I have a REALLY long back story about my Aperture use (went from PC to iPhoto to Aperture and have had SO many problems that Apple themselves can't answer that I have just this weekend deleted my library and started to rebuild from the PC on up to today. I bought the Mac about a year ago, so you can guess how fun this is…
Anyway, I'm hoping you can help me out. My import (folders into projects) locked up at one point in such a way that I'm trying to cancel it. I opened the import window and hit cancel, but I'm not sure if that really works on that particular type of import since that's not where I started it from. I also selected “Quit Aperture” and it asked if I wanted to quit or continue importing and I said quit. That's been about 3 or so hours I think and it still hasn't stopped. I'm wondering whether to just keep waiting, to force quit aperture, or to choose “cancel task” for each item in the Activity Window to help it along… I want this re-import done and I'm afraid I might need to restart it AGAIN to make sure I get a good clean import. :(
Also, my hubby has been going round and round about the idea of managed vs. referenced. We both are kind of nervous about all the files being inside one big file that could get corrupted, but Apple employees (I've been doing bi-weekly personal training) seem to think referenced would slow it down enough that it would be annoying. Any opinions? I was importing them as managed, but if I have to restart again, I thought I should find out what you think.
Thanks!
It’s now been 13 hours and it’s still not stopped… I hope someone gets on soon and gives some advice. I won’t be able to work on it for a couple hours anyway, but I thought I’d give you an update.
The Morrow Clan
MorrowClan,
Go ahead and force-quit. You’re not gaining anything at this point.
Since you just started again, let’s start completely from scratch. Don’t import all your photos (you didn’t say how many there are but I’m guessing it’s quite a collection) at once. The problem is if you come across a corrupt file that for some reason Aperture chokes on, it kills the whole import, as you’ve seen. So select smaller batches to import, which may take longer to do, but it’ll be a lot easier to isolate any problems.
Managed vs referenced has zero impact on speed as long as you have a fast external drive that you’re working from. If your internal drive has enough space to work managed, then go ahead just because it’s easier to backup and impossible to lose a file. The Library is a package, which is a fancy OS X folder, and you can open the package by right-clicking and choosing “open package”. You can always find your master files in there in a worst-case, Aperture-armageddon scenario.
@PhotoJoseph
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Yep, I did. (Long before I got your response. :) I realized that my machine appeared to have virtually no space even though I had just deleted 2 VERY large aperture libraries in order to rebuild them. It turned out that auto backup on Time Machine was on, so it was backing up to my computer since my external drive wasn’t plugged in. I was doing small batches of imports, so that must have been the hang up… I’m further along now, but in the midst of a “processing” mode now. I sure wish there was some kind of status bar so I knew how far along it was. I almost done with the rebuild and then I can start importing all the photos from my camera since then. Oh, and it’s over 60,000 photos I’m dealing with. :)
Part of the reason I rebuilt is that all the photos that were imported from iPhoto the first time did not show up as a master file in the “open package” scenario you mentioned. Freaked me out! :) So, I wanted it to be in better shape. Thanks!
The Morrow Clan