Organizing Content
I am having a very difficult time organizing content. When I install new content it seems to be added to several places under default and I want to categorize it all but I don't want to categorize the same thing twice. It presents a rather large problem.
Is there a way to stop it from putting content into multiple places?
Is there a set of folders that I can be sure will contain everything but not duplicated?
One of the biggest problems that I have is metadata that gets added with the installation of the content. The metadata always seems to result in content being placed in so many places in so many bizzare ways that make it impossible to work with so I have to completely redo everything once daz finds metadata. Is there a way to stop daz studio from ever reading any metadata files ever again? Am I missing something? Is it possible to use those categories in some way? They seem completely unusable to me and it's driving me up the walls trying to deal with this problem.
Is there some way to work with Daz content like one does with poser content? Just drop the files in and categorize? The way daz is doing things is incredibly difficult and wastes hours and hours to try to undo all of that metadata and all of those problems caused by it. I just want content to show up in one place and have it not split up to where each peace of content is in 20 separate folders that I can never work with.
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Are you using the DAZ Install Manager? What you can do is stop the CMS before installing a batch of items, then start CMS, launch DS and "Scan known directories for content". This puts them in Default/Unassigned. I create my own categories outside of Default the way that makes sense to me and categorize everything that way.
Another option is to use the Products view -- that will put all the files for an item in one folder. You can either work with them from that folder, or else categorize the items in that folder yourself if there are too many.
I have ordered lots of products for Daz3D, using the DIM to install them, and nothing EVER shows up in the Products view. It would nice to know how content is supposed to get there.
Does anything show up in Categories or Smart Content?
I have found that altho an item is listed under products, the folder will be empty, how do you get those products to show in the folder? Reimporting metadata doesn't help....
I have found that altho an item is listed under products, the folder will be empty, how do you get those products to show in the folder? Reimporting metadata doesn't help....
When re-importing metadata fails to load the Product folder, I examine the .dsx support file in Runtime/Support for the product and compare the paths for the Asset VALUE= entries to the path of actual files in the DS4 library folder. 99.999% of the time the two file paths don't match, resulting in an empty Product folder.
My recommendation would be to submit a service ticket with DAZ technical support and have them sync the .dsx and DS4 library folder paths. The times I've submitted tickets for this, it's been resolved with a DIM update within a few days.
To apply my own fix, I change the file paths in the .dsx file to match the DS4 library folder paths (to maintain DIM uninstall functionality) and re-import the modified metadata file.
Good to know thank you, Lindsay. I will submit a request for the ones that aren't working so they get updated.
Boy I feel your pain. Bought three items yesterday…used Install Manager to install them. Not a one will load. I get some icons, but when I load the set I get a box with a long list of files that it can't find. It shows the list and I can go to my finder and see that those files are in the folder….but it won't link to them. Already sent in a help request.
This sounds odd. Are you one hundred percent sure that DIM was pointing to the correct content folder? And are you sure that DAZ Studio is pointing to the DIM folder as both a DAZ Studio format path and a Poser format path?
The DIM automatically adds the Metadata to the CMS database (Smart content, and all), that allows the content Icons to appear in DAZ Studio as the Database is read at open. The content files them self's will not load if they are not in the Folder Path(s) set up in DAZ Studio.
I'll try to unpack what you've written Jaderail, but it's way over my head. You lost me and "pointing?" Isn't the entire purpose of Install Manager to….well…install the stuff? Shouldn't it know what file to install stuff too? And shouldn't Daz know where to look? there should be no variables here. These things should be automatic and handled in the background. Pardon my rant. It's buy biggest gripe with Daz…a miraculous program I otherwise enjoy.
DAZ Studio by default starts with a Content folder in the Paths. That path is..
C:\Users\USER NAME HERE\Documents\DAZ 3D\My Library
The DIM installer Path by default is not that path. It's default Path is...
C:\Users\Public\Documents\My DAZ 3D Library
That was done for two reasons, one, so users of the Older DAZ Studio 4.0 could keep the content separate and two, because Micro Soft and other OS systems now recommend that Data (content is just data) be placed in the Public folders so all users have access to it. A third reason is that DIM can only un-install content it installs. So the folders were kept separate for good reasons.
Here is a DAZ Studio Content Directory Manager set up to use both folders properly...
I'll have to check that out tomorrow. All I can say is the dialogue box in Daz came up with a list of files that could not be found…and yet in my finder window I can trace the exact file path…and the files are right there. I'm on a Mac, by the way, so the PC stuff is all Greek to me.
If I understand what you're saying, Install Manager puts files in a place that Daz isn't looking. Is that right? As a newbie, I can find no logical reason for such a conflict. If this is done for users of older Daz versions…then force them to upgrade. The program is free after all.
From a business standpoint, installing should be effortless. I as the end user should have no concern over what files are put where. I should only know that if I buy a car, it should install correctly and I should see a car icon in the category of vehicles. I should double click on that icon and the car should install. My apologies for the rant, but I really hoped to play with my new toys this weekend.
Open DIM. Go to the GEAR Icon in the upper right hand. In the New window open Installation. The Path listed here is were your DIM content was installed, mine shows my custom path here. Add that path to your DAZ Studio Paths that I showed above for your system. Then close DAZ Studio and reopen it. That should now get all your content working properly. Here is a example using my DIM...
It's occurred to me that the "can't find files" error message in DAZ|Studio is a bit misleading. It tells you where it was looking for the files in the Content folder location that D|S knows about. The error message doesn't say where that Content folder is. If you check in DIM where it's actually installed something, you get the full path so you can go right there and know the files have actually been installed.
The two programs don't talk to each other — the only way to find out if the Content folder in D|S is the same as the installation location in DIM is to check the Content Directory Manager in D|S (Edit>Preferences>Content Library and click the "Content Directory Manager" button). This will show you where to find the Content folder D|S is looking at. Add this folder path to the folder path from the D|S error message, and you should get the path DIM is installing to. If you don't, then D|S needs to be pointed to the DIM installation location by adding that in the Content Directory Manager.
Thanks for the help. That did the trick. DS was pointing to Daz Library and DIM was installing to "Daz Content." I changed the DIM setting, uninstalled the recent files, then reinstalled and sure enough they are now seen by Daz.
I don't know how the DIM settings changed as I've installed stuff to the right directory before. Any thoughts on what I should do with the fewer items still remaining in the "Daz Content" folder? Should I uninstall and reinstall them to the right folder? Or move them by hand?
Whichever you think would be quickest, both will work. Although, if you want to keep the DIM-installed capability for automatic updates, it would be better to let DIM do the re-installation so the program knows where everything actually is. If you just move files, the next time something is updated DIM might not detect it properly.
As for how it happened... The DIM and CMS working together are a very handy tool, especially for someone just starting out with D|S, but there are drawbacks. They can be unpredictably flaky, and some parts of the setup are unobvious until something goes wrong; the CMS database is solid as a rock on some computers but unacceptably fragile, or the whole thing just won't work on others; none of this will be any use at all for items not bought from the DAZ store; anyone using the DIM for a large content collection had better not be on a limited-bandwidth connection, the constant re-re-re-downloads will eat that up faster than you'd believe; and old hands with their own manual content arrangement system worked out over several years would have to toss the lot and get used to a completely new method.
Oh, and even after all this time, the entire store catalogue still isn't quite completely converted from the old installers to DIM-type files, and a larger proportion of items are not yet set up with the extra data that allows the CMS (Smart Content, automatic Categories, etc.) to work.
My guess for how it happened is a hic-up on DIM open. It very well could be the old path was still in the DIM paths and it was read as master DL folder instead of the proper path. I removed all but my master DL path to prevent that from happening. I saw it once when I got a DIM update, the Top path was read instead of my set path. I love DIM, all software can glitch from time to time depending on many things like Fragmented Ram at load time and other such things.
Hi
I have a bunch of characters/people I made, from several diferent projects, and would be great if I could put them in, let say, different folders, instead of all of them were just in the folder People.
Thanks.
Are you looking in Smart Content or Content Library? If it's Content Library, then just go ahead, make new subfolders arranged the way you want them, and (using the Content Library tab controls) move your characters from People into wherever. It's as simple as that; DAZ|Studio doesn't much care where your saved content files are for scenes, figures, props etc. as long as they're somewhere in Content Library, and as long as you don't try to move the not-visible-in-D|S-anyway files that make up that content.
I use categories, so i just created a category "My Art", and underneath it I put characters, locations, etc.
Ok, let's go to the basics, I'm not a Daz hard user. I made a character, then I saved as character preset? Ihave to create a folder, a label? Currently I've saved my characters in theirs respective project folders.
I think I figured out that. I went to User > Me > Documents > DAZ 3D > Studio > My Library > Project 01 > My Characters.
I just can't do that nice thumbnails in Content Library.
You can do your thumbnails in an image editor like Photoshop or Gimp. The final output should be 91x91 pixels. Save it as a png and give it the exact same name as the thumbnail image that Studio saved when you created your preset. Replace that png image with your image and, in Studio, refresh the categories.