Trouble with rebuilding the iPhoto library

Hi, I'd need help for a problem I have found on my dad's Imac. It's a late 2009, 21.5" with Core 2 Duo and 8 GB ram running Snow Leopard and the preinstalled iPhoto (I'm not sure about the version)
He told me about some issues with photos in his library, so I thought that maybe rebuilding the iPhoto library would fix them. Unfortunately I can't access the "rebuild" dialog and holding down Command and Option keys when opening iPhoto does nothing.
I've been trying with the iPhoto icon in Applications folder, not through the dock, keeping them pressed before doubleclicking, pressing them at the same time, pressing also shift or control or both... I've tried all combinations without any luck, as iPhoto starts normally without showing the dialog.
What could be the problem? Any solution?
Thanks!

Yep! I know it doens't make any sense... I've tried repairing permissions and checking the file system, I've also deleted the content of "caches" folder but without any luck.
I've moved the library to the desktop and started iPhoto, created a new library and then tried with that one. It doesn't work.

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I have iphoto 6 and my pictures are no longer showing. I have tried importing them but it just give me an error msg. (file format not recognized) I have tried rebuilding the iphoto library but that doesn't work either. Any suggestions?

I have iphoto 6 and my pictures are no longer showing. I have tried importing them but it just give me an error msg. (file format not recognized) I have tried rebuilding the iphoto library but that doesn't work either. Any suggestions?

How did you rebuild?
Try these in order - from best option on down...
1. Do you have an up-to-date back up? If so, try copy the library6.iphoto file from the back up to the iPhoto Library allowing it to overwrite the damaged file.
2. Download <a href="http://www.fatcatsoftware.com/iplm/"><b><u>iPhoto Library Manager</b></u></a> and use its rebuild function. This will create a new library based on data in the albumdata.xml file. Not everything will be brought over - no slideshows, books or calendars, for instance - but it should get all your albums and keywords back.
Because this process creates an entirely new library and leaves your old one untouched, it is non-destructive, and if you're not happy with the results you can simply return to your old one.
3. If neither of these work then you'll need to create and populate a new library.
To create and populate a new *iPhoto 6* library:
Note this will give you a working library with the same Rolls and pictures as before, however, you will lose your albums, keywords, modified versions, books, calendars etc.
Move the iPhoto Library to the desktop
Launch iPhoto. It will ask if you wish to create a new Library. Say Yes.
Go into the iPhoto Library on your desktop and find the Originals folder. From the Originals folder drag the individual Roll Folders to the iPhoto Window and it will recreate them in the new library.
When you're sure all is well you can delete the iPhoto Library on your desktop.
In the future, in addition to your usual back up routine, you might like to make a copy of the library6.iPhoto file whenever you have made changes to the library as protection against database corruption.

My iPhoto closed unexpectedly and now it says "Rebuilding the iPhoto Library database". What is going on and are my photos still going to be there?

My iPhoto closed unexpectedly and now it says "Rebuilding the iPhoto Library database". What is going on and are my photos still going to be there?

With the amount of information you've provided it's impossible to offer a solution. We can't see your computer so we need to know the details of your problem and setup, i.e.:
what version of iPhoto are you using?
what system version are you running?
what were you doing when iPhoto closed unexpectedly?
how big is your library, i.e. how many photos?
how long has the rebuilding been going on?
do you have a recent backup of the library made just prior to this occurring?
where is your library located?
did you apply any updates or upgrades just prior to the problem occurring?
are you running a "managed" or "referenced" library?
what type of Mac?
how much free space on your boot drive?

Loss of photos resulting from rebuilding the iPhoto library?

On behalf of myself and Susan Pease: Can following the directions to rebulild the iPhoto library (by holding down the option and shift keys while opening iPhoto) result in a loss of the photos? Is there some precaution we should take to make sure that the photos are not lost?

Hi, aag. I didn't make myself clear, at least not to you. Inside your personal Home folder on your hard drive is a Pictures folder, and inside the Pictures folder is an iPhoto Library folder. You can see this folder structure by visiting your Home folder in the Finder. What I was advising against in my prior post is opening that iPhoto Library folder in the Finder and adding, deleting or moving any of its contents. Don't do that.
When iPhoto is open, what it displays is the contents of that folder. It expects to find them exactly as they were the last time you closed iPhoto, and it counts heavily on finding them structured exactly the way it structured them the last time you ran it. If you have changed anything in there while iPhoto wasn't running, you're going to have trouble: iPhoto won't load the library, it won't display all your pictures, some of your albums may be missing or incomplete, etc.
"Nobody has any business in there except iPhoto itself" means that the only methods you should use to tweak, edit, delete, import, copy, export or organize the photos in your iPhoto Library folder are the methods offered by iPhoto itself when it's running†. When iPhoto isn't running, leave your iPhoto Library closed and stay out of it.
† Note that, at least in iPhoto 4 (I'm not familiar with iPhoto 2), these allowable methods include the designation of a different application for use in iPhoto's Edit mode, allowing you to use Photoshop, GraphicConverter, etc. to tweak your photos without removing them from iPhoto's control. But under no circumstances should you import a photo from your camera into Photoshop or GC and then save it in your iPhoto Library folder without opening iPhoto and importing it properly. And similarly, you should never open one of the photos in your library with another application, make changes to it, and resave it in the same place (or worse, a different place in that folder) without going through iPhoto to do so.
If you can train yourself to think of the iPhoto Library folder as a locked box to which only iPhoto has the key, you'll be doing yourself a big favor.

Rebuilding the iPhoto Library

I messed up the iPhoto Library!
What i did was that i wanted to use Automator to COPY all of the original photo files to a new hard drive for backup, but i MOVED them instead. So now I have one big folder of originals and an iPhoto library empty of originals.
Question:
1.Can i use the rebuild iphoto library thing?
2.Where do my originals need to be for iPhoto to find them again?
3. Any other way or program?
Thanks!

You need to put the original files back into the proper film roll folders. I think it will need to be done manually. You can look at which roll the thumbnails with the same file names are located and then move the originals into the same rolls in the Originals folder.
Inside your library folder (named "iPhoto Library" unless you changed it), you will see two folders you are interested in. The one named "Data" contains the thumbnail files. The one named "Originals" contains the original image files. They have the exact same structure except "Data" only has thumbnail versions of your photos.
Use the Data folder and its thumbnails to see where your original images should go in the "Originals" folder.
Rebuilding the library will not help, in fact if you try a rebuild before putting those files back it may mess things up.

Should I rebuild the iPhoto library or restore from backup?

When I start iPhoto I get this message:
"Your iPhoto library is either in use by another application or has become unreadable"
Shut down and restart your computer, and then open iPhoto again. If the problem persists, try rebuilding your iPhoto library. To do this, quit iPhoto, and then reopen it while keeping the Option and Command keys pressed. You can also try restoring your photo library from a backup.
What do I do? Which is best?
Robert

If the restart did not solve it, rebuild the library, but make a backup (don't overwrite any backup, that you have).
See Terence Devlin's post on how to rebuild here:
Your photo library is either in use by another application or has become unreadable https://discussions.apple.com/message/16810380#16810380

Migration to Photos: Trouble with import from iPhoto Library

I have just upgraded to OS X Yosemite (10.10.3). When I first opened Photos, it wanted to convert my iPhoto Library to Photos. After some hours of working with the 165.2 GB iPhoto Library, it told me that I don't have enough disk space. I believed that if I free my MacBook Pro from those 165.2 GB, I might solve the problem. So yesterday, I stored it on an external USB drive (a solid state drive of OWC with USB 3.0 connection to my MacBook), deleted the iPhoto Library on my harddisk, and opened Photos. In Photos, I chose Menu > File >Import , and navigated to the external drive. However, clicking the file icon and name does not release into any import. What shall I do to import data from my iPhotos Libray?
Suggestions will be most appreciated and rewarded with a virtual box of Mozart Kugeln.
Erik Thau-Knudsen

You don't import it, you simply open it:
Hold down the option (or alt) key key and launch Photos. From the resulting menu select 'Choose Library'

Trouble with restoring an iPhoto library from a time machine backup.

I'm having trouble restoring my iPhoto library from a time machine backup.
I have created a new library in my pictures file.
When I try to restore the library the restore process is trying to copy it to an external drive that no longer exists - it failed and I had to have it recovered and all the recovery (including backups) data is now on a different external hard drive.
iPhoto had been using that old external drive location to start. iPhoto is now pointed to the newly created iPhoto library in my pictures file on my MacBook Air.
Is there a way to have the restoration process point to that new iPhoto library that is now empty and not to the old external drive?

You might try this with the restored library:
Starting over from scratch with new library
Start over with a new library and import the Originals (iPhoto 09 and earlier) or the Masters (iPhoto 11) folder from your original library as follows:
1. Open the library package like this.
2. Launch iPhoto with the Option key held down and, when asked, select the option to create a new library.
3. Drag the subfolders of the Originals (iPhoto 09 and earlier) or the Masters (iPhoto 11) folder from the open iPhoto Library package into the open iPhoto window a few at a time.
This will create a new library with the same Events (but not necessarily the same Event names) as the original library but will not keep the metadata, albums, books slideshows and other projects.
Note: your current library will be left untouched for further attempts at a fix if so desired.

IPhoto randomly stopped letting me drag/drop photos into finder. It's been working all week and all of a sudden, the photos bounce back into iPhoto and don't copy. I tried to rebuild the iPhoto library using the ALT CMD buttons, but that didn't work...

Any suggestions?

What happens if you export the photo (file menu ==> export)?
What do you see if you right click on one ane reveal in finder?
LN

Trying to rebuild my iphoto library from time machine backup and it still says 0 restored with a grey screen and the circle. How can i restore my library?

I just bought a new Macbook pro and i tried to rebuild my iphoto library from a time machine backup on an external hard drive. Even after pressing command+option when starting iphoto and selecting rebuild library from automatic backup, it still doesn't work with the grey screen with the white circle and a little window that says 'rebuilding library: 0 versions restored'. I also tried to make a copy of my iphoto library but that did not work either. how can i restore my iphoto library or at least gain access to my photos?

Your question is not clear
Rerairing or rebuilding the iPhoto library never involves using Time Machine in any way
TM is a totally seperate program and you can "restore" a file (including the iPhoto library) from the past using TM - you launch TM and go back to the time you want and select the file (or folder or package) you want and click restore - it probably is best to keep the current one until you are sure everything is good
LN

Hung the iPhoto library rebuild

Intermittently, iPhoto synchronizes all my events to my iPhone 4 or iPad 2 in random order. The events are not in alphabetical order (like I have the on the computer), or apparently even time-ordered, expect that the most recently created event does seem to appear at the very bottom of the list. This makes finding the events I want on the phone/pad agonizing, since there are many events and many thousands of photos. To make matters worse, when I plug the device into the computer, and look at the synchronization details in iTunes, the list of events appears random there too. Albums and Faces are always in order. I've deleted all photos from the device, then re-synced. That seemed to help once and failed about 9 times. Occasionally the problem seems to fix itself for a while. Right now it's fine on my iPhone and messed up on my iPad. Suspecting library corruption, I tried to rebuild the iPhoto Library after making a backup. It gets to 98% then hangs forever when I ask for the first option (rebuild) with or without other options selected. If I ask for the rebuild from automated backups option, it gets to "Rebuilding Library: 14625 Versions restored" then hangs forever. If I only ask it to rebuild thumbnails (either of the 2 options) it has no trouble.
I'm stumped. Anyone have experience with this issue???
--Scott

I've got the same problem with iPhoto. Hangs at 69% when rebuild; hangs at a large number of items when rebuilding from backup. If I try to rebuild from backup, wait for the hang, and then force quit, the library is corrupted and iPhoto opens up with nothing. I have to use Time Machine to rebuild.

Iphoto locked up, I forced quit and now when I try to open iphoto it gives me a Caution note...The iphoto library is locked, on a locked disk, or you do not have permission to make changes to it. What do I do now?

I had to force quit from iphoto...
then I tried to reopen iphoto and it gave me a Caution message.
The iphoto library is locked, on a locked disc, or you do not have
permission to make changes to it....
What do I do to be able to get to my photographs?

Try Rebuilding the iPhoto library and post back with results. BTW if you don't get an answer on this forum there is an iPhoto forum too.

Photos exist in the computer but have disappeared in the iPhoto library

I needed more space on my hard drive and realized I had about 200 photos double loaded in a Nikon Photo program and in iPhoto. When I deleted them from the Nikon program, my iPhoto Library would suddenly no longer load any of my 5600 photos in edit mode and said they were all 0X0 in size. The photos exist on the hard drive but is there a way to relink them to iPhoto? I tried Toad's idea of deleting the 0X0 images but my computer can't find any as the iPhoto library no longer has any names or .jpg designations on the photos. (It does if you open up the library in the black background - everything looks fine - but then on the left the only info that comes up is the day and date shot.

I don't know if this will help or not, but have your tried to rebuild the iPhoto Library? If you are using iPhoto 5 or later, hold down the Command and Option keys while you open iPhoto. iPhoto 4 and earlier is it the Shift and Option keys. At this point you will be prompted to rebuild the library.
Make a backup first though!
I have a tutorial with more details here: http://www.learntomac.com/index.php/troubleshooting/rebuilding-iphoto-library/
Dan

Help with messed up iPhoto Library

I fear that I have made a horrendous mistake. I purchased a new Macbook Pro and used the Migration tool. I didn't see where the iPhoto Library transferred over. I found my iPhoto Library on the old Macbook and drug it into Dropbox since it would sync with the new computer. When I opened iPhoto on the new computer all of the events were messed up. None of them are named correctly. A lot of them say they have photos in them but the photos show up as a gray triangle with an exclamation point.
I thought I would check the old computer, but because iPhoto Library is in my Dropbox it simply synced and replicated the "bad" one.
Is there any way to get the "old" iPhoto Library back?

What is your iPhoto version that created the iPhoto Library?
Yes, storing the iPhoto Library in the DropBox probably is the reason, that the library got corrupted. Don't store it on network volumes.
The best way to restore your iPhoto library would be to restore it from your most current backup.
Alternatively you could try to rebuild the library. The procedure differs, depending on your iPhoto version, see: iPhoto 6 and later: Rebuilding the iPhoto library
If that does not help, you could try to rebuild the iPhoto library using iPhoto Library Manager, but that will not be able to restore your book, cards, ..., only the Photos and events.
How to do that is described here by Terence Devlin,
see Option 2: Re: iPhoto thumbnails distorted after every import
Fat Cat Software – iPhoto Library Manager
Regards
Léonie

Will my photos delete if i rebuild my iPhoto library

iphoto is saying to rebuild. Will I lose all my pics from my old library if i rebuild my library?
please HELP!!!!

No. Always good to have a back up in place however, like TimeMachine.
I've never had a problem rebuilding the iphoto library.

Trouble with rebuilding the iPhoto library

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