Lr Catalog Maintenance/Cleansing

[JoeB94]

Lightroom Version Number

Classic - Lates version from the subscription service

Operating System

1. macOS 10.15 Catalina

Good morning all,

I have been doing some more in-depth reading about how Lr catalog works & how to use/maintain them, however I have read a number of comments around making sure you regularly cleanse the catalog file, by delete old cache files & catalog backup files, but I just wanted to see if this is something that is normally done and ultimately if so, how to do it safely without causing any issues within Lr... One thing I’m worried about (and I may be thinking this wrongly), but if I delete old catalog files (backups), will this remove edits I have made to older images that are linked to my Lr?

Many thanks

 

[Linwood Ferguson]

I would ignore the cleanup of cache unless you start running out of disk (and even then it's usually better to just buy more).

Cleaning up catalog backups may be useful depending on how often you do the catalog backup. They build up and never go away, so if you backup once a month in many years you might want to take a look. If you back up once a day it's going to become more of a problem. Deleting catalog backups have no effect on current catalog data. Each time you do a catalog backup the entire catalog is backed up. Keeping old versions is useful in case there is corruption or other problems not noticed quickly. You will have to balance how often you back up the catalog with how many you want to keep.

Backing up the catalog does NOT backup the images in the catalog, only the metadata and edits.

Backing up the catalog by default is still on the same disk as the catalog, so it is NOT protection against disk failure; it is a protection against mistakes or corruption. You also need to back up the catalog and everything else including images to some other place (external hard drive, NAS, cloud, whatever).

 

[Conrad Chavez]

making sure you regularly cleanse the catalog file, by delete old cache files & catalog backup files

Another aspect is that dumping cache and backup catalogs does not in any way “cleanse” the catalog file itself, because those files are all separate from and outside the catalog.

The only way to “cleanse” the catalog is to, in Lightroom Classic, choose File > Optimize Catalog. That really does do a true database maintenance run on the catalog itself, and can result in a smaller and more efficient catalog file if it hasn't been done in a while.

 

[JoeB94]

Another aspect is that dumping cache and backup catalogs does not in any way “cleanse” the catalog file itself, because those files are all separate from and outside the catalog.

The only way to “cleanse” the catalog is to, in Lightroom Classic, choose File > Optimize Catalog. That really does do a true database maintenance run on the catalog itself, and can result in a smaller and more efficient catalog file if it hasn't been done in a while.

Thank you for this & I think I used the wrong word as by cleanse, I meant delete old files, backups etc to help reduce storage being used.