Quick questions about libraries
Andrew_C
Posts: 105
Its been a long while since Ive used Daz Studio so Im basically relearning it from scratch. Anyway my question is can put 3rd party stuff for Genesis figures (eg from Renderosity) in a seperate library, because I can see my primary library getting really messy if I have to put it all in there. Mostly wondering about stuff like morphs & figures.
Also for some reason my primary library created by the DAZ Studio installer (C:\Users\Public\Documents\My DAZ 3D Library) doesnt have a Content folder and I recall at least some DAZ Studio stuff used to go there & some freebies Ive downloaded have one. Did I goof up when installing & should I reinstall?
Not sure If this is OK here or should go in the new users forum
ED spelling
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Comments
The 'Content' folder inside the installation Zip, is an alias for the base folder of your Content Library (for example "My DAZ 3D Library")
The 'Content' folder should never be extracted as a sub-folder to ones content library.
Thanks for clarifying about the content folder, as I said been a while since Ive used Daz Studio
To answer the other question, yes you can put non daz-bought stuff in a different library and I would argue that this is the best idea. I believe it was said that Daz Studio can support up-to about 10 base directories at one time before it maybe starts getting a little sluggish (that's probably a safe estimate as it would depending on your hardware no doubt). Therefore, using an extra one or two should be perfectly fine. Given that 3rd party assets cannot be installed magically using DIM it is best to keep them separate to avoid any potential clashes or wiping out important directories within a mistimed drag & drop (only done this once myself but it was a real pain to fix).
It's simple enough to add the additional base directory and then Daz will be able to read the contents fine, regardless of what type of Daz content it is. Obviously if there is poser assets in there too then you should also add it as an additional base directory under poser content.
Great to hear, I had gathered it works much like Poser Runtimes, but its good to hear G8 (& G9) stuff doesnt have to be in the primary library.
Ahh, well I have never used Poser but given the history and various compatibilities then there will be some cross over - atleast in this version of Daz Studio.
Sorry, when I read the question before I thought you only meant keeping assets from third party stores (Renderosity/RenderHub) separate from daz3d.com/shop bought content rather than having separate base libraries for the generations. However, I think my answer still stands although there will be a little extra admin involved I guess. The setup in Daz itself will be the same but the installation will be a bit more involved. There is configuration within DIM to setup multiple base library targets but I don't think you can make it pick a base library by generation - you would have to select the items for a generation and then pick the matching base library before installing just those ones. For the third party stuff if you are installing manually I guess it's pretty straight forward but if you are using Content Wizard or another similar tool then that may not work as again I am not sure auto-setting a base folder by generation is an option. Also, I am not sure what you would do for cross-generation items - e.g. an outfit that works on G3, G8 and G9.
I only have three base folders setup: the primary library for Daz-bought stuff, a third-party library for anything obtained from elsewhere and the personal library for my saved scenes, subsets etc. So that means I have only the primary library configured in DIM and only the Third-Party library configured in Content Wizard and thus haven't needed to play around with the advanced distribution options for either of those tools.
The number of CMS directories doesn't seem to have any effect at all on performance and it really shouldn't; DAZ is using an SQL database to find stuff but it knows what is there after it has rebuilt its internal structures. This is obvious if a single directory is added or removed via the "CMS Directory Manager". Updating takes a few seconds but not that long (well, maybe longer with really slow disks or network mounted CMS directories). Once the update is done it is, so far as I have ever been able to tell, done; DAZ knows where everything is.
On the OP question I agree completely; Renderosity packages are a bit of a nightmare sometimes with stuff in unexpected places. I actually use Content Wizard to package them up as DIM packages before installing them using DIM; that gets me SmartContent but it also reveals when things are in the wrong places. I install the resultant packages into a separate CMS directory.
The directories are all created on demand, so if nothing requires the directory it won't be there. DIM does seem to remove empty directories on uninstall, which is actually very helpful when cleaning CMS directories up.
I don't have a "Public Documents" directory for DAZ and, anyway "My DAZ 3D Library" would not normally be in \Users\Public; pretty much be definition it's your directory. It defaults to \Users\Yourself\Documents, but I change that because my "root" directory (to use Unix terminology) is on a relatively small disk.
Well, for DB searches then yes that would not have an affect but I think it's for when stuff in the data folders are called for. However, the absolute paths to things are not stored (unless they are not within a base library), only the relevant paths within the base library. So I think the potential slow-down can come from that area.
I use Content Wizard for non-daz stuff also, but I just let CW itself add both the files and Smart Content as it usually does a decent job. I would agree that some of the third party packages are poorly packaged - although either they have been getting better recently or I am a lot less observant as the amount I have had to fix has been decreasing.
Maybe also good to know: if you're using multiple libraries and end up wanting to move an item from one library into the other then you'll never have to worry about your projects: as long as an asset is available to Daz Studio - no matter what exact library it's in - then DS will always manage to find your assets again.
In addition: keep in mind that it's actually relatively easy to add 3rd party contents into your smart contents panel; in its basic essence all you need to do is to categorize it and then add meta-data where the asset type will be the most important part. Figured I'd mention it.
Sorry about the really late reply, but TY for the tip of using Content Wizard for handing 3rd party stuff. And all the other tips