Create Poser 11 folder from selected DAZ content
Even after a year I am still a newbie at so many aspects. I have Poser 11 installed. There are things I think I can do more easily with it in terms of creating content. And packaging stuff as CR2s etc. One thing I can do is just add to the Poser 11 library the ENTIRE (over 1200 products) DAZ library appropriate version, the one installed by DIM. But it is a big deal and hard to search and sort out though it does work.
From Rendo I have hand made folders plus runtime that include a lot of merged content I got there both freebie and purchased.
I wanted to make specific selected similar sub-libraries of DAZ content for the sole purpose of adding them as Poser 11 libraries. To start with ALL of my Aiko 3 content from all over the DAZ library and then perhaps even hand complile into it some stuff for A3 I have gotten from Rendo.
I thought I might be able to talk DIM into doing this as I carefully save and archive all my ZIPS. And indeed DIM allows me to make a second location for installed content. The problem is that it thinks all this stuff is already installed for DAZ. I suppose I could uninstall it which would cause the selected list of files to build up in the ready to install tab and then install them again in the special Poser 11 subfolder I want to make. But then they would be uninstalled in DAZ.
Other than laboriously hand compiling such a thing is there a simple trick for this? If I went to all the trouble of finding all the ZIPS and putting them as duplicates into a folder and then using DIM by showing it THAT "download" folder could I trick it into installing just the Aiko 3 stuff (a rather long list salted all up and down the product catalog and DIM listing) into the desired new subfolder to add to the Poser 11 library list?
Man I do NOT want to break DAZ 4.9 yet again!!! And if the best answer is just live with adding a pointer to the appropriate DAZ installed content then I can live with that unless there is some terrible hidden hazard like accidentally erasing or moving in POSER something in the DAZ library. Thus I would prefer a completely separate content folder for stuff to add to the Poser library list.
I bought Prepper for Mac but that turned out to be vapour ware and I am still waiting for it to appear as a download in the Mac version as it might also do what I am trying to add to my possible workflow so I am looking at Poser more closely in the meantime.
Aloha and thanks in advance for any pointers on how one might do this sort of thing...
Daz 3D is part of 
Connect
DAZ Productions, Inc.
7533 S Center View Ct #4664
West Jordan, UT 84084
Licensing Agreement | Terms of Service | Privacy Policy | EULA
© 2025 Daz Productions Inc. All Rights Reserved.
Comments
DS can have multiple content directories as DIM can, just add the Aiko 3 folder (and so on) and use it for both Poser and DS.
Thank you Richard for your answer but I am still unlcear, sorry. I have added the DAZ folder to Poser 11 library list but it is huge. I wanted to extract just Aiko 3 stuff using the power of DIM instead of by hand one folder at a time into a new hand made runtime and make just a library for that and a few other subsets for favorite sets and another for favorite props. I can see how to add a new place to install content with DIM so I can select it, but DIM is sure content is already installed and apparently I would have to uninstall it to get the option to re-install the selected files into this new directory I wanted to get DIM to build for me. Without geting rash and deleting the manifest file or other draconian fiddling with a DIM that finally installs content where I need to have it and DAZ seems to agree it is there though there has appeared a new wrinkle.
Also I just noticed to my horror that when I tried to swap out a texture in a saved SubSet of a scene I was working on, The Cellar, The textures were no longer from the Product Library but from the cloud. I wanted to tone down the incredible texture on the concrete walls so I loaded the walls texture into photoshop and cut and pasted copies into a 2x2 grid and did some work on the seams and some rotations and made a new version that had smaller detail and saved it back to the actual DAZ library recognized from like 4.8. But found I had to browse to an entirely different place now that there are two libraries one of which is only named by code numbers and nearly impossible to navigate. True I was able to figure out where to drill down to in the real DAZ library and find the folder where I had saved my copy of the edited texture and install that but I had not expected to find that loading from the Product Library now uses the cloud directory to get all the content behind those code number folders completely restructured.
Now I really am worried about doing anything to the DAZ directory structure now that we have to deal with both the Product Library we had before and the new cloud directory of numbered folders all with individual runtimes. Will it freak if I put my edited texture into the runtime in the proper code number cloud folder if I can figure out which one that is? Right now I have a saved SubSet version that has mostly textures from the cloud and some edited textures from the real Product Library.
Also it seems to default to the encrypt files button which I never used before. I have started being sure that is unchecked. Is that OK? I was just finally figuring out how to drill and find things like a specific wall texture I wanted to adjust and make my own version of and was surprised to discover the one actually being used was now over in the cloud reformatted clone directory and inside a code numbered folder and all that the cloud folder had was over 1200 of these numbered folders now. Which explains why it took me over a week to reinstall all my content twice after changing to DAZ 4.9 apparently. It was building its cloud. And also probably the spinning beachball of death if I work online, it is trying to phone home when I exit and update some server version or re-verify everything I touched or some such?
Are you saying if I can figure out which cloud folders I need I can copy those into another new directory and point Poser 11 to that batch of numbered cloud folders?
Thank you for your help I was having enough trouble with one file structure. Now having both the Studio folder and the cloud folder has really confused me. I never expected that the scenes I was working hours on were in fact saving all their paths to textures etc to the cloud version instead of the Studio version. Did I screw up the DAZ 4.9 installation once again?
If the items are in the \Data\Cloud folder they have been installed via Daz Connect, if they were already installed via DIM then something is probably awry between your CMS and DS or you were using the Valentina engine and the database was on the verge of corruption and didn't transfer to PostgreSQL. Items that are installed by DIM should be picked up and used as normal in DS 4.9, if you are getting Connect fire up and download the items when you double-click them then that has not worked.
Edited textures should not be saved to the Cloud folder, at worst they will be removed next time there is an update (or will trigger an update if you overwrite an original).
What I was suggesting, though the DIM/CMS/Connect issue may wreck that, was creating separate folders for different content types (uninstalling from the catch-all folder and then reisntalling to the desired folder) and using those as content directories in DS and external Runtimes in Poser.
There is no 'cloud'...that is a folder on your hard drive. That is the Connect version.
Thank you Richard. I was super careful the last time I tried to get DAZ 4.9 to install sensibly. I went and made sure I had the latest version of postSQL I could find before I began and also made certain I had the latest DIM at the time. I have a total now of 290 plus Gigabytes of data between Connect, Studio and DIM folders so it cannot live on my limited solid state system drive. I use DIM to get stuff so I have the ZIP file to save so if yet again an update or something I do corrupts DAZ and I have to start from square one again I do not have to go through 18 plus hours of downloads but can quietly slide all those ZIPs back into a new DIM folder structure and get it to agree it is ready to install all 1200 or so of them. But alas the last time I eventually had to even slog through all the downloads which required ice packs on the poor computer (literally) as it slaved away to try to get everything downloaded again over a 3 day period. Everything installed by DIM had a black square or if lucky a white icon up in the right hand upper corner and needs to be "installed" or "updated" for there to be a nice green square in the product catalog. I finally got through all that (many hours of work while playing Fallout 4 on an Xbox to pass the time) and it seems like it is working right. Indeed recently Stuff installed by DIM has to also be "updated" or "installed" then by Smart Content by logging into DAZ connect and clicking on the white update icon or install icon to get their green square restored. At least recent download times from the DAZ farm have been the best I have seen in a year of being a member.
I did not realize I could do what you suggest and make multiple subdivided folders for DAZ content for special things. And not just install everything in the Studio folder with DIM and I suppose that Smart Content will still find it and it will end up eventually blessed and passed through security and end up in the Product Catalog anyway, as long as the new subfolders are correctly in the list of DAZ content places?
Right now I have the classic DAZ Studio folder structure that was created by DIM and it appears well structured on an external drive. But DAZ 4.9 was NOT a happy camper. Black squares and all sorts of messages and I had to go through and "install" in Smart Content while online every single item individually. And I still have to do this for updates and newly purchased stuff which I download after purchase or when updates appear via DIM. Smart Content finds them but views them as something wrong and needing to be installed all over again by Smart Content while Online to get happy green square.
Now it appears this process has created a situation where if I click on a preload in my Product Catalog it loads everything from the Connect number coded folders and not from my Studio file structure. Which it now seems to just ignore?
I suspected I could not put stuff into the numbered folders in Connect I assume that was just some new feature to make sure I actually purchased this content and did not borrow it or swipe it etc. from someone else.
I started putting edited textures into the Studio structure where the original was with a different name so I would not accidentally move the folder and lose them. I suppose even DIM would erase them if there was an update to that product?
I understand there is a "cloud" folder at least on my computer and it is a second DAZ library and it does appear to phone home if I go online and do some kind of re-blessing of everything I have "touched" in the UNIX sense apparently so the cloud folder is talking to someone out there somewhere.
I will make sceneshots and maybe you can tell me how I screwed up doing what I wanted to do. 1. let DAZ install the App on the solid state system drive. 2. Force DIM to operated on an external drive called DATA 3. Force the Studio library (old school 4.8 type stuff) to be made by DIM on install on the same Data drive instead of the system drive default. 4. when I discovered the Connect folder because it had grown to cripple my system drive (out of space) force it to move to the same Data drive. 5. Have DAZ 4.9 be happy camper about all this.
BTW just this second as I was attempting to make a screenshot I was told there was an update for DIM, not the first since I started the entire process of trying to get DAZ 4.9 installed.
You expert help is always appreciated. It is possible I set something wrong or did not "hold my mouth right". If there is still something all messed up I certainly need expert help.
I do really LIKE your idea of not just having DIM dump everything into the Studio folder.
I suppose could find all my Gen3 stuff, the base files, the clothing, the poses etc and uninstall it
Create in DIM a second possible DIM install file path and call that something like "DAZ_Gen3_Content"
Reinstall with that destination path selected.
Add that directory to the DAZ content directory manager as a DAZ content folder.
Magic happens, choirs of Angles (sic) sing, smoke, mirrors, Smart Content and Connect somehow live with this and behave right, and Viola this content reappears in my product catalog and can even have a nice green square, but are now segregated where I can tell Poser 11 to add it as a Poser Content file.
Repeat for all the Gen 4 stuff perhaps.
Is that correct? Aloha and thanks very much...
What do you mean by "I went and made sure I had the latest version of postSQL I could find before I began"? Although it is, I think, possible to use a stand-alone version of PostgreSQL that is not necessary - DIM will isntall one itself, correctly configured for DS. It certainly appears that the content isntalled by DIM is not being seen and that is why any attempt to use an item prompts you to connect and download - DS knows that you own the item, but can't see it isntalled, so it gives you a chnace to download and install (and then, even if the DIM isntall was seen, the Connect version would be used).
As to why things are not working for you, I am not at all sure - it looks as if both DIM and DS are using the same folder (assuming that you have not manually moved any of the isntalled content), and there must be a connection to the CMS or you wouldn't be able to access your order history or download with Connect. Exactly which version of DS are you using (Help>About DAZ Studio)?
DAZ version is
Version 4.9.1.30 Pro Edition (64 bit)
on Late 2012 quad core i7 based MacMini using El Capitan version 10.11.5
In my DAZ app folder there was already this folder for postSQL and it had an older version than the newest one I could find searching I believe the DAZ site so I downloaded and installed that to overwrite the folder before I began the last major re-install of DAZ 4.9 and of course I double checked I had the very latest DIM at the time. If Valentine? is still hiding somewhere I am not sure where that would be. I certainly made no effort to preserve it and let DAZ 4.9 do whatever it wanted after the most recent at the time 64 bit version was DIM downloaded and installs of components began, I think one of those was a postSQL one freshly downloaded.
But it appears the Studio directory is no longer used? As when I load something from the Product library and look at things like textures, the paths are all to the Connect cloud folder numbered folders and not the the Studio stuff duplicate installed by DIM first before going to online mode and then finding that Smart Content wants to "install" that and indeed goes to DAZ and the line slowly goes down the grey icon and it turns to color and then it finally gets happy and has a NEW banner across it and gets its little green square finally in the Product listing. I just assumed the Studio directory was actually no longer used from what I was seeing. Unless Smart Content installed for itself the stuff already just downloaded and installed by DIM, that content was grey and had the white tiny icon in the upper right corner for "install" or "update" and did not seem available until Smart Content installed it for itself.
Could be there is something fudged in the DS special version of the postSQL and somehow I did not get a properly adjusted one? I thought I got that from my account product listings in DIM as available downloads but maybe it did not overwrite the version being used since the version number was correct and I got that one from the wrong place (sans DS adjustments?)
As I said above, DS will ask to go online only if it can't find the local copy of the product. If it can find the local copy, installed by DIM, it will use that instead.
If you open the Content Library pane and go to products then L do you have an entry for LOCAL USER?
YES! I wondered about that. It has always been there at least since DAZ 4.9
In it is all the scenes, poses and subsets I have saved as work files and stuff I have generated (will not say created since they are assembled from parts from my product catalog and things like room creator mostly) and edited to make custom scenes and actors and props, though some I did make from scratch, imported as OBJ and saved to this same area as scene subsets. I created a directory I called something like My Daz Content and installed it with CMS as a folder under DAZ content. That content under Smart Content is all that is in LOCAL_USER when I tell Smart Content to open it up. It has one very strange property. If I decide a folder is getting too cluttered and I tell DAZ to make a subfolder called Backup for instance and then cut and paste the saved file to Backup it has a black bar where it used to say in a green bar "SET" or in a red bar "SCENE". It still seems to work OK but it has lost its pretty DAZ type label? They only way to move them and keep that pretty DAZ label is to load them, save them again but this time to the new Backup folder and then go in and delete the original saved file I just moved to do what I wanted and move an older version I was not ready to delete to a subfolder to unclutter the top working save folder.
I also went through a number of examples in my Product Content folders and they ALL point to cloud now. EXCEPT and this is interesting, the Gen 4 content and the other stuff that has the error icon, the grey square with the triangle and the ! point which work but never get their icons fixed and some even have black squares with an orange X in them in the lower right hand corner of the error icon, which have been much discussed. Those seem to work fine anyway and - those have paths to the Studio versions - and they are the only ones that still have paths to the Studio versions and they have been uninstalled and reinstalled at least once by DIM in an attempt to fix them and finally I just waved hands and said "they work, quit messing with them." Smart content never has given any options for those which do anything useful like one for Install or Update.
Everything else has been repointed to the cloud folders. (DAZ probably should have come up with a better default name for that folder like downloaded)
FYI - The DIM folder structure was moved way back in 4.7 and has not been moved again since through many updates and lots of added products etc.
The DAZ Studio content folder was moved way back in 4.7 to get it off the solid state drive and has been working great through updates through and including 4.8 in that same identical location.
but due to various "accidents" in trying to figure out how to safely organize DAZ content so I can find it, both of these have had to be completely erased and had to be remade and repopulated.
I was surprised to find 4.9 was making a brand new folder down on the system drive. I cannot remember if following some postings in the forums I understood that I did not have to completely remake it but could just copy it over to a new location and moved it that way and edited the file location in the CMS which seemed to work fine, or if at some point in the month of horrors it was completely erased and totally rebuilt from scratch as well.
Aloha and Mahalo (thanks)
So the content is no longer where DIM installed it? If nott hen that is your issue, I think - DS looks at the path set by the DIM install, can't find the content, and offers to download it.
I don't think so. for ages as I said DIM has installed to the same location on the data drive. And reinstalled a number of times no less during various "breakages" mostly caused by my attempts at organizing my stuff so I can find it. The Studio directory is where it has always been. But I checked yet again. Open DAZ, go to CMS directory manager. I even clicked edit and the link and confirmed that it went where I thought it went?
What I said was I might have just copied the growing DAZ Connect second library to the Data disk since I thought I saw postings that said this was an OK way to move that. But I am not even sure I have not completely rebuilt that one or more times in an attempt to finally get DAZ to recognize all three important directories at the same place, DIM, Studio and Connect.
What has happened is Smart Content has decided to take over all control and now everything loads from the Connect clone's numbered folders and Studio has become just vestigial like an appendix.
With as I said the content which DAZ can find just find still in Studio where it has always been because of the fact Smart Content seems to think the entire products are malformed and will not do anything with them like Aiko 4 and the other Gen 4 stuffs. Those with the error icon work because the product directory still points to them in the Studio folder structure and those paths have not been changed by Smart Content.
To make sure I am doing what you ask I went to DIM and opened that and went to Install under cog and did the same thing. Looked at the path which has been used by DIM for ages now since I first under 4.7 got DAZ to start using an install path not on the system drive. Same thing. Even did the browse to directory and confirmed that indeed that is exactly where it should be and when I do an install of new stuff and I watch that folder like a hawk with display of number of items in folder turned on, be in low hold, it increments as it should as DIM says it is installing content.
Now...
Because DIM itself is massive with its huge content directory if you do not erase the zips so you can reinstall without re downloading, The DIM itself also operates from the Data drive where it has been operating since I was able to move that massive folder as well back in 4.7 and that is where it also lives and works.
Is it possible that DS is only looking for the DIM information in the default location on the system drive and that is why it is not finding it? Never was a problem with 4.8 and it is still not a problem with the stuff which give the error icon so Smart Content thinks it is malformed and will not attempt to do any installing etc with it apparently. That still points where it always has pointed to the DIM designated and used install folder on the Data drive.
Triple check. In the default location under Shared there is in fact the DIM install stuff but NOT of course the downloads. The downloads are on the Data drive of course where they have been for some time. But the much smaller other two files are still in what I believe is the default locations. Where DAZ can apparently see the installed stuff just fine as that stuff which is "malformed" and Smart Content will just not deal with like Aiko 4 base is still properly pathed as it always has been.
At this point I have no idea what could be wrong though I understand your statement that Smart Content simply thinks the stuff was never installed so it needs to do that for me. Unless it simply cannot deal with the package at all like the various stuffs that get the grey error icon (triangle ! etc.)
And yes manifest is chock full of generated files
Sorry this has turned into an ordeal and thank you very much for your persistence.
No, DS will work with non-default locations.
As I have said, it isn't that DS has "decided" to use the Connect install - it's that you are double-clicking products thata re not, so far as DS is concerned, installed and so it is downloading them (which is the default action for uninstalled content). The only way to stop it doing that is to figure out why the CMS doesn't see the DIM installs and fix that. I think at this point you should open a support ticket, explain that your content management service is not seeing the content you have isntalled via DIM, and see if support can help.
OK I will go that route. Last time I tried that was during Hell Month and all I got back was a note that there was a hardware problem with the servers and everyone was very busy and nothing else and my ticket just died.
My download times indicate servers have clearly been worked on and are better than ever, so I will try a support ticket again. Maybe Smart Content is simplistically only checking for the downlaod folder and not in fact actually bothering to look at the DIM path or some such. Only the Shadow knows..
Thanks so much for all the effort trying to untangle this mess for me. I love DAZ or I would have written off my rather substantial investment of money and larger investment of time and scrapped it when 4.9 went sideways and then it became nearly impossible to even connect to DAZ content for some reason and support seemed simply overwhelmed.
When I finally thought I had this sorted and took a chance on purchasing some new content anyway, DIM downloaded that just fine and then I discovered the new stuff was all grey and I had to go online and let Smart Content "install" it for me. I thought that was normal under the new rules. I even was able to start making renders again and creating stuff instead of wrestling with trying to get some configuration of the 4.9 at least appearing to work. Then I noticed by accident all my textures I thought I should edit and replace were not in Studio any more. Then that the Studio folder was not even being used any more.
Your effort on trying to sort this for me is impressive.
Aloha and Mahalo
Update: Time for something Draconian.
I renamed the Daz Connect folder in use to make it "invisible".
I created a folder and called it "Connect" right next to Studio in the same DAZ3d folder on Data Drive where I wanted it in the first place. I started DAZ4.9 in offline mode
I started the CMS directory manager and edited the DAZ Connect Directory entry to point instead to this new folder. At this point something strange seemed to happen. I got a warning that this path was not ALSO in my DAZ Content directory list (and in fact the old directory path had been added there also?) So I edited that path also to point to the same new folder for Connect next to the Studio folder on Data drive.
Exited DAZ and be in low hold, DAZ had in fact recreated the DAZ Connect folder I was using since it could not find it but it was just an empty shell, so I erased that also. And went to the new folder location and found DAZ had also decided to adopt the new Connect folder and had put a data and cloud folder into that one, evidence that DAZ had apparently "moved in".
Went back into DAZ this time in full connect mode. Opened Smart Content. Lots and Lots of blank icons but wait, DAZ has decided all by itself it wants to update metadata and is working on all 1285 entries (oh no here we go again). Did not take long and all the icons but the known broken ones surprisingly turn full color regular icons with no white download or update icons in the upper right hand corner. In Product Catalog now everything has a BLUE square instead of a Green one down in the lower right hand corner of the mini-icon in the product list. Unlike before they do not have the dreaded Black Square there either. And checking paths, the stuff points to the files in the Studio folder and Smart Content does not want to install anything again. All is apparently like you said it should be.
Ok so I said well all my saved files are toast since they were are all using textures etc from that old fully populated DAZ Connect folder I just trashed and emptied trash on with extreme prejudice. But no??? They still load just fine and they load now with the Studio data structure paths and seem to have forgotten all about the bad dream it had about DAZ connect and Smart Content. And a check shows that somehow they have loaded not with the textures from the deleted old DAZ Connect folder but from the Studio folder everybody seems happy to find now, like they should and somehow fixed this all by itself and I do not have to rebuild all those stored Scene Subsets and Props etc? Looks like. Witchcraft, but I will take it and run.
On exit I find that a new meta folder is in the adopted new Content folder and nothing else except data and cloud (Connect - data - cloud - meta). No duplicate numbered folders of all the same content in Studio directory.
So what is different? Apparently it has to do with the need to have that connect folder double listed under DAZ Content as well? Where it sits and I am happy to ignore it and if I try to open it DAZ agrees it is an empty folder. Works for me. The clue was when I tried editing the location of the DAZ Connect Folder in CMS I got a warning that weird things would happen if I did not put this DAZ Connect folder path ALSO under DAZ Content as a matching entry and to emphasize its point it had created an entry for the old location there already by itself (which I edited to match the new location). See the CMS below from before and after.
I am in quit while I am apparently ahead mode. When in doubt use the BIG hammer? I cannot believe this seems to have worked or what prompted me to try it.
When you chnage the folder set as the Daz Connect content diectory, if the folder you were using was not also set as a regular content directory DS will ask if you want to set it as one now so that you don't lose access to any content isntalled there. Since you had in any event removed the existing folder by renaming it that didn't make any difference.
Yes, when you allow DS to connect it will download any new or changed metadata (which in this case would be all of it as your existing metadata had been removed by renaming the folder). The metadata isn't the content, just a compact description of it (and the thumbnail for the product).
DS sceen files store relative paths for content in a mapped directory - and in the case of Connect items it ignores the \Data\Cloud\1_SKU part of the path. So as long as the content was there in the correct relative location (the \Runtime\Textures\... bit for textures) the files will open correctly.
I don't know why these actions would have prompted the CMS to start seeing your isntalled content correctly, but as you say quit while you are ahead.