Why do things end up in Lost and Found?
Joltrast
Posts: 199
in The Commons
I consolidated my content folders and noticed many items lack thumbnails and are inside "Lost and Found" in the smart content panel (but most seem to load fine).
Is it because they have no metadata attached? Will they stay in "Lost and Found"?
Thanks!
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If a file has no metadata category assigned it will stay in Lost and Found until a category is assigned. If a product contains even one file without a category, the product will appear in Lost and Found in the Product view of Smart Content.
I imagine thumbnails will work as per a duf. Just create a png for the thumbnail, name it poserfilename.png - check other thumbnails for the preferred dimensions. For a bigger thumbnail when hovering the mouse over the icon, add another, larger png called poserfilename.tip.png. Put both in the same folder as the poser file.
I have loads of stuff in Lost and Found, some even very recent products. I don't get it, why not use a checklist before submitting a product? Fixing after the fact seems more work.
Metadata is not made by PAs, as far as I know.
I don't know Daz operations or organizational processes, I was referring to the person who owns the release process of new products in the Daz shop.
Redacted
It's more like Smart DisContent. Roll the dice. It will work or not.
Redacted
That's 20% with one or more Lost and Found files, most of which will be only a very small proportion of the total - and at least some of which may well be files that would otherwise require a custom category of their own. Ideally there shouldn't be any files in the Lost and Found category but it seems a pretty mionor issue that there are
Does anyone know of a good walkthrough on how to create metadata?
Is it the same process for all DAZ stuff no longer available on site?
Which thumbnail are you talking about? All items in a Product should have some sort of thumbnail, but not necessarily the larger "tip" that you see on hover. The Product thumbnail that normally comes with the Product's metadata support? You can create one from any image (a promo, or a render of your own) by copying it (probably want to resize it to something reasonable) to the Runtime/Support folder and naming it exactly the same as the metadata .dsx file for the product. If there was no metadata included with the Product, the installation process (DIM, at least, maybe Central, don't know what Connect does) creates one to at least define the Product and its contents for the CMS database. The easiest way to find the metadata file is to search for the SKU in the Runtime/Support folder. Copy the filename to the image you want to use, and it should appear for the Product after a refresh.
Redacted
@CertaintreeV2, this YouTube video is by SloshWerks and was for an older version of D|S but is still valid. It was the one that made sense to me and helped me to clean up my Lost and Found. Poser files, Generation 4 and some Genesis don't have metadata, and as I have found, Daz will not correct metadata now that is messed up from SKU 30000. That may have moved further up as it has been a few years since they told me that. Besides fixing the old things, knowing how to fix it when your G8.1M is set compatibility to a G8.1M Eyelash is critical.
Mary
A product being in L&F or not even in Smart Content does not equate to the product not working. I believe the reason so many of us 'old timers' are not bothered by this is we never relied on Smart Content.
If you are worried about not finding a file just find the product and you will hae access to all of its files. Of coruse functional files thata re in Lost and Fount (e.g. materials) should be reproted as a bug, though I realise that some are not going to get fixed at this stage.
A rare moment of disagreement with Richard! For me, having items end up in Lost and Found ruins the whole point of Smart Content. I switched computers six months or so ago and decided to rebuild my content library from scratch and finally get on board with smart content. Prior to that I had installed things manually and put them into a directory structure so if I needed a hat I went to the Clothes -> Hats folder. Same for shoes, plants, etc. It was a breeze but I thought "If I can get the same capability AND the ability to easily install and completely uninstall items via DIM AND the extra goodies Smart Content gives, what's not to love?"
Then tons of stuff ended up in Lost and Found and it's just random, clothes, figures, props, etc all in one bin. I find it to be a big bummer and I'm considering rebuilding my custom folders again, much to my dismay, because it takes forever. But it's foolproof once it's done.
Ideally it would be easy to just move things around and fix it but you go to "edit metadata" and even something simple like adding a proper icon to replace the ones that came in as black seems impossible to do. So stuff jsut sits and Lost and Found, certainy lost but rarely ever found (by me)
I started with Poser about a decade ago, so I'm a pre-Smart Content guy. Some percentage of users seem to prefer to stick with the Content Library world of simulated manila folders. Why? Force of habit? The contrarianism of "Doing it the hard way proves my skills"? Other people using the Content Library has no effect on how I use Daz Studio, so if the Content Library works for those users, good for them.
However, I suspect most users think that a modern or contemporary graphic arts application should have a GUI that is modern or contemporary. Smart Content is simply faster and more intuitive for us. It's especially useful once you acquire a sizable amount of content with similar names. Digging through a number of files differentiated only by not-very-descriptive names (How many "bob" or "updo" hairstyles do you think most users have?) located in file folders that are identical in appearance just isn't an efficient way to find a specific asset.
Yes, an item with a metadata error will load into the scene just fine once you've found it in Lost and Found. If the air conditioner in your house breaks, the house hasn't necessarily collapsed into a pile of rubble, but that malfunctioning AC unit is a significant problem, and it should be taken seriously. "Well, the basic functionality is still there" isn't a good response to the problem.
Old Generation 4-era items ending up in Lost and Found? I expect that. I buy those assets knowing their age and obsolescence, and paid very little for them. But new items with metadata problems? That's a sign of inadequate testing and quality control.
On the last, the database editor has nothing to do with icons.
This.
I have thousands of assets dating back to 2011. I waste far too much time hunting stuff down in the directory tree and the search option is next to useless.
Understood. Ilustrating my real point which is that I don't know how to correct the problems that lead to misplaced or misconfigured items in the content manager and haven't been able to find documentation on how to do things. Some youtube users have put up guidance vids which had some good tips so that's good. I'd be happy to fix it all manually if I could figure out how. After all, I'm used to manually moving every file in my contant library into custom folders, it has to be easier to just correct the metadata somehow if the documentation exists somewhere.
Directory tree? Endless fun.
"Daz Studio Formats" (3 categories) includes "My Daz 3D Library" (37 subfolders, with both a "Readme" subfolder and a "ReadMes" subfolder). Opening the "People" subfolder leads to 22 subfolders, including 3 which exist solely because the PA misspelled "Genesis". One of the "People" subfolders is "People". There are also subfolders for "People" in "Content", "My Library", and at least 2 other locations of which I know.
Sure, I could spend some of my finite time rearranging this. But correcting errors and non-standard file structure still leaves anyone with more than 100 assets with a rat's nest of folders and subfolders to search through. I spend more than enough time maintaining and updating my external database of Daz Studio assets (which includes notes on how to find non-Smart Content items, old and new).
@Richard Haseltine
take a look at
https://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/503386/vaispora-hd-for-genesis-8-female#latest
to see why "lost and Found" is leading to "request for refund" and people returning purchases.
I thought it was the material no working that was the main problem? Though having the headpiece that does work in Lost and Fouind when one that doesn't work is in the main category certainly doesn't help.
Yes, first I thought that the materials are just not working - now I learned that in the connect installation there is a "lost and found" Item I do not have in my DIM installation
I do not have the time to investigate deeper in this mess - please just solve it or its another "request for refund" from my side - the way the product is right now - its not usable