A Peculiar Problem: Corrupt catalog?

1. The basic problem: In Lightroom 3.2 and now 3.3, when new images are downloaded, the folders appear in the list of folders (in the left-hand panel) and the same folders appear in the Lightroom_Library folder on my N drive. However, when Lightroom is closed and reopened, these folders no longer appear in the list of folders in the left-hand panel of Lightroom. The folders and their images are still on the N drive and can be accessed with Photoshop.
2. The two sets of imported images that have been a problem were shot in late October and late November. I had not taken any photos prior to that since August. I made three backups of my catalog in August long before I began to have the current problem.
3. I have synchronized my 2010 folder (which contains the two problematic folders) in the list of folders in the left-hand panel. This action replaced the two missing folders shot in October and November in the list of folders; however, they both disappeared again when Lightroom was shut down and reopened.
4. I noticed that when I import test images and the folder name appears correctly in the list of folders in the left-hand panel and then turn Lightroom off and then on again, even though the folder disappears from the list of folders, the images themselves still appear on the screen, which means, does it not, that the images are in the catalog even though they are not showing in the folders list.
Following up on this, I imported some test images and gave them a unique keyword. I then shut Lightroom down and reopened it and that folder was missing from the list of folders in the left-hand column, but I was able to bring the images up by searching for the photos using the unique keyword that I had given them, which, I think, is more evidence that the images are in the catalog.
5. I spoke with an Adobe customer support representative, and as a last resort, he created a test catalog into which he imported new images. The images appeared in the list of folders. Lightroom was then shut down and reopened, and the folder was still in the list of folders in the left-hand panel. Based on this experiment, the Adobe representative concluded that my catalog was corrupt, and that I would need to import my current catalog into a new catalog to solve this problem.
6. Except for this one problem, the catalog seems to function normally, and I have checked the integrity of the catalog and this has turned up no problems. I have not received any warnings from Lightroom 3 to indicate that the catalog is corrupted.
6. Since I thought I was dealing with a corrupt catalog, I substituted one of my backups from August, which was made at a time when I was having no problems with the catalog; however, I am having the same problem with this backup catalog. Does this suggest that the problem may not be that the catalog which first showed the problem is corrupt?
7. The support representatives that I spoke with gave me somewhat different recommendations for transferring this catalog to a new catalog. One suggested that I create a new empty catalog and then combine the corrupt catalog with the new one. In this case wouldn’t the new catalog be corrupted too?
If I have to accept that the problematic catalog is corrupt, how exactly do I transfer the contents of the corrupt catalog to a new catalog?
Thanks.
Roger

Create a brand-new test catalog and try importing the two folders into it.  If they still disappear it is something to do with those folders or their contents.  If they seem ok, then it could be something wrong with your catalog.  When importing make sure you've done right-click Include Parent Folder enough times to make it the same relative depth of folders as your regular catalog.
I assume you've done an optimize catalog with test-integrity enabled.
I have seen problems in the past with folders that had some weird character or were longer than the rest so see if that is the case for these two.  When the folders do happen to be visible, you might try renaming them (within LR) to something much shorter and see if they work, then. 
Before messing around too much, I'd write XMP files (select all / Metadata / Write Metadata for Files) for all the photos in these two folders, so at some point if things go completely haywire, you can at least reimport the photos with their current set of adjustments applied although linkages to them in collections and keywords and such may not be as lucky.
You can also use File / Import from Catalog... and File / Export to Catalog... to create working copies of just those two folders in another catalog but if the catalog, itself, is corrupted, that may only propagate the corruption.

Similar Messages

  • Peculiar Problem: Corrupt Catalog?

    1. The Basic Problem: In Lightroom 3.2 and now 3.3, when new images are downloaded, the folders appear in the list of folders (in the left-hand panel) and the same folders appear in the Lightroom_Library folder on my N drive. However, when Lightroom is closed and reopened, these folders no longer appear in the list of folders in the left-hand panel of Lightroom. The folders and their images are still on the N drive and can be accessed with Photoshop.
    2. The two sets of imported images that have been a problem were shot in late October and late November. I had not taken any photos prior to that since August. I made three backups of my catalog in August long before I began to have the current problem.
    3. I have synchronized my 2010 folder (which contains the problematic folders) in the list of folders in the left-hand panel. This action replaced the two missing folders shot in October and November in the list of folders; however, they both disappeared again when Lightroom was shut down and reopened.
    4. I noticed that when I import test images and the folder name appears correctly in the list of folders in the left-hand panel and then turn Lightroom off and then on again, even though the folder disappears from the list of folders, the images themselves still appear on the screen, which means, does it not, that the images are in the catalog even though they are not showing in the folders list.
    Following up on this, I imported some test images and gave them a unique keyword. I then shut Lightroom down and reopened it and that folder was missing from the list of folders in the left-hand column, but I was able to bring the images up by searching for the photos using the unique keyword that I had given them, which is, I think, more evidence that the images are in the catalog.
    5. I spoke with an Adobe customer support representative, and as a last resort, he created a test catalog into which he imported new images. The images appeared in the list of folders. Lightroom was then shut down and reopened, and the folder was still in the list of folders in the left-hand panel. Based on this experiment, the Adobe representative concluded that my catalog was corrupt, and that I would need to import my current catalog into a new catalog to solve this problem.
    6. Except for this one problem, the catalog seems to function normally, and I have checked the integrity of the catalog and this has turned up no problems. I have not received any warnings from Lightroom 3 to indicate that the catalog is corrupted.
    6. Since I thought I was dealing with a corrupt catalog, I substituted one of my backups from August, which was made at a time when I was having no problems with the catalog; however, I am having the same problem with this backup catalog. Does this suggest that the problem may not be that the catalog which first showed the problem is corrupt?
    7. The support representatives that I spoke with gave me somewhat different recommendations for transferring this catalog to a new catalog. One suggested that I create a new empty catalog and then combine the corrupt catalog with the new one. In this case wouldn’t the new catalog be corrupted too?
    If I have to accept that the problematic catalog is corrupt, how exactly do I transfer the contents of the corrupt catalog to a new catalog without losing anything?
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    I assume you've done an optimize catalog with test-integrity enabled.
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    Before messing around too much, I'd write XMP files (select all / Metadata / Write Metadata for Files) for all the photos in these two folders, so at some point if things go completely haywire, you can at least reimport the photos with their current set of adjustments applied although linkages to them in collections and keywords and such may not be as lucky.
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    Click on 'OK'
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    Security settings in Windows can get very complex very fast. I hesitate attempting to walk through this can be done because there could be many factors which has caused this issue.  You could have specific security settings on the files which override parent directory security settings.   Or the parent directory security setting could simply be wrong.
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