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Folder names are not metadata, and we are going to have to go on agreeing to differ on the merits of having the artist's name on a folder.
Vanity folders I can deal with...
I just wish there was some consistency in the folder names:
Character vs Characters
Pose vs Poses
Genesis vs Genssis
Scene vs Scenes
The amount of typograpical errors in the folder names is overwhelming.
The artist's name on a folder doesn't help find anything when it's among a hundred other folders in a gigantic "Props" directory.
All I'm saying is that whoever is responsible for these installers creating directories like "genesis 8 females" should be...doing something else.
DAZ QA said some months ago that they had written some software for auto-detecting some of these folder naming errors (something I'd suggested for a long time, it's pretty simple to make). So maybe at least misspelling default folder names isn't a problem with newer products.
If DAZ wanted to get rid of me as a PITA customer, then all they would have to do is add product sorting to DIM. I'd probably have an immediate joy aneurysm.
Sorting based on which criteria?
Just being able to do simple things... Like "Show me Shaders." "Show me G8F Characters."
The product sorting in DIM right now is just guessimates using fancy filters on the product names. Having actual, meaningful metadata associated with the archives would be nice.
If the DAZ store files we discussed a while ago contains these data it should be possible in some way by passing data to DIM from some external program like Product Manager. I guess you already know that you can pass data from a Product Manager search to DIM so it lists the products found?
Unfortunately the electricy prices where I am, which already were among the highest on the planet, have tripled+ so it's very limited what I can work on right now without going bankrupt.
Yep. And I still use Product Manager when I am doing extensive searching. I just don't break it out when I am looking for one or two products.
Anyway, I don't want to derail the conversation any further. :)
Or even DAZ vs Daz for crying out loud.
Redacted
That is not true, filtering can be based on many things other than string matching for the name (though that is an option) http://docs.daz3d.com/doku.php/public/software/install_manager/referenceguide/interface/filter_field/advanced_filtering#file For example, you could use the paths of files in the package to identify morphs etc.
file::rx::ci::^/data/DAZ 3D/Genesis 8/Female/Morphs/.*
--
file::rx::ci::^/data/DAZ 3D/Genesis 8/Female 8_1/Morphs/.*
--
file::rx::ci::^/data/DAZ 3D/Genesis 8/Female/Projection Morphs/.*
--
file::rx::ci::^/data/DAZ 3D/Genesis 3/Female/UV Sets/.*
--
file::rx::ci::^/People/Genesis 8 Male/Characters/.*
Okay, there are multiple problems with this approach.
1. It only works if the products are installed.
2. It doesn't work with products that aren't consistently named.
3. The last time I did have everything installed and did this, it was insanely slow because of the number of products I have in DIM.
4. As far as I know, it can't differentiate between periods in the file names.Which is a big problem with the 8.1 files.
But most of all, this black magic annoys me, which is just a trick to try and catch the 8 in the filename and ignore other instances of 8. And not use any sort of metadata:
Which doesn't catch any of the 8.1 characters, Like Kento and Leanne:
The final two things I will say is that there is metadata associated with the packages, its just not consistent or checked.
Like this, what's the difference between "Software" and "Software Only?"
But this one is my favorite. If I am searching for "Plug in" under "Type" why does Mystic Gorge, Clothes, and Characters show up?
"Ha Ha Ha"
That is what the refund option is for; if i had so many with errors, I'd return the damn lot.
As is often the case, a balance achieves the best results.
The RegExp can be modified to handle variants:
file::rx::ci::^/People/Genesis 8 Female/(Characters|Character)/.* - Character or Characters
--
file::rx::ci::^/People/Genesis 8 Female/Characters/.* - just Characters
--
file::rx::ci::^/People/Genesis 8 Female/Character/.* - just Character
If you preceed the dot with a backslash the ., i.e., \., it "escapes" the dot's syntactical meaning of "any character" within a regular expression (rx::) and makes it function as a literal character.
rx::ci::^[A-Z]+\b ?(?:[A-Z]+\b)? 8(?:\.\d+)?$
--
This is the same expression, but "(?:\.\d+)?" has been added between between the "8" and "$", which translates to "an optional non-capturing group consisting of a dot followed by one or more digits" at the end. There are a great many guides availble online to using RegEx syntax.
Obviously if there are errors in the emtadata they will be an obstacle to filtering - though filtering, e.g by path ("female" vs "male") can help. if you find bad metadata it should be reported, of course, but that doesn't mean that the filtering system is bad or that it doesn't work from the metadata.
Software is a catch-all while the previous three are specific. See
http://docs.daz3d.com/doku.php/public/software/install_manager/referenceguide/interface/filter_field/advanced_filtering#type_s
http://docs.daz3d.com/doku.php/public/software/install_manager/referenceguide/tech_articles/types/start
There may be good rasons (I think the Advanced Lights install like plug-ins, they put code, shader code, in the application folder) or it may be a mistake.
All of that is well and good, but complete misses the point I was making.
If I am in DIM and I am trying to filter Shaders, there is no way to do that. Some Shader packages have the word "Shader" in the file name. Some don't. From there it just gets worse in trying to narrow down Shaders.
The "black magic" I referred to is what is built into DIM's filtering. So DAZ should update the DIM Install Filters or whatever the package is. They shouldn't expect that every user will learn how to code filters and then implement them.
The bottom line is, I do this for a hobby. I don't want to have to learn a new language just to be able to sort through my purchased content. I'm certainly not going to install 17,000 products just to be able to filter the directory names. Which may or may not have the right names to begin with.
I only wanted to bring it up as one more ripple of problems that happens when misspellings, bad metadata, etc. makes it through QA.
I know this will probably all be disregarded... but if DAZ wants to know why they don't attract and retain as many new users, its because the whole process is far from user friendly. Just band aiding the problems only makes them fester and infected.
I doubt if many Daz users understand rx::ci::^[A-Z]+\b ?(?:[A-Z]+\b)? 8(?:\.\d+)?$
At least the capability is there, if someone wants to study up on regular expressions.
With you on this.
There are already a lot of pre-rolled options in the Install Manager Default Filters package, RegExes that rob wrote to cover a lot fo common needs and to provide a starting point for others (since the text is available in the filter box).
As an aside, I'm pretty sure that the Word and other word processor search/replace filters can use RegExes, as can many text editors (I have, with considerable consultation of the web, made a fair bit of use of the one in TextPad for various things) so any skill you do pick up is portable to other activities
That's why I have 425 products out of 17,000 installed.
I install what I need for whatever project I might be working on or items I want to experiment with / test.
Then when I am done, I uninstall them. After I've backed up the project so that I know what needs to be reinstalled if I want to revisit it.
This way my unmanaged, haphazard, impentrable forest of content is only a small garden with a couple of weeds.
Yes, I use those built in DIM filters. Just the thought of regex takes me back to the days of using the vi editor. Thank goodness we've come a long way since then. Notepad++ is my go to now. But regex lives on in many use cases, as you say. I couldn't do anything with it now, without looking stuff up continuously and following examples.
Redacted
Maybe Studio 5.0 will have something to get around this?