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Adding New Content to DAZ 4.5 is Mind-Numbing

BrotherloboBrotherlobo Posts: 495
edited December 1969 in Daz Studio Discussion

Warning....I'm going to rant for a minute.

/rant on -- Okay, I am reasonably new to DAZ -- only had version 4 for about a week before upgrading to 4.5 -- and overall I love the program.
But I HATE adding new content. Its not hard to figure out how to have the program find it....but it is mind-numbing having to go thru the 'unassigned' category and move the new content to somewhere I can find it. Why even have a 'Smart Content' tab if I can never use it? Less than 10% of the items I've purchased have shown up there.

Now, I''m sure there are some tricks people have figured out to move/reorganize items -- possibly some 3rd party add-on or a secondary program that fixed the meta-data...but why? Why should I even have to? The program developers and content developers should be on the same page! Yes, I know the program was FREE -- but since the middle of last month, I have spent over $300 on content (low estimate). I'm sure other people feel the same way I do....I just felt the need to get this off my chest.

/rant off

Comments

  • JimmyC_2009JimmyC_2009 Posts: 8,891
    edited December 1969

    I don't use Smart Content or the Database system at all. Everything you install will appear in the Content Library folder under either Poser Formats or DAZ Studio Formats. There is a search option at the top of the Content Library whcih I find very handy, but it relies on the CMS to work.

    Have you tried using the tools in the drop down in the Content Library tab, Content DB Maintenance?

  • adamr001adamr001 Posts: 1,322
    edited September 2012

    Couple of things...

    1) Smart Content is relatively new and only new items (say last 4-5 months) are going to have the necessary metadata to make it work.
    2) Smart Content Metadata is ONLY imported when DAZ Studio is first started. So if you install several things while DAZ Studio is open, the Smart Content will not be available until you restart DAZ Studio. Yes, I think this is silly. Yes, there is a way around it, but it too is silly. You have to re-import the entire metadata catalog (which can be quite lengthy). To do that just go to the Content Library context menu (little icon that looks like a page with lines on it at the top of the content library tab) and select Content DB Maintenance. Then in the resulting popup select "Re-Import Metadata". Be prepared to wait. It takes my system about 10 minutes to finish this. (It's usually faster to close and relaunch DAZ Studio is what I'm getting at).
    3) Categories are infinitely customizable. That's the point of them. I would be madder than hell if someone tried to force me to use their version of what categories they want. It would make it much harder on me to find things!

    Here's an (older) example of what you can do with Categories if you have the will: http://daz.tall-tales-racing.com/misc/20110818101_cmdb_example.jpg
    Here's a crash course on using Categories in DS4 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_nnPf8nCcc4

    Post edited by adamr001 on
  • fixmypcmikefixmypcmike Posts: 19,598
    edited December 1969

    My process is:
    1) Categorize in DS3
    2) temporarily remove the RunOnce entry that triggers DS4 to ask about importing metadata
    3) Migrate my DS3 database to get the stuff I just categorized in DS3
    4) Scan for new content and categorize the DS4-only content
    5) Close DS4 and restore the RunOnce entries
    6) Start DS4 and import metadata

  • ChromaDrakeChromaDrake Posts: 288
    edited November 2013

    fixmypcmike said:
    My process is:
    1) Categorize in DS3
    2) temporarily remove the RunOnce entry that triggers DS4 to ask about importing metadata
    3) Migrate my DS3 database to get the stuff I just categorized in DS3
    4) Scan for new content and categorize the DS4-only content
    5) Close DS4 and restore the RunOnce entries
    6) Start DS4 and import metadata

    Has this been improved?

    I have been having continued troubles trying to find content that I load into DS4.6.

    As a work around I try related to what the above admin suggests. I have been loading content into DS3 to categorize it then opening DS4 and migrating the data. It's a hassle and something that I hope to learn this has been fixed.

    Post edited by ChromaDrake on
  • ShelLuserShelLuser Posts: 749
    edited December 1969

    aemccullough said:
    But I HATE adding new content. Its not hard to figure out how to have the program find it....but it is mind-numbing having to go thru the 'unassigned' category and move the new content to somewhere I can find it.

    I fully agree.

    What I did was getting rid of this category in its entirety, then all your contents simply show up in the smart content panel.

    Now, the only problem is that I'm not exactly sure anymore how I did this.

    If I remember correctly you can find all the categories in the content library tab (which by itself is a very important tab to become familiar with. As others already mentioned; the smart contents tab can be easy to use, but if you want full control then you'll want to rely on this tab instead).

    As said I don't quite remember what the default setup was. If I remember correctly then there were two categories listed here after which I simply removed the first. Because when I started it used to first list the category name in the smart contents tab and only after I expanded it would it list the rest. Highly annoying. So when I removed that silly category in its entirety everything moved to "Default" after which the whole thing would just pop up.

    The only time I get to see "Unassigned" is when I save my own stuff. Everything I save is put under "Unassigned" within the smart content tab which suits me just fine. So my scenes are listed under "Unassigned -> Scene".

    Hope this can help.

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