ACDSee Photo Studio 8 (for Mac): Basic Bug with pictures in Studio 8

[Tahunga]

When I open a picture to “View" from the Manage window the correct picture shows up. But when I then click on the “Develop” tab, the very first picture in the folder opens up instead of the selected picture. In short, I can not open a picture for editing/develop from the “Manage” or “View” window. I can only open it by going to “Develop” and then use the filmstrip at the bottom of the window to select the picture.

[[email protected]]

Hi Tahunga,

Thank you for your feedback. I'm not able to reproduce this issue. Does it happen with all of your photos or only certain ones?

Regards,
David

[Tahunga]

Hi David,
when I noticed the issue and reported it, it happened all the time. But today as I tried to repeat it, I can't. So for all intents and purposes you can forget about it.

Regards,

.....Tahunga

[Tahunga]

Hi David,
the issue started again. Here is what exactly happens:

1. I have a large DB of pictures with many folders and subs-folders.
2. I use the following file formats:
   1. TIFF
   2. JPEG
   3. PNG
   4. PEF (Pentax RAW)
   5. MOV (QuickTime movie)
   6. MPEG-4 (movie)
3. Today the issue happened for the first time when I was in a folder that had a JPG picture as the first file. I viewed a picture far down in the folder before I clicked on the "Develop" tab. At that point ACDSee jumped to the very first picture in the folder and displayed it in "Development mode".
4. I tried many times, starting with many different pictures in VIEW mode. But ACDSee ALWAYS jumped to the first file as soon as I clicked on the Development tab.
5. I tried to use several different folders to see if it always jumps to the first file in the folder, and here is what happens:
   1. In a folder which contains the following first few files: mov, mp4, mov, m4v, mov, jpg, png, png, ....... when I select a file in View mode far down in the list, it is displayed as it should be. But when I then click on the "Develop" tab, the display jumps to the sixth file (the jpg which I highlighted in red above). That is, for all intents and purpose the first jpg file.
   2. In a folder which contains the following first few files: png, PEF, PEF, PEF, PEF, PEF, png, png, .... when I select a file in View mode far down in the list, it is displayed as it should be. But when I then click on the "Develop" tab, the display jumps to the first picture in the folder (i.e. the png picture).
   3. In a folder which contains the following first few files: PEF, PEF, PEF, PEF, PEF, png, png, .... when I select a file in View mode far down in the list, it is displayed as it should be. But when I then click on the "Develop" tab, the display jumps to the first picture in the folder (i.e. the PEF picture).
   4. In a folder which contains the following first few files: jpg, JPG, MOV, MP4,MP4,MP4,MP4,MP4,PEF, PEF, JPG, JPG, .... when I select a file in View mode far down in the list, it is displayed as it should be. But when I then click on the "Develop" tab, the display jumps to the first picture in the folder (i.e. the jpg picture).

In short, it looks like the issue alway jumps to the first Picture file (not movie files).

Just for the record, I am using:

• MacBook Pro (13-inch, M1, 2020) with an Apple M1 chip
• macOS Monterey, Version 12.3.1
• ACDSee Photo Studio 8, version 8.1.2323

....Tahunga

[Tahunga]

Hi David,
I think I am closing in on the issue: Most of my pictures are kept on various external hard-drives as they would not fit on my internal drives. Besides, it's awkward to keep picture libraries on an internal drive, as that restricts their use to one specific computer.
But today, after testing the issue in many different ways, I decided to try the problem on a small picture library which is kept on my internal drive. And oh behold, the issue is not present in this case. In short, I think the problem is linked to external drives. In my case I use LaCie hard drives with 4TB and 5TB.
Hope this makes sense to your developers. And also hope they can fix the issue, as this problem makes using ACDSee VERY difficult.

....Tahunga

[Tahunga]

Hello David and ACDSee development team,
I think I have found the issue which is related to my two problem reports: "ACDSee Photo Studio 8 (for Mac): Basic Bug with pictures in Studio 8" and "Can't delete picture files using keyboard commands". I know you tried to reproduce these bugs, but could not. And I think I now know why not.

These are issues I encounter when I work with picture libraries kept on external hard-drives. But more specifically on external hard drives which I use to travel with, and therefore have "password protected". As they are my own hard drives, my system keeps the passwords on my keychains. That means, I do not have to enter the passwords each time I connect the hard-drives. The system knows these drives are mine by virtue of the fact that I always use one of my own computers to connect them.
I am now convinced that ACDSee stumbles across that password protection and can't deal with it. I do believe that is the issue. HOWEVER, I also believe that it is indeed a bug in ACDSee, as the app seems to have no problems to perform some editing on the pictures on my external drives, but not all. Either way, if your team can't fix the issue (or tell me how I can get around the bug) ACDSee becomes somewhat useless to me.

Please let me know if you have any questions. I will be happy to help you and the ACDSee team to fix this issue.

With kind regards,

....Tahunga

[[email protected]]

Hi Tahunga,

Thanks for this info. How do you implement the password on your external hard drive? I've tried to reproduce the issue by encrypting an external hard drive via the macOS Disk Utility app and following your steps, but I couldn't reproduce. I find that if the password is provided (either manually or via keychain), the device is fully unlocked and everything works, or, if the password is not provided, then the volume does not appear at all in Finder or ACDSee.

As a test, could you try creating a new ACDSee database (via File > Database > New...) and seeing if the issue is still reproducible?

Regards,
David

[Tahunga]

Hi David,
I implemented the password on this hard drive as follows:

1. When I got the new drive I re-formatted it using the Apple Disk Utility. The drive was brand new and had absolutely no data on it,
2. During the re-formating, I used the "Password protection" and applied a password,
3. Then I copied all my Pictures from my slightly older LaCie 5TB hard drive to create a complete back-up (that process took a couple of days ),
4. Next I started to use this new drive to work with my pictures. All worked just fine,

For the first while (one month or so) all worked just fine. But then, all of a sudden, the problem(s) I reported on the forum started to appear. I tried to analyze the issues and was sure it was related to the "password protection". But as of yesterday I am not sure it has anything to do with the password. Specifically, some folders in the picture library on the drive act perfectly well, as they should, while others react with the problems I reported.

AND HERE IS what happened next....

• As you suggested, I created a new Database on the password protected hard drive.
• All the issues I reported completely disappeared !!!

Now I have some questions for you:

• As I mentioned, I keep all my thousands of pictures on two different external hard drives. I use one of these drives when I travel and "hunt with my camera". When I come home I synchronize the second drive (i.e. my backup drive for all intents and purposes) with my "travel drive".
• I then edit and work with my pictures on either of the two external drives.
• Just before I go on the next trip I synchronize the two drives again.
• There are a bunch of pictures on the internal drives of my computers as well.

Now for my questions:

1. I decided to create a new ACDSee Database (and thus hopefully clean up all the issues). Where should I place this new Database? Would it be best on my "travel drive" or my laptop computer which travels with me?
2. Should I create a backup copy of the database on my "backup drive" which stays at home while I travel?
3. What's the advantage to place the database wherever you suggest?
4. How can I delete any and all old databases? Should I search for them and delete them?
5. Attached are a couple of screenshots. They show all the "mediaDatabase" files on my laptop. The files entitled "Test DB" are those related to my brand new database. As you can see at the bottom of the screen shot these files are stored on my external hard drive "LaCie-5TB Travel". What are the three files entitled ACDSee Database Backup ....which are also stored on my external hard drive "LaCie-5TB Travel"? How did they get created? What is their use?

Thanks for your help,

....Tahunga

[[email protected]]

Hi Tahunga,

Thanks for the reply and sharing your workflow.
Generally, I advise having one database on your main machine at the default location. This is for both performance and stability reasons. An ACDSee database is designed to be used by one instance of ACDSee only. So I would not advise having different machines using the same database.

Regarding the extra DB files, they're just part of the database implementation and you don't need to worry about them. If you're sure a DB (or DB backup) is no longer needed, there's no harm in deleting those three files via Finder.

Thank you,
David