Well, that really is a mystery. I just thought of one other thing that has happened that might be a part of this...
I downloaded and installed LR 5 beta. It would not run so I checked the forum and found a way to delete the LR5 preferences that it tried to copy from LR4.4 and then started LR5 to create a new set of preferences. Once this was done, I put the LR4.4 preferences back where they should be and I thought everything was fine.
Now, I have this issue ; a method I have been using for years that suddenly does not work.
What do you think?