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Mac: After update to Monterey 12.4, photo data no longer shows in Finder

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michaelp

Active Member
Joined
Aug 14, 2019
Messages
106
Lightroom Version Number
11.3.1
Operating System
  1. macOS 12 Monterey
Using LrC 11.3.1.

Before 12.4, in Finder with Column or Gallery view you would see key information about an image e.g. filename, size, colour space and colour profile, dimensions, content create date, create date and modified date and camera .

This is so annoying. This was so useful, especially for checking image dimensions on export from LrC.

Now all I see is filename, size, create date and modified date.

I've looked high and low for some changed settings to no avail.

What I have noticed is that if the image is on the internal SSD you see the metadata just as before.

But if it's on an external drive (HDD in my case) the metadata is no longer displayed.

Anyone else having the same issue?
 

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UPDATE: I have noticed that when when the image is on an external HDD and you open the Preview Options pane , all the ticked fields suddenly display, but have no data. When you close the Preview Options pane, they vanish.

If you copy a file from external HDD to internal SSD, all the metadata (as selected in the Preview Options pane) displays just as it should.
 
Yes, same thing here. As a workaround, if you right click the image and choose Show Preview Options, you can select to view the data you want. However, it doesn't seem to be persistent in that once you dismiss the Preview Options box, the info no longer appears in the preview pane.

EDIT: I plugged another external drive, an SSD formatted as ExFAT and it behaves the same as the internal SSD showing the preview data. The drive that misbehaves is an external hard drive formatted as NTFS and using NTFS for MAC to allow writes.
 
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In my case when you open the Preview Options pane you suddenly see all the EXIF fields that are ticked in that pane, but there is no data in them.

It seems like Finder can no longer read the EXIF data, unless a file is on the internal drive.
 
Only thing I can think of at this stage is that my external USB HDD is not formatted APFS. Hasn't been an issue before though.
 
In my case when you open the Preview Options pane you suddenly see all the EXIF fields that are ticked in that pane, but there is no data in them.

It seems like Finder can no longer read the EXIF data, unless a file is on the internal drive.
Only thing I can think of at this stage is that my external USB HDD is not formatted APFS. Hasn't been an issue before though.
I didn't notice the EXIF fields show up on mine but I didn't notice that they were unpopulated with data. This is on my NTFS formatted external disk.
I used another drive formatted as ExFAT and it shows the the EXIF data. How is your external drive formatted?
 
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MacOS Extended (Case Sensitive)
 
I can confirm that if the file is on an ExFAT USB stick, the metadata is correctly displayed.
 
OK, so I have an external SSD formatted APFS (which I keep to run Mojave for some old apps). Files on that show the metadata, just like they should.

So it looks like I have to go through the long and painful process of copying my data off my external HDD and reformatting it APFS, and restoring the data.

Thanks Apple!!!
 
OK, so I have an external SSD formatted APFS (which I keep to run Mojave for some old apps). Files on that show the metadata, just like they should.

So it looks like I have to go through the long and painful process of copying my data off my external HDD and reformatting it APFS, and restoring the data.

Thanks Apple!!!

I might be WRONG, but I think Apple can reformat to APFS without removing the data . I know this was true for the drive that got the OS installed.

Of course any file system level operations should be performed in the presence of a full back up.

The process of reformatting a disk to APFS is not long or painful even after moving the data. If you have a spare drive then you could simply replace the old HDD with a APFS formatted and copy only once.

https://apple.stackexchange.com/que...lossless-in-place-conversion-from-hfs-to-apfs

Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk
 
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The problem is not with NTFS per se, but rather that Finder Preview doesn't work for files stored on read-only volumes. NTFS volumes mounted with the built-in Mac NTFS driver are read-only -- you need to use a third-party driver to mount NTFS volumes read-write.

Interestingly, the Finder's View > Show Preview command is greyed out in the view modes As Icons, As List, and As Gallery, but not As Columns -- I think that's a Finder bug.

Why doesn't Preview work with read-only volumes? I think Preview gets its metadata fields from Spotlight (Mac OS's file-indexing/search service), and Apple never bothered to make Spotlight work with read-only volumes. And I think that's because Spotlight wants to write essential hidden files at the root of a volume (e.g. ".Spotlight-V100").

Out of nerdly curiosity, I verified this by successfully testing Finder Preview with these formats/protocols:

AFPS (case insenstive), MS-DOS (FAT32), ExFAT, Mac OS Extended (Journaled), Mac OS Extended (Case-sensitive, Journaled), NTFS (Mac OS built-in readonly), SMBFS.

Preview wasn't available for these formats mounted as read-only:

ExFAT (read-only), Mac OS Extended (Journaled, read-only), NTFS (read-only)

"I can confirm that there is NO exif data on files stored on my NAS device."
As mentioned above, Preview will show EXIF metadata on SMBFS network volumes. You might check two things:

- Is Spotlight enabled for that volume? See https://jonathansblog.co.uk/how-to-enable-spotlight-indexing-on-a-network-drive.

- Is the NAS configured to use the long-deprecated AFP protocol? Older NAS devices sometimes default to AFP, which can cause obscure issues with modern Mac OS and apps (including LR). These devices can be switched to use SMBFS.
 
The problem is not with NTFS per se, but rather that Finder Preview doesn't work for files stored on read-only volumes. NTFS volumes mounted with the built-in Mac NTFS driver are read-only -- you need to use a third-party driver to mount NTFS volumes read-write.
I do have the NTFS third party driver and the volume is indeed writeable. I use ExFAT on my SSD external disk and have no problem displaying the EXIF data. Good idea on AFPS, I checked to make sure I am using SMB and indeed I am. I believe you may be on to it with Spotlight.
 
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I do have the NTFS third party driver and the volume is indeed writeable. I use ExFAT on my SSD external disk and have no problem displaying the EXIF data. Good idea on AFPS, I checked to make sure I am using SMB and indeed I am. I believe you may be on to it with Spotlight.
I enabled Spotlight Indexing for the NTFS for Mac application on my external disk and let it work for a few minutes. I am now able to see the EXIF info in finder. Hopefully the OP is able to enable Spotlight on his disk and get this to work as desired. Spotlight, in my case, was the key. Good catch johnrellis.
 
So I formatted a portable HDD as APFS (case sensitive); copied everything from my desktop HDD on to it; reformatted desktop HDD as APFS (case sensitive) then copied the data back.
The HDD was clearly indexing for a while as it was very active, but after that the metadata appeared again.
After all that it could probably have been fixed just by using the terminal command sudo mdutil -i on /. At least all my drives are now APFS!
Thanks for all the helpful suggestions.
 
Be careful with a case-sensitive formatted internal disk. AFAIK, Lightroom Classic cannot be installed on such a volume, unless that has changed recently and I don’t think it has. https://www.lightroomqueen.com/community/threads/case-sensitive-file-systems.44478/
Thanks for the tip but the drive concerned is an external HDD containing the images only. LrC application and catalog files are on the internal SSD which shows as APFS (encrypted). LrC 11.3.1 seems to be working just fin.
 
Thanks for the tip but the drive concerned is an external HDD containing the images only. LrC application and catalog files are on the internal SSD which shows as APFS (encrypted). LrC 11.3.1 seems to be working just fin.
In that case I must have misunderstood what you say here:
So I formatted a portable HDD as APFS (case sensitive); copied everything from my desktop HDD on to it; reformatted desktop HDD as APFS (case sensitive) then copied the data back
 
The terrors of terminology! By “Desktop HDD” I did not mean “Internal HDD”.
 
Re case-sensitive drives: There are some obscure bugs in LR when storing catalogs or photons on them. I can't recall all of them, but one I remember has to do with the case of sidecars (.xmp versus .XMP).
 
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