Opening Lightroom

<p>Hi all- When I open LR2, I always get a dialog box telling me that I've asked LR to do a backup and where do I want to put it, etc. etc. I did no such thing, and I've looked everywhere for that menu or those instructions and can't find how to disable this. I'd do a back up, but am not sure what it would back up and where. I use Time Machine for my daily backups, so I'm not sure I need to change. Any idea how to shut this off? Thanks</p>

<p>preferences -> catalog settings -> general</p>

<p>Ah, thanks, I'll check it out.</p>

<p>LR backups are a good idea, as it creates a catalog of the files as you have them in LR.</p>

<p>By its very nature it doesn't force changes to save into the actual files, its all data stored in LR itself. So if you were wiped out, you'd have to reorganize and redo any changes that haven't been forced to save into the actual photo files.</p>

<p>You can set them to go wherever you want.. I have it backup for me about once a week.</p>

<p>Kyle</p>

<p>this is a tricky question and I'm not sure of the answer because.......................</p>

<p>the LR database is an SQLite file oriented database. When LR starts up, the db is 'closed' and it can safely make a backup/copy/whatever which is what it is asking. Once you get past that, the file is opened and ready for read/write. If the LR code is nice, it will write any changes out to the file as required so the file is in a stable state. That is good since when TimeMachine comes around, it'll have a stable file to backup. If, on the other hand, there are unwritten changes to the file when TM comes around, it can save the file but the file may be in an unstable state that LR wouldn't actually be able to re-open later if you tried to restore it.</p>

<p>So, LR is telling you that the safest way of backing up the database is to do it when LR is first started, before it has opened the db file. But, it would be interesting to get a definitive answer although I'm guessing that Adobe would tell you they only assure no corruption if you do it their way, not via TM.</p>