Synchronizing iPhoto Libraries

My wife and I both maintain separate iPhoto libraries on our laptops. We both have our creative differences about how the libraries should be maintained. :)

I have a G5 tower downstairs that serves as our general use workstation/server. I'd like to set up an rsync job to synchronize both libraries to one master library downstairs. I'm not sure where to start in a way that would make sure the new "Master" library is actually usable in iPhoto.

Now that I type this, I guess I could sync both libraries separately, then occasionally merge them manually... I guess I'd like a fully automated solution if possible. I "think" this would be possible with rsync, just don't know enough about the iPhoto library database to know which rsync options would be best.

churnd

Posted 2010-02-15T22:14:16.140

Reputation: 4 228

I would also like to know this, as I want to sync a single iphoto library across 4 logins (2 accounts on 2 computers each) so that either of us can access the library on either computer. People have mentioned dropbox solutions, but my library is getting pretty big. – micmcg – 2010-02-15T22:34:14.080

Answers

The best I could come up with was using rsync to sync both libraries to the workstation/server downstairs, and manually merge the photos. Tedious, yes, but couldn't find any other way.

churnd

Posted 2010-02-15T22:14:16.140

Reputation: 4 228

iPhoto Library Manager could be an option...

iPhoto Library Manager allows you to organize your photos among multiple iPhoto libraries, rather than having to store all of your photos in one giant library.

iPhoto Library Manager lets you easily create and keep track of multiple iPhoto libraries, but that's only the beginning. It also has the ability to copy your photos from one library to another, while keeping track of photo metadata that is normally lost when exporting from one library and importing into another.

Titles, dates, descriptions, keywords, ratings, faces, and place information are all transferred along with the photos, ensuring that you keep all that information you spent hours entering into iPhoto. iPhoto Library Manager also reconstructs events and albums with the same photos as they had in the library they came from, as well as retaining both the edited and original copies of each photo. You can split up a large library into multiple smaller libraries, merge entire libraries together into a big one, and much more

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yegor256

Posted 2010-02-15T22:14:16.140

Reputation: 1 439