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What could they do to deal with the plug-ins, other than what they are going to do - keep DS 4 available so that people can do whatever they need with the plug-in/script there and then ttransfer to DS 5 for rendering if they have a card unsupported in 4. But as I said above, it would seem likely to me that the non-Daz developers of scripts and plug-ins would not be willing to do many additional rewrite/recompile cycles for compatibility so I would not expect them to start working until at least close to a final version (and if they are already working they would not be alowed to discuss that).
I don't know how it works, but the Qt framework isn't Windows so it may well be different enough to allow translation where Qt doesn't (or would be unacceptable slow/would have stability issues/would break some kind of protection in licnesed plug-ins/would have any number of other possible issues). It's not as if WINE is a panacea, see the many issues and limitations discussed in the long thread on using DS under WINE in Lunux.
I was referring to your "...hopefully in a rather less bare-bones state than seemed likely earler..." and only saying that if they were still at a bare bones state they were in trouble, not saying that they actually were at that state.
Thanks, that does catch us up to where we are now. Based on some of the change logs over the last few years, I wonder if maybe there *should* be two versions of the program, a "DAZ Studio" and an "Nvidia Studio" where the latter deals with all of the many Nvidia-related updates and the former is a more limited, 3DL/Filament-oriented software with an Apple Silicon-native version with less reliance on 3rd party plug-ins. On the one hand, it would mean supporting two versions, but on the other, they're already -- theoretically -- supporting two versions anyway.
I know, this solution is specifically Walt-oriented and wouldn't necessarily please even Mac users very much if there's a loss of features in a stripped-down version, so it's not a serious suggestion.
When DAZ Studio 5 was announced, I hoped that it would be released by the time I retired. Missed that date. Now? Without any excess drama, I'm hoping it wil be released before I die... I'm just not holding my breath.
Two versions? Despite the Premier marketing there is only one DS version - the question is which features are activated and which additional plug-ins can be enabled.
Sorry, I should have expanded on that. I was thinking of there being the current version and DAZ Studio Next (the DAZ Studio formerly known as "5"). You've mentioned that every time they add a new feature or make some fix to the current version that they're also adding the feature or fixing the bug in DAZ Studio Next. In essence, they're working on two versions of the program at the same time, one of them unreleased but still lbeing maintained to align with the released version.
People are speculating a lot. I'd safely say we won't know any details until DAZ officially releases them. I just don't have the time to think on it.
DAZ is one huge reason why I gave up on Macs, and switched back to Windows PCs. I currently have a PC that runs DAZ Studio nicely.
I've thought of getting a more powerful PC. I think the timing would be wrong. I'll wait and see what happens when DAZ Studio 5 has been around for awhile.
There are ways you can get around the plugin problem - you can even decompile C++ DLLs these days - but my, it isn't half a ton of work for each individual plugin. There's also likely a legality aspect to it (with the caveat that I don't know the contracting agreements between plugin vendors and Daz). It's relatively common in the gaming community in order to keep old games running, but like the people who probably do Wine, it's an act of love not commerce. Except maybe for GoG, who I believe dabble in this and for whom it may be an act of both. But even they benefit from building on the efforts of an open source community, as well as the efforts of their lawyers to keep everything legit.
QT I thought was supposed to be the generic interface between the APP and the OS, just like Vulkan and openGL was suppsed to be the generic interface between graphics hardware and the OS and apps. Of course, we know Microsoft went with DirectX and Apple with Metal.
In the case of PA plug-ins (those which don't list Daz as a vendor) then no-one but the artist would have the right to make changes. It is the PA-owned plug-ins that are the issue.
Qt is aframework that can allow developers, to an extent, to write platform-agnostic code. However, different versions of Qt are not hot-swappable.
It sounds like the only way that issue will ever be resolved is with the updated version being released. If the DAZ-owned plug-ins are all working, then it's stable enough to get plug-ins working, right?
Moreover, the original plan was to keep version 4.x.x.x alive so that people who are dependent on the older plug-ins could still work. For that matter, it should probably be kept alive for older PC operating systems and video cards regardless.
Sure, some vendors might feel that they don't want to update their plug-ins for limited payback... but, those vendors would have decided that last year, or would decide that next year. I don't see there being a "sweet spot" where they'd decide otherwise.
Plus, the sooner the updated version is out, the sooner *new* plug-ins might be developed to take advantage of new features.
Thanks again, Richard, for all of your patience. I respect that you have to play devil's advocate to some of our more outrageous suggestions while at the same time -- due to your inability to share company specifics -- you're playing the role with one hand tied behind your back. You're a better man than I.
I don't buy plugins any more. Many years ago I bought one and DAZ eventually gave it away.
Another time I bought Mimic. I think DAZ eventually abandoned Mimic.
That was July, 2021. At least one of those predictions has come true: We can still indeed download and install Daz 4.
I know this is not being helpful, and I know Mac moved the goalposts by dropping Apple Silicon on everyone in 2020, but we're going on a half-decade now. I'm baffled how something can transition from "almost done" and "the very end of [2021]" to Welcome to Duke Nukem Forever mark II. Do we have anything even vaguely approximating an ETA?
The way in which this post, by a former employee, keeps being brought up is a major part of the reason that there is no ETA for the next major version of Daz Studio.
I understand. It puts DAZ In an awkward, very difficult spot. It's the reason British Royals very Rarely comment -- Oops! -- I don't mean Harry and Megan.
In all fairness, the "former employee" (Director of Technology for Daz 3D) was doing damage control. The Mac OS "Big Sur" was announced on June 22, 2020 and released on November, 2020; DAZ Studio didn't work on machines running it; the next OS, Monterey, was announced on June 07, 2021. At the point of the announcement by DAZ_Rawb (July, 2021), the then-current OS had been out for eight months with a new one on the horizon and any Mac hardware upgraded to it (intel- or silicon-based) or any new machine purchased couldn't run DAZ Studio. At that point, I had over $60k in DAZ content alone but if I wanted to update my computer or buy a new computer, the investment in content would be rendered useless.
In hindsight, had they known that they'd shortly get help from Apple that would make his announcement unnecessary I'm sure the post would never have been made, but in truth they hadn't been able to get it working for eight months at that point and something had to be done. They made the decision to put out a pre-beta (alpha?) that would allow Mac users with newer operating systems to at least use their content in a bare-bones (but with Filament!) program.
If they hadn't made the announcement and just gotten it running, instead of quoting the post every year I'd be asking when I was going to get Filament, since Filament had been released almost five years ago. Mac users would still be making posts asking about an Apple Silicon-native version, and so on.
There'd still be posts asking for updates, road maps, hints of upcoming features and so on, and we'd still be here, still wondering.
A total lack of any road map or any word whatsoever would still have people asking what they should be expecting or looking forward to, especially if they're investing hundreds or thousands of dollars on content. It's only natural to want to know how their investment will turn out.
Does DAZStudio Run in one of those Windows Emulation apps? I'm wondering this in case DAZ Is unable to get this app to run on the Macintosh OS, and in case Apple drops it's emulation Mode, which I'm guessing it will eventually.
But yes, I do think there should be more updates from DAZ About what we can expect and when, even if it's an update that just says DAZ Doesn't know. At least we'd know that DAZ was making an attempt to communicate with us, and cared about our anxiety.
People do get it running under WINE on Linux, though I get the impression it is not straightforward. There is a long, and long-running thread on Daz Studio in Linux.
At this point I don't care when DAZ Studio 5 will be published... I just wonder if finally animation will get some attention.
And, please! Give us the option to turn off that popup that freezes everything every time I want to create a new scene. I don't need presets, I just want to create a new empty scene.
Workaround for new scenes: Save a scene the way you want it, then create a custom action to open that when you want a new scene. The only thing you have to remember is not to overwrite it accidentally.
Starter scenes are a great idea! They also allow one to add lights, skydome, cameras, or whatever other settings one desires in a new scene. I have a few in different configurations, and I pick the one that helps me most for what I'm doing.
Yes, I had to do this. To avoid overwrite just set the scene file to Read Only.
I should probably set up a few more. Thanks for reminding me of that :-)
We will see a DS 5 PB long before their is a DS 5 RC