Hi Folks! I recently purchased an external CD Recorder/Rewriter. I was actually lucky enough to find one with SCSI ports for my first-generation (beige) PowerMac G3 tower. This opens up lots of opportunities for me to be creative in the way I organize my Poser files when I transfer them from my hard drive and Zip disks and burn them to a CD. Currently I have dozens of folders organized in three general categories: Custom Stuff, for my own Poser props and textures; Web Stuff, for all the objects and morphs I download; and Traveler's Stuff(!). I was wondering if any of y'all would like to share any information about how you organize your personal collections of the enormous amount of stuff that's available to collect from this forum and other online resources. Peter (Dr Zik)

Organize? I've got a big subdirectory in my downloads folder called Poser Stuff. Everything I download I leave in Downloads till I unzip it, then I move the zip into Poser Stuff. That sucker's huge right about now. Finding something I need is a real pain. =) I'd love to hear some ideas as well. =) Rosh

I have so much stuff now, but someone in the group gave a suggestion that I have been using whenever I download and also to re-organize the stuff I have. It will also help me remember where I got stuff. All Zygote stuff gets it's own CD. Anything else I buy or download gets put in a folder that is named after wherever or whoever I got it from. This was the suggestion someone had here and it works great. Now if I want to give credit to someone, I don't have to try to find reame files, I make up my own as I install so that I know where they came from. You could drown in the freestuff area alone, not to mention the other sites here! lol Have fun untangling your hard drive, I'm STILL at it! Marque

organize? what's organize?

Hello, I use something like this AppsBackupsProgramsPoser AppsBackupsProgramsPoserMorphs AppsBackupsProgramsPoserHair AppsBackupsProgramsPoserPoses AppsBackupsProgramsPoserTextures AppsBackupsProgramsPoserZygote AppsBackupsProgramsPoserDedicatedDigital ect.. Serpent

I always download the thumbnail, copy its name & then download the file with same name-zip. Then when I get a "bunch" of stuff I'll create several folders & sort into sub-catagories (ClothesTextures, Textures, PoseableClothes, Animals, Props, Characters, Hair, Plants, Fairywoods, Bryce, etc.). Then use GraphicsConverter to cteate previews for thumbnails & any unzipped graphic files for easier previews later. After burn to CD I use Zips FindIt to catalog disk. Normally I'll unstuff & MaConvert files before burning to CD but I always include the original zip file within its folder. The "getInfo" for the zip file almost always has a reference to the download site & name.

For my own stuff, I keep a work in progress folder and a final folder, while I am working, I keep stuff organized by topic, objects, textures, whatever, and by date. When I'm finished, I put all the pieces in a final folder, like KrystaFinal, which has sub-folders for Geometries, CR2 files, textures, finished renders. For downloads, I try to keep stuff organized by topic (character, texture, prop, and by creator) When I have enough stuff collected, I burn a CD. In my media catalog program (Where is it?), I also try to cross reference stuff, so I can find everything by a specific artist, or every type of prop. Confession time: I am really far behind on this organization thing. I blame this on all of you people! If there weren't so much good stuff to download, I could keep up! :)

Don't ask me .. My system really doesn't work. Shudders 100 or so zip disks wih stuff scattered here there and everywhere. Want to set it up in Morphs (segmented by parts and gender) Textures (gender and type) props Poses etc ...

Yes, I know Ghost. I just burned an 'animal' CD--my other CDs are organized pretty well, but I burn one from a file I keep on my desktop (well organized there) with a date when I feel its getting cumbersome, so I still end up with a lot of 'organized' CD's. Now I'm 'micro' organizing them, I guess LOL.

-Keep the original .zip. -Add authors name to .zip filename. -Keep thumbnail with same filename. -Archive on CD-R's, split up similar to Poser Library catagories.

On my Poser 4 I make extra character classes, e.g. ...charactersdivers .

I create directories (charactersThorne) and sub-directories (charactersThorneTextures) to store stuff. I keep a batch of CD's, one for characters, one for props, one for textures and so on. Paul

If you have Paint Shop Pro, you can try this method (idea from a photographer friend of mine): o "Steal" the thumbnail (RIGHT CLK - SAVE AS...)of the d/l o Open in PSP and write a brief description AND a file path on the image o Save to a well-chosen folder (see ideas in posts above) When you need something, just browse the thumbnail folder - the actual files can be kept as ZIPs. It's amazing how small a pic you need to jog your memory. Have fun.

Hi, It took quite a few weeks til I found the right way to organize my archives for Burned CDs .... Finally I think the best way is to keep the same directories as Poser Stuff Downloads and to add some specific sub-directories. For example, my charater directory is splitted in Men/Women/Animals/Super-heroes/Sci-Fi/Heroic-fantasy/Others I also added some new directories, such as Environment (for a room Prop, for example). I poser, I've tried to keep the add-ons separated from current items and put'em into specific folders with fair names ... It causes some problemes the first time you try to use the prop or character, because the program doesn't often find some parts or elements ... but I get rid of it or modify the log files .... Hope this will help you ... OJM.

Hi Folks! Thanx for all the wonderful suggestions! I think this discussion benefits lots of us, so please feel free to add your comments if you haven't yet done so!! Peter (Dr Zik)

I'm like Roshigoth. I have tons of stuff on my HD, but no CD/RW. I save each item in a format like this in one directory according to what it is: CHAR_delores.zip COMIC_IronMan.zip MORPH_head_femefacepack39.zip POSE_superhero1.zip PROP_belt1.zip TEXTURE_Miko.zip UTIL_phibuild.zip etc... Sort the directory by name, and all the like items come together.

::THUD:: That was me, falling off my chair laughing so hard at the thought of organizing my Poser files... I download them, and then forget I did so, re-download, open the zip, and place the files in the default locations. I have about a dozen tabs in Poser for files I don't even have because someone else included their directory structure in the download...

LOL I'm so glad I'm not the only one with this problem. I've been sitting here looking at some 1 gig of poser files wondering how on earth I'm going to sort these out so I can actually find something. I did finally start downloading hair things to a seperate directory, and 3d props. But ugh... it's going to take me days to go through files and figure all this out. Lynne (the procrastinating organizer)

For the moment i store all ZIP-Files in specified folders. But it's not really successfull. I think the way which THIP works really good. Some painting-programms gives a subprogram for viewing images in a gallery (directory). In this programms you can make some notices and more informations. With this methode its possible to store the zip's in one and for all the same folder. The information where the files-name is could be stored in the thumbnail-gallery. But damned, this would be a hard job to came to finish it. But i'm shure the time will come when i had to do this. SHARKEY

Gee, "system"? I need a system! I've got stuff all over the place, I've got 3 operating systems on my computer, 3 copies of Poser 4, 3 versions of Photoshop, two hard drives, 'lebende-leben logical drives, stuff all over the place, dozens of folders on my desktop, no backup in living memory (I do have a Zip and a re-writable CD, just no backup). I've got to get organized real-soon-now! Incidently, never count on a Zip - "beware the click of death". The new ones do seem better, though.

mine is probably stupid.. I download to a folder on my desktop called Poser in that I have a section for characters clothing, lights, Poses, utilities, tutorials, reflections, and props. under characters I have folders for textures, completecharacters, and animals, then in each one of those I have a folder for artists. under clothes I have folders for textures, and one for meshes, Then under those again I have artists folders. Now certain places have a folder of their own. Poserworld, Propsguild, Tygerskins, and 3D Cafe all have their own folders. I keep all the zip files and exe. For future reference. It helps me keep track of things but then I have to search through artists names to find that one prop, texture or whatever i need. Not perfect yet.. Storm