Organizing DAZ content

malswansky

So I've looked through a number of tutorials & threads, but I still have a bunch questions -- I certainly don't expect anybody to answer all, but any tips would be much appreciated!

1. Let's say I have successfully created an additional content directory (on another drive) to keep stuff that I don't want to clutter my main drive (but still want to keep installed). Is there a way to move an existing installed product from the current content directory to this new one? Or should I just a) uninstall from current, b) install to new?

2. The organization of the installed stuff in my Content Library doesn't make a lot of sense to me, e.g. a product that consists of Clothing + Poses seemingly arbitrarily goes into clothing, or some products are in a folder by artist name, while others are under product/set name, etc. Is there way to reorganize it in a more custom way? I assume one isn't supposed to mess with the physical folder structure, because that might mess up the information in the manifests, etc... or can one?

3. I'm kind of confused by the metadata, e.g. type vs. category, what is actually important and what is is used by Smart Content? Like, what might I need to add as far as metadata to make Smart Content work better? And what metadata do you try to maintain/keep organized for your content?

4. In the same vein, what does one use Content DB Editor for? Is it to set metadata for products where the artist didn't bother to do it, and stuff that you create? Or is it needed to fix some other issues?

5. Categories seems like maybe the way to go to set up a completely custom hierarchy of all the content... is that what experienced users do? Or is it kind of superfluous if one properly organizes Content Library and Smart Content?

6. Finally, maybe an alternative way to cover all the bases is just to ask -- what is your workflow when you get or create new Daz content and want to keep it organized -- do you move stuff around, set you custom categories, or perhaps do something else with metadata?

Thank you!

frank0314

1. The easiest way would be to uninstall them with DIM (assuming you installed the products, that was), and then reinstall them to the new mapped location.

2. The reason for the difference for the most part is most Daz Original products is that the saving functions make them easier for smart content. The PA folder and products within are so users can keep all packs from them in one place for ease of use, though it is highly argued in the forums about doing this. We have pretty strict guidelines we follow on our brokered products when saving certain files so they can be used and tagged properly for use in smart content.

3. Not too positive.

4. Daz does the metadata so it can't be messed up by the PA. The products that are missing metadata at this time are most likely newly ported products from other stores because the PA is now selling here.

5. Yes, categories are the easiest way to custom organize your library.

6. The important thing is how you install your products. The most customizable one is DIM. You can set up numerous libraries to install products to so you can get it close to how you want your library to look.

crosswind

malswansky said:

So I've looked through a number of tutorials & threads, but I still have a bunch questions -- I certainly don't expect anybody to answer all, but any tips would be much appreciated!

1. Let's say I have successfully created an additional content directory (on another drive) to keep stuff that I don't want to clutter my main drive (but still want to keep installed). Is there a way to move an existing installed product from the current content directory to this new one? Or should I just a) uninstall from current, b) install to new?

For the products installed with DIM, yes. For other products, you have to manually move the folders/files to the new Library.

2. The organization of the installed stuff in my Content Library doesn't make a lot of sense to me, e.g. a product that consists of Clothing + Poses seemingly arbitrarily goes into clothing, or some products are in a folder by artist name, while others are under product/set name, etc. Is there way to reorganize it in a more custom way? I assume one isn't supposed to mess with the physical folder structure, because that might mess up the information in the manifests, etc... or can one?

There's no absolute / right or wrong rules but better or best practices for organizing product folders.... as long as the vendor don't make the folders very messy ~~ If you never use Smart Content, you can freely re-organize the folders / file locations as per your preferences. But if you use Smart Content, better not re-organize them because that'll easily break the metadata...then any product update in DIM can make things even messy...  unless, you're very familiar with the ways of preventing these mess from happenning (that's another long story....).

3. I'm kind of confused by the metadata, e.g. type vs. category, what is actually important and what is is used by Smart Content? Like, what might I need to add as far as metadata to make Smart Content work better? And what metadata do you try to maintain/keep organized for your content?

Type, aka Content Type, is defined by Daz as higher level classification for user-facing files as well as Properties, which is maily used for showing you the Type icon on the file thumbnails and as the conditions for saving / applying some Presets and running certain scripts, etc. You have no way to add new Types in DS.  Categories can be freely and flexibly defined as per how a user want to show the Tree of Categories in Smart Content for fast filtering products by choosing more detailed Category from the Tree.

Content Type are used in both Smart Content and Content Libary while Categories are mainly useful in Smart Content.

4. In the same vein, what does one use Content DB Editor for? Is it to set metadata for products where the artist didn't bother to do it, and stuff that you create? Or is it needed to fix some other issues?

To create metadata for the products from 3rd-parties or the products we made, as well as correct wrong Content Type / Categories.

5. Categories seems like maybe the way to go to set up a completely custom hierarchy of all the content... is that what experienced users do? Or is it kind of superfluous if one properly organizes Content Library and Smart Content?

Technically, yes. But I don't think most of the users do that ~~ because the top and 2nd level Categories are defined by Das well enough. Whether spending time on manipulating Categories or not is always up to one's preferences... as well as depends on one's capability and time ~~

6. Finally, maybe an alternative way to cover all the bases is just to ask -- what is your workflow when you get or create new Daz content and want to keep it organized -- do you move stuff around, set you custom categories, or perhaps do something else with metadata?

For selling / sharing my products, I most of the time assigne Content Type and Categories in the simplest way, by using Default values. For the use of myself, I just necessarily added some custom Categories at higher level and mainly add some useful Keyword to the main user-facing files for precise filtering.

Thank you!