This is a fairly common error taking many forms, shown when opening a photos library with the Photos app. Your library is most likely still intact and your photos still stored safely. Just because Photos can’t automatically repair the library on launch doesn’t mean it is unrecoverable. Here’s some steps you can take to recover your photos.
Jul 27, 2018 There’s no software to download, all you have to do is hold down the OPTION and COMMAND buttons while launching Photos. You’ll need an Administrator name and password for the computer to authorize. Either the iPhoto application is corrupted or it is the iPhoto Library that has corrupted. We can rebuild your iPhoto Library and see if that works or not. Close iPhoto if it is open. Hold down the Command and Option keys on the keyboard and open iPhoto. Keep the keys held down until you are prompted to rebuild the library. I have the same exact problem, photos hanging for days at 18% complete. I even restored from an old pre-upgrade version of photos library and still the same result. El Cap also crashes my home Netgear router whenenver I try to access any menu items from any browser (Chrome, Firefox, Safari).
Photos library could not be opened
The library could not be opened.
Photos has attempted to repair the library Photos Library.photoslibrary but is unable to open it.
The most common cause of this is a permissions problem. Not necessarily that you don’t have the permission, as Photos will prompt for administrator permissions if that’s simply the case, but that permissions can’t be obtained, even with administrator. For example, if the library is open elsewhere: on another Mac on the network, for example.
If that didn’t fix it for you, you can manually try repairing the library. If it’s a permissions problem, Photos.app doesn’t like to ask for administrator privileges automatically, instead just saying that Photos attempted to repair the library but is unable to open it without actually trying to repair it. You can force Photos to try to repair the library by holding ⌥option and ⌘command whilst launching Photos. Photos.app will try to repair the library and it may ask you for administrator privileges.
Photos library could not be created
Photos could not upgrade your library because it is on an unsupported disk volume
This error is likely due to an incorrect partition format, such as NTFS which can’t be written to. Photos requires write permission to create a library or to migrate a library from iPhoto. You can fix this by copying the library to somewhere where you can write to, such as your ~/Pictures directory — the default location for photos in your home folder.
Using Console.app for error research
For more information on an error message shown in Photos like this, open Console.app, in /Applications/Utilities/ and search for “photo”, perhaps choosing Process for this search. This can be extremely telling in what the problem is. For example, in my case, the important lines here is that photolibraryd “failed to open library” with an error message:
photolibraryd: Failed to open library Photos Library.photoslibrary Error: Error Domain=com.apple.lithium Code=54 “locked by remote host” UserInfo=0x7fafbbb48d90 {NSURL=file:///Volumes/Server/Shared%20Folders/Photos/Photos%20Library.photoslibrary/database/metaSchema.db.lock, NSLocalizedDescription=locked by remote host, NSLocalizedFailureReason=locked by host georgegarside.com}
The important content here is why the library failed to open. Here, the problem is that the library is “locked by remote host” which means that the library is open somewhere else on the network, as specified by the NSLocalizedDescription. The NSLocalizedFailureReason also includes the hostname of the Mac on the network which has locked the library—in this case, the device with the hostname of georgegarside.com. If you find that messages in the Console are hidden as <private>, you may need to set the Console privacy level to see private logs.
The solution to this issue: close Photos.app on the other Mac, or open a different library on that Mac if there are multiple libraries available.
Which version of MacOS X are you using?
My Mac Is Stuck
My iPhoto library is on an external USB disk.
What is the file system format of the external drive? Is it MacOS Extended (Journaled) as it should be? Otherwise Photos will create the new Photos Library on your internal system drive and get stuck, if it is running out of storage.
If the drive is correctly formatted, but the library migration still gets stuck, you may want to repair the iPhoto Library in iPhoto, before you once again try to migrate it to Photos.
Mac Photos Repairing Library Is Stuck Video
To repair the iPhoto Library, make first a backup copy of the library.
Then launch iPhoto while holding down the key combination option-command ⌥⌘ . Keep holding down the keys, until the repair dialog appears. Use all options in turn, starting with 'Repair Permissions'.
Jan 29, 2018 11:05 AM