Lightroom sync-filename problem because of symbols

RWilsonRWilson Registered Users Posts: 8 Beginner grinner
edited September 18, 2014 in SmugMug Support
I recently bought Lightroom and many of my images won't sync because of filename issues. My professional photos are usually named using straightforward rules, but I have been scanning all my old prints and negatives and using very descriptive file names for my personal stuff. Unfortunately I have included symbols like ampersand "&" and comma ",". The SmugMug plugin won't sync those files, if I understand the SmugMug heroes correctly. I made good use of Organize in SmugMug so the hierarchy doesn't match with LR. I have over 100,000 images so any one-by-one solution isn't practical. I also have long file names so when I download a gallery the file names look strange and are truncated.
Does anyone have any ideas? Maybe a way to do a find-replace on file names in SmugMug. Is there a third party LR plugin that can read "illegal characters" in SmugMug file names?

Comments

  • ian408ian408 Administrators Posts: 21,949 moderator
    edited September 18, 2014
    Have you considered the tools that can be used in Lightroom?
    Moderator Journeys/Sports/Big Picture :: Need some help with dgrin?
  • pathfinderpathfinder Super Moderators Posts: 14,708 moderator
    edited September 18, 2014
    Like the "Spray Can" for image data, or synching settings, maybe, Ian??
    Pathfinder - www.pathfinder.smugmug.com

    Moderator of the Technique Forum and Finishing School on Dgrin
  • RWilsonRWilson Registered Users Posts: 8 Beginner grinner
    edited September 18, 2014
    SmugMug file names are the problem
    I think I need to change the file names in SmugMug not LR. If I have a file named "Karen, Robert, & Woody in a red canoe", LR plugin can not sync. If I change the LR file name to "Karen Robert and Woody in a red canoe" the plugin still can not sync.

    I don't know if it helps, but if I download the SM gallery as part of a zip file, spaces and illegal characters get translated into +, %26, %2c, etc with an ending string of characters and the O for original size. Of course the file name is truncated and I loose some of the description too.

    I'll try replacing the "spaces" in some LR files to see if that helps.

    I got into this problem because a few years ago I tried to enter what I thought was metadata into files in Photoshop Elements Orgazer, uploading to SM, downloading to a computer folder and checking properties. I couldn't figure out inconsistent things like notes, title, header, and caption. My objective was a file that had information independent of program. That lead to descriptive file names. I'll try to learn more about that from other posts instead of sidetracking this thread.
  • ian408ian408 Administrators Posts: 21,949 moderator
    edited September 18, 2014
    "%26" is a URL encoding for "&". You can find a list of encoding here.

    The coding for a "space" is "%20".
    Moderator Journeys/Sports/Big Picture :: Need some help with dgrin?
  • RWilsonRWilson Registered Users Posts: 8 Beginner grinner
    edited September 18, 2014
    Another test
    Thanks, I looked up ASCII, but didn't think of URL. I figured there was a way to decode, but still haven't figured out the mystery. I don't know if there is a way to rename the LR files to get a sync. I even tried to name the LR file to match the zip file name. It was:
    wedding+Frances%2C+Barbara+Rober-1897670569-O
    And I still didn't get a sync. I'll be glad to try any LR renaming schemes if anyone has anything I should try.
    My current hypothesis is that any special character in the SM file name will prevent a sync using this plugin, and the only way to change that file name is to replace the file.

    My other hypothesis is that it is not related to file name, but to something else. I must not be the only one with this problem. Maybe someone has already solved this and they don't check Dgrin because they don't have a problem anymore. Or there may be no soluton.
  • RWilsonRWilson Registered Users Posts: 8 Beginner grinner
    edited September 18, 2014
    Catalog
    I had missed an email. The SmugMug heros requested my LR catalog. That sounds promising.
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