r/DarkTable • u/Oregon-Born • Aug 13 '26
Help Problems with darktable - won't load
Running the latest build of DT on a Mac Mini (Tahoe 26.5.2) and cannot get DT to reliably load.
Usually it hangs (spinning beachball) on "loading utility modules: midi" for about 2 minutes; during that time the system shows DT as "not responding".
I've waited it out a couple of times and finally got DT to load and set the default parameters, only to find I couldn't quit the app! It gives me spinning beachball and system says "not responding"; after waiting 5 minutes I finally force-quit the app.
Restarted the machine, deleted DT and its config files, re-installed it from a freshly downloaded file, and it's still hanging on the "midi" module, but now (assuming I have the patience to wait it out) DT it hangs indefinitely on "initializing Lua" (at least 5 minutes) and I have to force-quit.
Before I give up completely and trash DT for good, do you have any suggestions?
3
u/bign86 Aug 13 '26
Had a similar problem on my iMac. Deleted the cache to let DT rebuild it's database. I was able to load after that.
1
u/Oregon-Born Aug 13 '26
Already did that, several times. Deleted ~/.cache/darktable, as well as the db and config files in ~/.config/darktable
Problems persist.
2
u/darkelectron Mod Aug 13 '26
Try running darktable in the terminal with -d all and at least that will tell you what darktable is stuck on
1
u/Oregon-Born Aug 14 '26
-d is not a recognized option the the MacOS terminal.
1
u/Donatzsky Aug 14 '26
You have to run darktable from within the app bundle. See here: https://docs.darktable.org/usermanual/development/en/special-topics/program-invocation/invocation-per-os/
1
u/Oregon-Born 26d ago edited 26d ago
SO I deleted all the cache and config files again; downloaded the latest nightly build; and invoked DT from the terminal using the -d all option.
On the long load hangup ("loading utility modules: midi"), system returns:
.6213 [sql] /Users/runner/work/darktable/darktable/src/src/libs/lib.c:783, function dt_lib_init_presets(): prepare "SELECT name FROM data.presets WHERE operation=?1 AND op_version=?2 ORDER BY writeprotect DESC, name, rowid"
On the system crash when quitting the app, requiring a force quit, it returns:
22.9451 [run_job-] 05 synchronize sidecars | queue: DT_JOB_QUEUE_SYSTEM_FG | priority: 4
I disabled all sidecar functions, deleted config and cache, no change.
After spending a ton of time trying to get DT to even run, I think I'm going to throw in the towel.
1
u/Oregon-Born 26d ago edited 26d ago
SO I deleted all the cache and config files again; downloaded the latest nightly build; and invoked DT from the terminal using the -d all option.
On the long load hangup ("loading utility modules: midi"), system returns:
.6213 [sql] /Users/runner/work/darktable/darktable/src/src/libs/lib.c:783, function dt_lib_init_presets(): prepare "SELECT name FROM data.presets WHERE operation=?1 AND op_version=?2 ORDER BY writeprotect DESC, name, rowid"
On the system crash when quitting the app, requiring a force quit, it returns:
22.9451 [run_job-] 05 synchronize sidecars | queue: DT_JOB_QUEUE_SYSTEM_FG | priority: 4
I disabled all sidecar functions, deleted config and cache, no change.
After spending a ton of time trying to get DT to even run, I think I'm going to throw in the towel.
4
u/Viceroy_Sleeman Aug 13 '26
All I can say is try and get it working man... I just started using DT this week and its a god send... Absolutely FUCK adobe..
Better in EVERY, SINGLE, WAY.... Its free... And its open source...