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Poser users? The screenshot is from DS. All you need to do is restructure the zips to create a more logical structure just like when people reorganize their runtimes. In this case putting all the V3 folders into one main V3 folder inside the Pose folder etc..
I am not a fan of connect, but it is a lesser evil than DRM, if I want to nix the bothersome sign-in or even using connect I simply re-set the CMS settings to "none" and be done with it altogether, however, CMS is a brilliant system for non-power users, as most mainstream users are only concerned where their files are when something goes wrong, so the CMS is the perfect solution for that scenerio...
But since you cannot even navigate to your content's folder with connect, (As it's buried and hidden with automaton speak.) I see no reason to use either, and am glad that we still have the choice to bypass it!
(For now...As the Daz automatons will surely change that in future releases...)
BTW, Automaton is my personal nick-name for programmers, and seeing as I admire them, I don't see this nickname as a negative in describing them...I'm even using their favored font for this to boot!And since the items in question were originally sold to be used with Poser, changing them to match what some users want (the way DAZ does things for Genesis figures) would require having two files, one for Poser users and one for DAZ Studio users.
Actually a lot of the products sold here have two zip files, one of DS and one for Poser.
I'm not sure what you mean here. In 4.9.2.70+ we have a "virtual" Daz Connect folder under Daz Studio Formats and Poser Formats showing all the Connect-installed content amalgamated in one content tree, so in that sense you can see a standard view of the content (albeit in a separate folder from the non-Connect items). If you are wanting to navigate to the folder on disc that holds the files you can do that by right-click menu, giving you an option to browse to the file or folder (for a product) location. The Info tab at the bottom of Smart Content will show the location of a fiel on disc even if it is Connect-installed. And of course you can create links to the Connect-installed files in your existing content directories, by drag-and-drop from Smart Content or by right-click in the virtual folders,
What I was suggesting was something like this (and I wonder why that wasn't done in the first place, when the product was created):
Please keep in mind that these old poser products were originally released before Poser allowed subdirectories. So, these either would have had to be dumped into a single directory, or they were split up like they were to make life easire for folks using them. Of course, then you had M4, S4, D4, F4, PT4, etc all doing the same thing...it just went crazy.
I agree that DAZ should have taken time to reorganize these at some point in the past. Maybe they plan to? Or maybe they are just too old to see the real value for it. But, ultimately, these sort of things, along with those weird products where PAs just put their stuff whereever they wanted without any organization at all resulted in an absolute mess. DAZ cracked down on that problem at some point during the genesis period, as best as I can tell, but a huge amount of the older content still is a nightmare to deal with if you just left the content where it was installed.
OK, haven't been using the oldest Poser versions so I wasn't aware of that.
Even some of the latest DAZ stuff is badly organized and I think their QA could do a better job here correcting it, when vendors are messing things up. Give the vendors some strict gudelines and if the don't follow them they'll have to fix it before the product is accepted.
Most of that was frustration as I was hunting for the redundant Daz directories and I found the Connect under here C:\Users\Ghtera530-4=8\Documents\DAZ 3D\Studio\My Daz Connect Library I thought I consolidated my directories but it seems connect defaults to the C drive and thankfully, I had not installed much via connect.
But yes, it is well contained and very convenient for when you are missing assets from your scene, but I still end up moving the entire directory from the C drive as I do not have as much space, so every time it default-installs there, it really screws my systematic installed directories up...(Which is unavoidable for any non-default custom install/dir)
Is there a way I can change the default Connect directory per chance?
Thanks again for your continued clarity for our chaotic conundrums!
Hm, there is an option for it under preferences -> Content Library associated with Current Directories:DAZ Connect Data
I have mine set to an external drive and it has several products there for things that I was experimenting with when connect first came out. Mine has 9 items installed and is already over a gig...though, most of those were the "freebie" encrypted items that were released early on for encouraging us to try them out, so they probably are bigger than some of the older content.
Still off topic...sorry, but poking around to verify the above answer suggests that using DAZ connect could result in a large proliferation of duplicated files. At least, back in the old days, people reused common resources. So, if you bought a product from Vender A, and they used reflection maps or generic texture maps in multiple products, they stored them in the same place so that you only had one copy, even if you bought 5 products that used the same one. DAZ new filesystem will store all 5 copies and massively increase the hierarchy overhead of your filesystem. As a programmer, this makes me feel "dirty" and doesn't pass the sniff test. Surely there could have been a better way that wouldn't have been so wasteful.
How about instead of creating Connect, remove the commands inside Studio that modify physical files and instead expand the Category system to have much better management controls (also give it a robust tag system that users can store their own settings to that DS won't keep overwriting) for those that want to reorganise files?
Edit>Preferences>Content Library tab>Content Directory manager button, change the Daz Connect Data location by selecting the current path and clicking the edit button (there can be only one active path, though as long as the others are in Daz Studio Format content directories they will be found).
It's too late to affect DS, but if you want to avoid other applciations' defaulting to storing documents on C: find your Documents folder in C:\Users\YOU\, right-click on it, and in the Location tab change it to a folder on a drive with more space. Most applications (including DS) wil respect this.
having multiple products use the same file opens up risks if one or more products use a differnt version of the file from the others - and also has issues if one of the products using a common file is uninstalled. DIM deals with the latter case by tracking how many products it installs use the same file and unisntalling only when the last product is uninstalled, but that can't help with the former issue. Having each product keep its own set of files avoids both issues, at the expense of using a bit more HD sapce (but not, in geenral, an enormous amount relative to the total size of the unique files associated with only one product).
Changes in DS 4.9.2.x and the (presumably) forthcoming 4.9.3.x have largely or entirely dealt with the overwriting issue - the current version won't overwrite updated categorisation, though ti will still reshow the default categorisation too, while the forthcoming version allows the hiding of the default categorisation (unless it is changed, allowing the user to assess the changes0.
Filename collision is really a PA problem and could be prevented by proper management at DAZ' product validation phase. A simple database with all "verified" files and a simple script that checks against that would be fine. It could even happen at the original upload automatically (i.e. requiring that the PA be aware of the filename collision and agrees that it's OK. This could even verify that the colliding filenames are identical using checksums, and if they differ, then the PA again would have to verify that they are aware and explain why it is (maybe they made the item bigger or look better). Then, a DAZ employee could check to see that the files are correct and OK the product to continue being evaluated for whatever quality tests they currently apply).
So, perhaps, it's one way to solve some problems, but I disagree that it's the right solution.
If I were to install all 6500 products that appear in my meta directory, I would accumulate roughly 228 thousand directories, most of which are completely redundant. I personally think that's bad design. But, you may disagree.
Most of which are redundant? That sounds unlikely if we are still talking about files found in more than one product, which are the exception not the rule.
Most of the 228,000+ directories created by this approach would be redundant. I would guess that only about 6 to 10 of those directories (out of avg 35 per product) are truly product specific with the rest being standard stuff (runtime/textures (that's 2), people/genesis whatever/etc) and then a number more which would be specific to the PA which would be common across a number of products. The number of redundant files would probably be in the 100s, unless you don't have a lot of old poser 4 era content. I think those were mostly reflection maps, most of which could probably be deleted altogether these days, unless you are actually using a really old poser program.
Looks like there is another new one to add to the list:
http://www.daz3d.com/fw-nadine-hd-for-victoria-7
As normal it is heavily discounted, with a price under 4$ if you buy one of today's releases.
Aaargh! Thanks for the heads up!
Being in a different time zone ... is Release Date: 2016-06-26 correct? (Readme is not up yet)
Impossible to discount DRMed products enough.
The funny thing is I had her in the cart, but the price raised some red flags in the back of my mind so I checked and yup, encrypted. Out it went.
Yeah, the steep discounts were obvious. I am so sick and tired of having to check toi see if something is DRMd. Really sucking the fun out of purchasing and this hobby.
So not only are they refusing to mark things as encrypted or not, the new strategy is to make it as unclear as possible that new products are encrypted?
If you want to sell things encrypted, that's fine, whatever - but be up front about everything you're doing. Intentional or not, this comes across as super sneaky (as shown by all the people who post that they didn't realise at first each time) and is not good for brand reputation. Completely agree - going to go spend my money on things that are still fun.
Oh well - sneaky it is not ...
That's like Poser only users complaining about not seeing that things are DazStudio only, it is clearly on the product page ... we are required to take a look at that page before buying. Or would you buy something at another online store without looking at the product page?
Quote from product page:
Wrong advertising doesn't help and makes it even easier to oversee the Daz Encrypted Content note. Instread it should clearly say it's a 4.9+ only product (for a year at least).
That's an interesting point. The PA went to the trouble of making the product useful to both sets of users, and the sales folks here blew that effort away by making it useless in all but the most recent. That's a shame, though, I guess they got paid the same in the end...
I check every product whether I'm buying it or not and I still miss it sometimes. I'm also aware that the part that says if it works in Studio or Poser is often inaccurate and not an actual prooduct compatibility list.
The fact is we asked for clear markers / icons on the product icon the same as DO and PC+, or like the 'new' banner, and were completely ignored. Now they don't even bother mentioning it in the promo. They may not be intending to be sneaky and whatever but if people are still getting the impression they are then it's the same result.
well I've bought a few connect stuff included the latest lady sorry guys but one of my monstrosities freebies I got btw you can cheat here buy one required item choose your freebie buy pay, then you can repeat and get another freebie you could probably do this and get a lot of the freebies if there are a few new items in that sale you like, anyway back on topic one of my freebies was wicked undead fiend morphs an old product from the v/m4/genesis days right now I didn't take notice of stuff being installed selected by dim bought a few other things not in sale as soon as finished started daz to install new girl and what did I see not only the new girl to install but I had to install wicked undead fiend morphs via connect - this is an old product dim should have installed it if I hadn't had to download the new girl via connect I wouldn't have known had to with undead and this isn't the first time either other products released long before connect I've had to too and some have had their parts split up between connect and dim giving me incomplete products I wouldn't relise missing something if I hadn't had to open connect to download connect only content even old stuff bought and installed long agao I've had to reinstall via connect seen had to when opening sometimes a few times for the same stuff that up it's frustrating and no sign in dim had to reinstall anything