P: All photos are synced & backed up but bottom right hand corner of the screen shot it says pending

[kenal69]

I have been using Lightroom since 2007. I have used the web-based version on both the Mac and PC when they were released and stopped using LR Classic a long time ago.

My work flow includes photo uploads using PC, Mac and iPad and all full resolution images are kept in Adobe Cloud. Despite all the irritations one has come to expect from Adobe, the Desk Top version has served me well and I have produced 11 photo books on the Blurb platform.

Two weeks ago I was working on my 12th book and Lightroom started to play up. Most photos I uploaded after 2018 seemed to have lost all the smart previews. 

I have included a screen shot from my M1 mac mini.

1. LR proclaims all photos are synced and backed up. In the bottom right hand corner of the screen shot it says "pending". I could not access thousands of photos and produced the same error message.

2. I could however access and edit all the same photos on the iPad or on the web version of LR.

3. Giving all disk access etc to LR as suggested somewhere didnt work.

4. My work-around was to reluctantly use LR Classic and I managed to finish the book. I say reluctantly because the folder and album structure I built for the book on LR desktop simply disappeared on LR classic and the albums were all over the place.

5. I tried the desktop version on the PC and gave similar results. Same error messages for the same photos.

6. This gave me an idea. I rolled back to the previous version, 5.4. Didnt help. Rolled back to version 5.3 and bingo I am in heaven! I can now access all my photos and edit on both Mac and PC.

7. Clearly there is a bug in both 5.4 and 5.5 that stops some photos from being displayed and edited. Adobe, please rectify this major bug that is bugging me. I want to be able to use the latest version of the software. Afterall that should be your undertaking for a subscription model?

8. LR classic pundits please note. This query is about Lightroom Desktop version 5.5 (web based). And not LIGHTROOM CLASSIC.  It is really annoying to see so many replies pointing to LR Classic when asked about Adobe Photoshop Lightroom (web based desktop version). I know it was Adobe who is responsible for all the confusion about terminology, but that is another topic.

[Jao vdL]

I have seen Lightroom Desktop sometimes corrupt its local library copy. If all your images are correctly uploaded in the cloud (you can see them all in the https://lightroom.adobe.com link and there are no sync issues noted in the web link) you can safely delete the entire library. It will be in your pictures folder in your user folder and called "Lightroom Library.lrlibrary". You can drag that in the trash and when youo after that start Lightroom again, it will recreate the library file and download files and previews correctly. Only do this if you are convinced that all images are in the cloud correctly.

[kenal69]

Thank you Jao vdL

I had seen the advice to delete Lightroom Library.lrlibrary and did this on both the M1 MacMini amd M1 MacbookPro. Uninstalled Lightroom, deleted all preferences files and reinstalled version 5.5. It rebuilt the library file but the same problem returned. I could see the images in library view but unable to edit. File missing, corrupted etc message appeared on thousands of images. 

So, I repeated the whole process and installed version 5.4. Same results and error messages. 

I had roll back all the way to version 5.3 and everything is working fine now on both machines. LR 5.4 and 5.5 definitely have some bugs. At least on my computers.

Yes, I did transfer the licence to a PC running Win 10 and the same results. Only version 5.3 worked on the PC without the error messages.

Thanks

[Jao vdL]

Very strange! I have no clue why it would be doing this

[kenal69]

Thank you Jao vdL

I am stumped. Versions 5.4 and 5.5 are the only versions that don't work on both M1 MacMini and M1 Macbook Pro. When I transferred the licence to a PC they failed on that platform too. I strongly believe there are inherent faults with these two versions, version 5.3 works on all three devices faultlessly.

I am annoyed that I am unable to use the newer features in version 5.5. There is no way to approach customer support at Adobe. That is even more annoying when one forks out money to them every month.

Does Adobe read these posts?

Is there any way to contact Adobe when there are issues?

Thanks for your time.

Ken

[Rikk Flohr: Photography]

Updating status - adding bug number

[Julie Kmoch]

Thank you for the report, and sorry to hear you're having trouble. Just last week we figured out an interaction between Lightroom desktop (the newer app) and Lightroom Classic that's causing this scary message to appear. As you've discovered, your photos are fine in our cloud but Lr desktop is failing to refresh the local copy after Classic adds metadata. Please do stick with 5.3 until we can get this fixed.

[Jao vdL]

I was going to say that there are adobe folks in here and it seems they have found the thread and have engaged so it seems this big will get addressed!

[kenal69]

Hi Julie

It was not the 'scary message' that was worrying me. I had full access to the original images via the web version, iPad and LR Classic. The biggest problem apart from the message was I am unable to edit any of the photos using LR desktop version. 

I was able to edit photos using version 5.3 for some time. As of yesterday even 5.3 displays under 'Sync Status' for individual photos 'Local Pending...'. This time around there is no 'scary message'. I am unable to edit photos again, even in 5.3.

[kenal69]

Hi Julie

I notice LR 6.0 is now available. Is the problem with SmartPreview not showing up fixed in this update?

I do not want to update until the preview problem is fixed. Else I will have to go through the whole process to downgrade to version 5.3!

Thanks

Ken

[Rikk Flohr: Photography]

Greetings all, 

Updates for Adobe Photography products began rolling out Monday night, December 12th,  The updates contain a fix for this issue. 

If you do not see the update in your Creative Cloud Application, you can refresh it by hitting [Ctrl/Cmd]+[Alt/Opt]+[ R ].

Note: It may take up to 24 hours for your update to be available in your Creative Cloud app.

Thank you for your patience.