Smart Content Library is empty. Help

AbnerK

This is one of those discussions that has come up many times but, none of the threads I've read have helped or made sense to me. A lot of people talk in jargon which makes no sense to me and you smart hours trying to decode the jargon only to find it wasn't the same as my issue or it's just years out of date. I've used Daz for 5 years but, that doesn't mean I know all the jargon and backstage workings. My computer crashed I've had to reinstall windows and didn't get any options to keep App data so I had no choice but to wipe it. I've got PostgreSQL (still no clue what that string of letters means, I still have to copy and past it) working. I'm Online/Logged in but, the Smart Content is empty. I've never had this issue and can't find any fixes. Anyone got any help. Try not to talk jargon, I don't understand it and I'm new-ish to Windows. I've got My Content Library stored on an external.

felis

Have are you installating?

And have you tried for Smart Content to click the '"burger menu" (3 horisontal bars) > Content DB Maintenance > Reimport metadata?

AbnerK

Yes, I that's what I just did. It took ages but, yes that worked. I had done that once before a few years ago and new it took a long time, I don't know why I did it then or if it fixed whatever was wrong then which is why I was reluctant to just give it a go but I thought since I'm out of options I'd try it, it fixed it this time.

SofaCitizen

To explain a little further, PostreSQL is basically a database server but 99% of users don't really need to know the details of that. You can probably just use "PostgreSQL" or "CMS" interchangably and when everything is installed fine either DIM or DazStudio will fire it up in the background (so you don't have to worry about launching it yourself).

However, what you do need to know is that PostgreSQL/CMS handles all your "Smart Content"/Categories and uses a separate place to store it's data - this data is probably not something that you have backed up. This is the reason why when you re-installed and hooked up your base directories again the Smart Content was empty - that is to be expected and not something that has "gone wrong" at all.

The above comment mentioning to "Reimport metadata" is the correct way to resolve this and this will put all your Smart Content back to "factory defaults" i.e. Categoried as the PA or Daz has set it. It does this by going through all dsx files contained in the Runtime/Support folders for all linked base directories and recreates the data within the CMS.

If you do make manual changes to the SmartContent/Categories and want to make sure they would be re-applied if you ever need to re-install again then you can select "Export Metadata" from the same "Content DB Maintenance" menu. This will simply export all your changes from the CMS and creates a custom UserData1.dsx file within the Runtime/Support folder of your primary base directory. This means that if you ever have to "Reimport metadata" again then your changes are re-imported also.