have an internet connection? I get that there are two audiences - "classic" vs "mobile". But why wouldn't "classic" users want cloud capability? I've read many people say "because Adobe wants more money; driving everyone to CC because it's cloud based". But they're already getting my money! They won't get more by getting me to switch to CC. I pay monthly for classic. I'm willing to pay more monthly for cloud storage. But instead they are trying for artificially tie "cloud" with "dumbed down mobile". There is surely an audience for that, but they are killing the rest of us. I was literally about to pay for 1Tb of cloud storage with them (more money for them!), but now that I fully understand their keyword "strategy", I'm not. It's really unclear is this choice is creating more revenue for them. Sigh. Off to look for alternatives...

[Califdan2]

Ever feel like you are whistling in the wind? 

This thread, if anything, should indicate to Adobe that this is a problem that deserves some sort of a response other than the "it can't be done" ones they've provided so far and to which several people (including myself) have offered viable ways to do it.  These range from 'add hierarchical KW's to Cloud based system" to a way to assure a non conflict sync between the hierarchical Classic and the flat CC worlds. 

But all we hear from Adobe is silence, and the less we hear the higher our blood pressure goes, the higher our frustration level rises, and the angrier we get.   

I don't know how long a problem thread like this needs to get or how many "Likes" on a thread it takes to get this off the dime, but apparently we're not there yet.  At some point, some high level person at Adobe made a strategic decision that prevents the keyword sycing from seeing the light of day.  I don't know what that decision was.  Maybe it is that LR Cloud based is intended to replace Classic at some point.  Maybe it is that LR Cloud was always intended to be a "Lightroom Light" or "dumbed down" sort of application aimed at a different audience than Classic.  It is hard to know.  However it is not hard to observe that so far Adobe apparently has not seen fit to re-evaluate that strategy.  

When I was a manager in computer application development we had a word for this.  We called it "Married to an idea".  It happens when someone (usually a high level person) sells an idea which sounds good at the time and in one way or another bets their credibility (or perhaps their career with that company) on that idea.  Then when it turns out that  things unfold differently than originally anticipated they won't let go of that original idea and just cling to it like gold even though it is now no longer a wise strategy.  They just don't want to "look bad" or "lose face" so they just keep going and ignoring all evidence that what had been a good idea at one time is now the opposite.  Can I prove any of this?  No.  Have I seen it dozens of times?  Yes.  Does the evidence fit this scenario?  Yes. 
Am I optimistic that this will change?  No.  Am I hopeful that it will change?  Yes.

OK,  I'll climb down off my soap box now and go back to my corner.. 

[chrisb123456]

I hear you on the silence and blood pressure. I'm starting to get deja vu. All the Aperture users were dying to hear from Apple and what the future of their favourite software would be. I held out till the end having countless hours invested in my data. Eventually they released the upgrade path: Photos - a dumbed down consumer cloud program. I felt duped - a dummy for not choosing Lightroom in the first place. So I migrated to Lightroom and became an avid fan but still bitter from loosing all my edits and data unique to Aperture. Here I am again hanging on to older software waiting to hear about it's future and dissatisfied with the path presented. What's frustrating is it's so close - all I'm asking for is data parity and I'll migrate! Failing that I'll continue to use Classic and beg for better syncing with the cloud ecosystem.

Don't get me wrong Adobe doesn't appear to be abandoning it pro users to the degree Apple did but I still feel hopeless.

[andrewg72989545]

This issue is now three years old and still with users actively sharing their frustrations. It's a basic functionality that's keeping many of us from using CC. A small technical hurdle but clearly held up somewhere in management. Adobe, we need this. Let the programmers make it happen and we will all happily continue supporting your products. Meantime we are coming up with convoluted solutions of our own that cost us a ridiculous number of hours and force us to break out of your cloud.

[andrewg72989545]

Adding my voice to the chorus...

I spent at least 100 hours of my life transitioning my photo library from Aperture to Lightroom, confident that that was the right path forward.

I maintained all the metadata because I rely on it to easily find any image on mobile devices. The simplest (and should be most basic!) example is searching by keywords on my phone. My friends, family, coworkers, and clients have always appreciated my ability to almost instantly pull up any photo in the middle of casual conversation. That's a very valuable tool and something countless of us have spent untold hours making possible.

Ironically, my workflow now involves exporting finished photos *from* Lightroom *to* Apple Photos, because Apple's Photos app handles searching by the keywords quite well. This is crazy and should not be so difficult! It's a feature even most casual users would enjoy.

So I feel your pain but hopefully it's not hopelessness forever... if Adobe were to implement some basic functionality with their cloud service, there would be no further conversation about it.

Just sync the damn keywords and it will bring joy to everyone who gets to see the fruits of our labor!

[Patrice Morel]

I can't believe Adobe did not think about that. This is very annoying. Lightroom CC is very useful, but without keyword synchronization, and without colors added to the photos, it's a nightmare when I am looking for a photo from my phone, when I don't have access to Lightroom classic.

[FeedbackCommunityMember]

Just adding my voice to the chorus of complaints. The lack of keyword sync is closing in on deal-breaker status for me. I guess Adobe is feeling confident LR is still the best right now, but ignoring straight-forward feature requests from a crowd of paying customers seems like a bad business plan to me.

I just can't comprehend why they wouldn't implement the sync, I can't imagine what other features it would conflict with.

[toddf58817227]

I for one am starting to look into other photo management software such as Capture One.  I believe that if enough of us starting to consider alternatives and started migrating our images over, then would Adobe start to listen.  Currently they do not feel there is any incentive to do so nor really care to.  This is evident in the manner in which they are silent on the topic and all the responses we are seeing are from other disgruntled users.  Food For Thought.

[Charlyw64]

That doesn't help you much because on all of the alternatives you lose the very functionality completely that you want Adobe to improve (it is there to begin with)... The DAM functionality in all alternatives is miles behind Adobe - thus therein lies the problem, until a serious competitor with cloud integration shows up there is no immediate incentive to improve.

[shawnb71499088]

Just pulled the trigger - Adobe is no longer getting my monthly subscription. That lack of $9.99 monthly revenue will surely bring them to their knees! Sigh, well, I can dream. Anyway, I've moved on to ON1 RAW with the 360 cloud service. The desktop software is quite nice (I'm not missing anything from Lightroom yet), but the mobile software (which JUST launched) I'll charitably call "a work in progress". You can see all of your synced photos which sync with a smaller, compressed version. The smaller files plus a minimum storage of 200Gb means I was able to comfortably sync all my photos. But that's the end of the good news for the mobile app - you can't add tags (!) and the albums (ON1's version of collections) can't be nested (as they can in the desktop software). The GOOD news as the company is clearly very active in rolling out improvements. I decided to give them my money to continue encouraging those improvements since Adobe clearly has no intention of doing so.

[Antoine HLMN]

That is, sadly, exactly what needs to happen. I’ll probably to the same when my subscription comes to an end. I’m afraid it won’t change a thing as the market of smartphone users is probably still growing, but still.
Thanks for the feedback, I’m sure many people are interested in switching experiences.
Cheers!

[Califdan2]

Keep us posted as On1 moves ahead. 

However, if your purpose of moving to On1 was that keywords don't sync between Adobe's desktop and cloud apps, and On1 doesn't allow you to add tags (which I assume are keywords) at all, I'm not sure what you've gained?

[shawnb71499088]

You are 100% correct. The lack of keywords means nothing has been solved for me. Yet. The mobile app is literally a couple of weeks old. What I’m banking on is future improvements. I could hope for the same from Lightroom, but they’ve had plenty of time to do that and have made their intentions pretty clear - no sort of merger between Classic and Cloud. Also, just to be clear, ON 360 supports tags and everything else. If you’re using two computers to look at synced files the experience is identical on both computers. It’s just the mobile app that can’t see or edit tags. I’m really hoping (and expecting) that will change in the coming months. 

(And, yes, they're actually called "keywords" in ON1. I guess I interchange those terms without noticing.)

[Guest]

Why not allready giving the possibility to sync keywords between lightroom classic an lightroom mobile in a flat way?

[Lewis Craik]

Because they do not seem to care about Lightroom CC users...

[Antoine HLMN]

Because « syncing strings is a technical difficulty », then « no further sync development will occur on classic ».

Now you know how Adobe treats you and thanks you for your money! Come again!

[Lumigraphics]

I've stayed out of this because I have zero use for the online ecosystem.

However, its disingenuous to claim that hierarchical keywords cannot be maintained by Lightroom CC et al.

Keywords are plain text and are written into the file as "parent" + separator + "child." In other words, "Bird|Sparrow" would be a hierarchical keyword in the file.

ALL of the interpretation is done on the client side. So the photo viewing app reads the metadata and determines that "|" is a separator.

The easiest route would be preserve the hierarchy as it is written in the file and let each app interpret it. Lightroom CC uses a flat structure where "Bird|Sparrow" is the keyword and either ignores "Bird" or shows it. Lightroom Classic interprets it as hierarchical.

Adobe already deals with this problem in Bridge, which can use either flat or hierarchical keywords.

https://helpx.adobe.com/bridge/kb/nested-hierarchal-keywording-bridge.html

[Antoine HLMN]

This, again, proves it’s not a technical decision but rather one to piss off customers.

[Arcterex]

@lumigraphics I do agree with you (and @antoine_hlmn) it's just them not doing it, but I do suspect that the keywords in online and CC aren't done the same as with CC or other apps that use whatever the keywording standard is.

I'd guess that the keywords are stored separately from the images as part of the image library in some other format that's possibly more appropriate for an "online only" world as well as dynamic keywords. 

That said, regardless of if they're stored "normally" or not, there's no reason (other than not wanting to put the effort into it) they can't add keyword syncing as part of the CC <-> Classic sync.

One thing though - to do this they'd have to change the keywording in CC and mobile to match the heirarchy set up and features in classic.  In CC you have a flat list of keywords, plus whatever hidden keywords that are used for their AI searching (possibly - no idea how they do that part of it).  In Classic you have keywords that contain other keywords as synonyms, a keyword hierarchy, keywords that are "people" keywords or not, keywords from the hierarchy that export with the image or not, etc.

To match this up you'd have to duplicate that entire set up and functionality inside CC and LR Mobile and web.  Not impossible of course, but a fair chunk of work, and my guess is that it would also go against the "simplicity" that they seem to want for the CC ecosystem, which could be a reason they're choosing not to do it.

An alternative would be to do some sort of mangling of the keywords (flatten the entire hierarchy when going from Classic -> CC, and then sync the flattened keywords back to Classic) and as someone with some fairly in depth keywords, I sure as hell don't want that.

Another alternative would be to display all the keywords as just a list when it syncs to CC (ie: go from people -> clients -> weddings -> Bob Jones, Events -> Wedding, Places -> Weddings -> Blah Golf Course which would just turn into "Bob Jones, Wedding, Blah Golf Course"), and then I guess any additional keywords get added back as a root keywords (so you tag "Mary Jones" and that goes into just a single keywords in Classic).  But what if you delete "Bob Jones".  When it syncs back to Classic would people -> clients -> weddings stay or would / should it remove the entire hierarchy because you removed the "end" keyword?

I'm not saying it's impossible, just that there are a lot of edge cases which could turn into doing a ton of changes in the CC version.  Oh, and don't forget that since CC, Mobile and Web are pretty much the same, all the theoretical new keywording hierarchy and synonyms and person vs not person (and the person tagging would probably mean you'd need to implement face tagging and recognition in CC as well) and export or not would have to show up in web and ios and ipad os.

I want to see it as much as anyone else, but I think it's more complicated than "it's not a technical decision but rather one to piss off customers".

[brians69296344]

I use Lightroom Mobile and Classic. I would love to be able to save time by keyword tagging photos in Mobile. To do that effectively I would like to have access to my Classic keyword list within Mobile. Also, since Adobe Stock has a 50 keyword limit, with the first 10 keywords having greater importance, it would be nice to be able to organize my keywords in both Mobile and Classic to accommodate that limit.

[FeedbackCommunityMember]

PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE bring back keyword syncing between Lightroom Classic and Lightroom.

[Victoria Bampton LR Queen]

Just for clarity's sake, keyword syncing between Classic and the cloud has never been available. 

I'll merge this thread into the existing feature request, you may want to go vote on that thread.