Carrara and Linux? Is it possible?
Knittingmommy
Posts: 8,191
I was just starting to get around in Carrara when my Windows 10 took a dive. For now, I have Linux up and running again and got DS installed and running. I'm in the middle of transferring all of my daz library over to the Linux drive. I'm wondering if anyone has gotten Carrara to work in Linux. There seems to be a general impression on the DS and Linux thread that Carrara and the other DS programs won't work. So, I thought I'd ask in the place where all of you hang out and ask. At this point, I'm not sure what I'm going to do about Windows. I'd love to just scrap it completely, but I might reinstall Windows 7 since I never had any problems with that version other than the memory restriction since I own the Home version which I didn't know about when I bought it or I would have done the Pro version even though it was more.
So, Carrara and latest version of Linux. Is it possible?
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Here's a thread from 2012 which indicates that it worked fine inside WINE on an Ubuntu build: http://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/6764/carrara-64-bit-linux-64-bit-wine-awesome.
I don't think Carrara has changed significantly since then, so I would imagine it still works, but I know very little about Linux. The poster's "last active" date is August, so they are still around - maybe you could message them and ask if it is still working/supported?
Also, I'm kind of glad you asked this since I was holding off switching to Linux just because I use Carrara and Photoshop so much, but when I Googled for that thread, I also found links on using Photoshop CS5 and CS6 (I use CS5) in Linux and now it looks like all the barriers that used to be in place are gone. I'm about due for a new computer anyway, so I may finally go to Linux.
I'll let you know. I'm seriously thinking of trying now that I'm only using Linux at the moments. Once I get all of my DS library squared away on the new drive, I'll give it some serious thought. With the advances in Wine and Linux, it might be easier than once thought. I don't know.
Have you give Linux Mint 18 a try yet? That is the distro I ended up deciding to go with. I used Slackware for years, but I couldn't figure out how to get things set up and installed without calling for help from my husband every time I wanted to add something new. When I decided to give Linux a try on my new computer last year, I looked for one I thought I could handle doing everything without calling for help. I ended up with Linux Mint 17. I totally trashed that trying to get Tomb Raider working with my graphics and failed miserably, but it was more my fault and my choice of graphics cards than the distro's fault. When Windows 10 failed and I decided to go with Linux again Mint 18 was out and, so far, I'm doing much better and they fixed the graphics problem I was having as Tomb Raider installed perfectly this time around. So far, my husband is very happy with this plan, too! :) I haven't had to ask for help once.
When I was doing my annual "gaze longingly at Linux across the room" I did try Mint and that was one of the ones I liked a lot (it's neat how you can put Linux on a flash drive and boot from it to try it out!) but I am not sure which version I looked at.
I really only use my computer for 3D art, assorted dice and paper RPG record and reference keeping and internet stuff. The internet stuff works on anything, of course, and all I need for the PRG stuff is something that reads PDFs and a word processor, which again you can find on any OS, but the 3D was keeping me on Windows. I use Carrara, a little bit of DAZ Studio, Blender, Substance Painter and Photoshop and both Blender and Substance Painter have native versions for Linux. If the others are workable now through something like Wine...
I was going to set up my next computer as dual-boot, but now I may just go straight Linux.
I don't have Photoshop, but I have read on several sites while doing research to get DS up and running that PS does work with Wine. I don't recall which versions if anything was specified and I don't recall if it was mentioned about how difficult or easy it was to set up. I use GIMP which also runs natively in Linux. I'm currently trying out GIMP 2.9 beta because I found a build that uses the Topaz filters and the NIK filters which I have fallen in love with using. :) GIMP 2.9 also has the ability to process .exr files which I've been playing with a little bit in Iray when I remember to run Canvases.
Yes, I think it is amazing that you can try so many different builds of Linux from a flash drive! I tried a few out before I settled on Mint the first time around. If I hadn't been monkeying around in terminal trying to get the graphics working for a game when I was permanently installing it, I would have still been using Mint 17 instead of Windows 10 this whole time. Live and learn. Mint 18 came out shortly after I had 17 up and running, but before I trashed it. So, when I got the new HD drive to set Linux up again, I went with the latest version. It seems pretty stable and I haven't had any issues with it so far. I like it. If I hadn't decided on Mint, my second choice would probably been Manjaro, but I found Mint easier to use so I went with that one. You may find another distro easier. Mint doesn't have all of the latest stable builds on some software so if you want the latest of something in particular like I did then you may have to add a ppa for download or go directly to the software's site to download the latest. This is what I had to do for Blender as the version I've been using to learn it is the latest and what comes with Mint is two builds away. I also went for that beta version of Gimp and the latest version of Calibre which I use for e-books. I found that installing them in Mint is really fairly easy, though, so not a hardship on me to track down the latest versions of the software I use the most and get them set up.
I'm curious about Wine as well. The documentation says its NOT an emulator, so I expect that applications would not take the performance hit that typically happens with emulators?
If anyone has noticed any performance issues running Carrara or other Windows apps in Wine compared to running in native Windows, that would sway me away from considering it useful.
Yeah, my understanding is that as well. I've seen said that Wine is really an acronym for Wine Is Not an Emulator. I don't know how true that is. What Wine does is kind of trick a program into believing it is running natively in a Windows environment when it really isn't. I'm not a scripter or coder so I can't tell you how it does that. I do know that I've read that it interprets the .dll needed for Windows programs and actually uses Linux processes to actually run the program. Most people seem to agree that there isn't a performance hit doing it this way. I know I've never noticed a difference and in a lot of instances native Windows programs run in Linux using Wine actually perform much better than they do inside Windows. I don't know if that it true for all programs, but that seems to be the case for most programs
All of that is based on lay terms that someone like me can understand. I'm sure someone who knows more about the inner workings of Linux could give you more accurate, precise details about how all of that actually works. I'm just glad that it does. I was in a totally Linux environment for a number of years until I came across DAZ Studio and broke down and got Windows just so I could try it out. DS and a few other programs were the only Windows programs I used. Everything else I used was in Linux. Now that Windows 10 has taken a dive on my computer, I'm kind of glad to be back in an entirely Linux environment. There are certainly fewer headaches. My install of Windows 10 which I was forced to upgrade to because of memory issues was very flaky from the start. Windows 7 was much more stable.
That is extremely true...
https://www.winehq.org/
Ah, that must have been where I read it! :) I've been on so many Linux and Wine pages the past week that my head is ready to spin! Luckily, I'm just at the boring part where I get to sit and watch files go from one HD to another HD for the moment. I'm playing Pingus again, too, while I'm at it. I used to love playing Lemmings. :)
Hello,
Carrara works considerably well on Linux if you decide to not use Genesis figures, as well as you become patient on rendering previews in shader room, this may be system and drivers dependent, but my experience is that cancelling rendering process usually cause a failure of Carrara under wine.
The main obstacle you may encounter is Rendering, you have to uncheck Texture Spooling in Carrara's preferences for rendering engine to work. Everything else should work pretty well, except dynamic cloth plug-in by Sparrowhawke, last time I tried it it usually hangs on calculating dynamics. Last time I checked, smart content managing system introduced in Carrara 8.5 doesn;t work at all and causes Carrara to get a fatal error. So if you want to use figures like Victoria or Michael etc. the latest that work are generation 4 figures. But I experimented with this like 6 months ago, things might have changed or not.
Sometimes development versions of Wine introduce some changes that may result in unhappy vertex.cmx file, but last time I encountered this issue was very long time ago. But stable branches usually work very well. Spooling texture on disc tick unmarked, patience with preview windows rendering and you are mostly good to go.
Sweet! I actually wish there was a tick in Preferences that allowed us to disable the preview render in the Texture room. I don't really need that anyways - just plug in my maps, values and other things... and do a complete test render.
Col to hear that it works though - even with a few small caveats! Thanks JetBird!!!
Thanks for the tips. I actually got around to getting Carrara installed in Linux tonight. I played with it a little bit and everything seems to be working. I haven't tried rendering anything yet. I'm still installing any Carrara content that I have. I hope to get to the point that I can get a test render soon. I was just starting to learn the program when my Windows 10 crapped out on me. So, now I'll have to load Dartanbeck's video up again that I was using to learn how to get around and see what I can do with it.
Right now the main problem I see with it is that some thumbnails don't seem to show up in the Content tab, but when I double click on the box where the icon should be, the item still loads up so it is there and Carrara seems to know where it is.
Dartanbeck, have you tried unticking the Auto Update in the preview render in the Texture room? Not sure if that's what you meant, but I sometimes turn that off because in certain situations it makes Carrara grumpy...usually using displacements if I remember correctly.
I'm still setting things up, but I have a question about runtimes and Carrara. Is it better to just install the poser files for Carrara for those that have them or should I install both DS and Poser versions of the files like they suggest for DS? I'm wondering if it is better to keep a separate Carrara folder structure or just let it use my DS folder with DIM installed products. I have to say I like the Poser file structure and I wish the DS file structure were as neat.
Although, it looks like I may have to manually install the Carrara specific products that I have because DIM did NOT like them last night and every single Carrara install failed. No idea if it was DIM related or Linux related. Up to now, though, I hadn't had any problems installing with DIM.
@knittingMommy, I use Carrara, Poser, and DS, and most of my content collection is older/poser-formatted, so tending toward the poser formats works best for me. There are some other tidbits worth considering with older packages:
- The largest of the packages for a given DAZ product usually contains the 'guts' of it (geometry/textures/etc.), and the companion files are generally 'presets' for the other SW tools that 'point' to those base data files (geometry/textures/etc.).
- Even the newest of the DS-format packages tend to have a 'runtime' with textures anyway, so going with the runtime format that contains it all might make life simpler if the DS files are only companion-files (only one folder to 'mount' in your content library).
- Carrara has had poser compatibility for a lot more program updates and time than it's had DS 'duf' capability, so I personally assume the poser files *will* work, and the DS files will probably work, but this is purely superstition... Their DS 'duf' code may be quite well written.
- If you also use DS and Poser, all three have mature code for the poser runtime format, so, again, it might be more likely to just work in all three SW tools.
Alternately,
- The Genesis line of poses, clothes and characters is only DS-formatted, so if you use the newer stuff most, the DS/duf choice may be a better choice.
- Two favorite PAs, Faveral and Stonemason have pretty-much stopped doing poser formatted versions of their stuff, so in some cases we have no choice, unless we go through the manual extraction/conversion of their stuff (re-texturing, etc.) ourselves. I'm sure there are others moving this way as well.
That said, I've been building aniblocks and puppeteering in DS a lot lately, and keep forgetting that some of the stuff in older products is only found in the runtime (e.g. even michael4 stuff is missing DS/Duf companion files for some of hist settings), so I'll be toodling around in the DS folders for too long before remembering to look in the runtime for the stuff I know is in there somewhere, etc. (I'm being DS-ized, little-by-little).
Open for counter-points/corrections, but that's my 2c,
--ms
Yup. Mine is always unticked, window made as small as it can be, and dragged as out of he way as I can get it ;)
mindsong sums things up nicely. And when it comes to making a separate install for Carrara - nah... just use your DS library in Carrara's content tab so you're not doubling your files.
As for Poser vs DS content, it kind of depends up the product. We have to look at it and get to know it. I know this can be daunting when we have to install a LOT of stuff as quickly as possible, but here's the thing:
Some DS stuff is ONLY for DS (like Genesis stuff and other DUF-Only content) and that stuff I like to keep in my "My Daz3d Library" instead of a Poser Runtime structure because that's how it works best.
I don't use DS for rendering and such, so when content has Poser AND DS downloads available, I (me personally) only install the Poser files since I know I won't need the extra DS materials and such. Even if I load the stuff into DS from my Poser runtimes, I don't need the DS specific files because I won't be relying upon DS to render it.
So far I'm just using DS as a toolkit. Sometimes getting stuff converted for Genesis 1 or 2, sometimes using aniMate 2 for working with aniBlocks or something like that.
I am slowly (s l o w l y) learning DS on the side, but not much. Too much fun to be had in Carrara! ;)
Thanks. I guess I'll just use My DAZ Library then as I do still render and do things inside DS. It isn't perfect, but I do have it running in Linux, just no cms at the moment. I still haven't worked that out. I don't really care if I get Connect up and running and from what I understand I'd still have to install with DIM to work with Carrara. But that also means that I don't have any categories or alphabetized product lists to work with. I'm mostly finding everything that I have installed at the moment though. I do miss being able to create categories.
I just spent practically all day pulling my hair out, but I managed to get half of my postwork workflow running in Linux (Gimp 2.8 and Gimp 2.9 Beta along with the Google NIK Collection working in both) and now I need to see about getting Filter Forge working. Once I'm done with that, I can really start working on actually getting something rendered in Carrara and maybe show off some renders a little while I learn how to use the program.
Just a thought:
When we manually download content, I think they come in the same package that DIM downloads
I wonder if DIM would work if you downloaded them manually, then slipped those files into the DIM downloads folder, and run DIM - they'll now show up in the "Install" tab instead of the "Download" tab.
That way you'd still have the wonderful file management that DIM offers.
Oh shoot. If CMS isn't working, that probably won't work, will it? Bummer
Yes, you can download manually and put the zip in the DIM downloads folder, and DIM will see it as Ready to Install.
And CMS isn't required for DIM to work.
In Linux?
AFAIK, yes. DIM will add/remove information from the CMS database while installing/uninstalling/updating, but if it can't connect to the database it will still operate, it just puts a message in the log about being unable to access the database.
DIM can connect to my account and download files. It's had some issues with a few files, but for the most part all of my files have been downloaded and installed with DIM. Manual download and install with DIM works as well. Anything I download and put in DIM's Download folder can be seen by DIM and DIM will attempt to install it.
The part that isn't working is the CMS inside DS. I don't think I have Carrara's Smart Content tab working either, but I seem to be able to see most things inside the folder structure. I haven't really gotten that far with Carrara yet other than get it installed and make sure the most of the basics seem to be working. I just have a slight problem where icons seem to be missing their images, but the products are still accessible. I can load something up in Carrara and pose it and move around. I haven't gotten to the stage of trying a test render yet.
I'll have to look for that in the DIM log. So far, I've only accessed the log to see why some files don't seem to want to install. I haven't looked to see if there were messages about not being able to connect to CMS. Depending on what the message says, it might help me figure out why I can't get it to work yet.
So it might be helpful to go to the upper right of the browser window and turn off the icons, so you just get text to select? But it would be even cooler if that part could be made to work instead of bypassing it.
For what I do with computers, Windows 8 went in the wrong direction for me. I like 10 a lot better than 8, it came back towards my direction a little, but even further away in other aspects. I'd love to one day just switch to linux using some sort of shell, like Ubuntu for example. I'm not that savvy with that stuff... so I need an easy-to-use interface ;)
Hey... thank you SO much for reporting your progress on all of this. This information becomes invaluable for all time!!!
I've used Linux as just a user for a long time. I've had a love hate relationship with Windows for years. However, my husband who loves Slackware (probably one of the hardest Linux distributions to work with for ordinary people) and he always set up my computers with dual boot systems. When I got my new computer, I wanted to try everything myself. I did a lot of research and LinuxMint seemed the best choice for someone like me who doesn't want to build Linux from the ground up and do a lot of terminal stuff. I like the pretty packages that practically run themselves.
I knew that I would have to have some grit and determination to get my Windows programs that I can't live without all working, but at least I don't have to manually build everything. LinuxMint 18 has a nice package installer for all of those Linux based programs so you just have to look at the list and click a button to tell it to install. The one thing I don't like is that those packages aren't always the latest, best package. For example, I wanted to be able to use Gimp 2.9 beta because it can handle .exr files which Gimp 2.8, the latest stable version, won't. Some other programs are not the very latest either, but they are pretty close. Luckily, I was able to to find a great version of Gimp 2.9 in an AppImage format which let me use Gimp 2.9 without touching my Gimp 2.8 version so I have both running.
Linux has come a long way and LinuxMint 18 is a great step toward getting more people who are accustomed to Windows to try it. If you want to test it out, LinuxMint has a version which you can put on a USB drive and you can boot from that to try it out without doing anything to your Windows system. If you like it, you could always set up a dual boot system and play around with Linux.
I just got the Google NIK filters set up so that Gimp can see them and Filter Forge got installed successfully tonight so most of my postwork tools are now set up in Linux which is a big part of my transfer to Linux list taken care of for now. So now, I can both render and do postwork all in Linux with the same tools that everyone else is using in Windows.
Sweet!
Wow, thanks for the info! LinuxMint, the way you've explained it, sounds to me like it's a lot like Ubuntu, which I've tried a million years ago, running it from a CD that I saved it on.
I could almost get around okay, and I was truly stunned when I saw that "Add/Remove Programs" could add anything - Anything! Just like you said - but just the stable versions, again, like you said.
So I'll definitely try LinuxMint and give it a test draive next to the larest Ubuntu and whatever other distribution I might find interesting.
And then we'd use WINE to make Windows stuff run?
I'd need Carrara and Project Dogwaffle Pro: Howler running for sure. I think there might be Linux versions of some of my other stuff, like HitFilm and Fusion. I have a bunch of apps I really like, but what I "Need" is a different story ;)
Gimp Rocks! I actually like a LOT of OpenSource apps.
Maybe Carrara 9 will have a Linux version?
(yeah, Dart... keep dreaming, eh?)
What a fun thread... I hope it all works out well for you - and I always look forward to your next report - even if I can't get the chance to reply right away
One reason for that might be because the LinuxMint build uses a version of Ubuntu. I like they way LinuxMint is set up better than Ubuntu. Easier to get around. I did try a Ubuntu and a few others before finally deciding to go with LinuxMint. My second choice was Manjaro. Again, LinuxMint seemed easier for me to work in for everyday use.
Yes, I use Wine and PlayOnLinux which is a front end for Wine that makes getting some Windows programs to work in Linux a little easier.
Okay, see the threads with Project Dogwaffle Pro, but haven't actually looked in them. I have no idea what that is. I'll have to take a look. Once I figure out what it is, I might be able to do a few experiments and let you know if it will work in Linux. Hitfilm, I'm not sure if there is a Linux version. I'll have to look into that. Fusion 8 has a Linux version which I've downloaded, but haven't installed yet.
I like Gimp! Until I found DS two years ago, I was pretty much in Linux full time and decided to try that one little program. Two years later, I'm still here. Just tired of Windows again. I hate the crashes and blue screens.
Ah, well, from what I've read, you guys have been waiting awhile on that one. I hear soon, but I wouldn't hold your breath for a Linux version. :) I'm hoping to get into Carrara this weekend to play around. I'll update the thread with how it goes if I manage to do that. I have this list that is contantly getting things added to it and, while I get a few things knocked off like getting the NIK filters and Filter Forge up and running in Linux, I usually end up adding as many items to the list as I knock off. :)
I may not even try others... and just go for LinxMint then! I like Easy!
Again, Thank you So Much!
I like pictures. They just seem to make threads look so much nicer!
Ah, well, I like your pictures! Maybe I'll be able to add some soon. :)