Custom Tags in DIM

bytescapes

DAZ Install Manager supports a variety of tags that can be applied to content packages indicating, for example, the app that a package is intended for, platform etc. It's possible (using a somewhat baroque syntax) to search for packages matching a particular tag or set of tags.

I'd find it very useful to be able to add my own tags. For example, I tend to split up content across multiple content directories, so being able to tag items as belonging in, say, the core content directory, or one of a number of optional, supplemental directories might be useful. Rather than having to pick and choose items to install one by one, I could tag the items I want in a particular directory, then search for them and install them all together. And I'm sure there are other potential uses for custom tags.

AFAIK, DIM doesn't offer any way to add or search custom tags. But the CMS is actually a (rather ancient) Postgres. If I were to access it with a Postgres client -- or a custom script using a pg library - could I add my own tags? Or would they just get stomped on next time DIM did a full refresh?

Has anyone experimented with this?

Richard Haseltine

DIM doesn't use PostgreSQL, it uses manifest files (package and install) for each zip. Currently the application does not support, and would not work with, custom tags - you could make a feature request for them to be added https://www.daz3d.com/help .

bytescapes

Thanks, Richard.

It sounds as if -- based on what you say -- custom tagging would be quite a complex feature to implement (there'd presumably need to be a parallel hierarchy of manifest files that could be read and written, plus a UI to support making changes to them). So I'll make the request, but realistically I doubt that DAZ would want to spend that much effort on a fairly niche feature (and I wouldn't blame them if they didn't).

What I really want is a kind of soup-to-nuts content management system that would manage targeting different content directories, categorization of items, and handling third-party content. I have individual components that do some of it, but there's no all-in-one solution. And probably never will be.

frank0314

Yes it would probably be complicated but it's well worth a feature request and would be quite beneficial for a lot of people.

bytescapes

frank0314 said:

Yes it would probably be complicated but it's well worth a feature request and would be quite beneficial for a lot of people.

OK, if it would be useful to more people than just me, then I'll put in a request.