Allie, Welcome to the community! {hug} Since you've already started purchasing models even before your copy of Poser arrives, we'd better discuss what to do with them. First: protect your investment. DAZ will reset the downloads or burn stuff to CD for a small fee, as will many other sites, but if the merchant has changed stores, or you've got 3 years worth of freebies (your time is also an investment!!!), you will find it less nerve-wracking to have the files backed-up safely somewhere. Some people will ghost their Runtimes or keep a spare copy of the Runtime on a different drive. This is good if the Runtime is bloated. (Every once in a while, there will be a bragging thread, and Runtimes of 30-40 gigs are not uncommon, bigger if animation is involved.) Some people don't have that much spare space lying around, so they just keep backups of all the files and have to reinstall if things go belly-up. It doesn't matter how you handle it, as long as you are at least mentally prepared to have your computer die and eat everything. (I believe that you are working on PC, so expect it at some point in time.) I download all files to this PC and then transfer them to the Mac. Both machines can burn CDs, but I usually do it here. Even after stuff gets moved (via Zip when I get 95 MB in a folder), I leave the folders here until I have enough for a CD. Purchased items are duplicated; they are in the relevant files (more later) and a file called "purchased downloads". Purchased items folders never get deleted; the others do after being both moved and burned. Purchased items on the Mac also reside in 2 folders, relevant and "purchased". That makes 4 copies on 2 machines and a CD. If I spent money on it or got it as a gift, it is going to be as secure as I can make it. I can not afford to replace anything. Do NOT use rewritable CDs. Apparently they have a small piezo charge to enable the rewriting and when the battery goes dead, they become unreadable. The plain kind are cheaper and last longer. I bought a spindle on sale, and if a CD is bad or doesn't burn right, I can just make another. Test them! When you burn the CD, make sure to burn it as a data CD readable across systems, both PC and Mac. You never know what machine you'll be working on in the future. So, make 2 folders on the desktop: "Poser Downloads", "Purchased Downloads". You can also stick the folders elsewhere if your drive is partitioned, but I will remember to burn them if they are in sight. The "Poser Downloads" folder has subfolders... because the moment to start organizing is the moment you are about to click the download button! To be continued....

Amen to that post! Wish I'd have had that advice in the beginning lol.

Allie, As you have seen, names of downloads often make no sense (some numerical convention for the vender), or have the same name as other files (candle01, candle01, and candle01 by 3 different people and being 3 totally different candle props) or are cultural props with foreign names (is that a Chinese wedding headdress or an Australian musical instrument? Don't guess later, label it now). It is courtesy to state who made a freebie if it is used in a gallery picture, but if you don't add the artist's name, you will not remember 2 years from now, and far too many readmes don't have this information, even if the download has a readme. If the name of the artist can't be found, I will substitute the name of the site. This is also done if it is a "site freebie" such as RDNA light sets. I put the name of the item first, because that will help keep similar items together. I try to put the name of the underlying model if it is critical (clothes usually will not fit other characters). Then I put the name of the artist. Example: "Microsuit-4V2-Iso" tells me the name of the outfit, who it is for, and who made it. "Microsuittex-navy-LL" will be next to it in the alphabetized list of files... and far easier to find! If it does have a foreign name I will use it, but put a translation or key word next to it. Example: "sorayama-helmet4v2-mechismo"... lest it be mistaken for a flower. ;) This renaming is done at the moment of download. Trust me, there are more important things to do than renaming files later, and you probably can't find the file anyway even if you remembered downloading something like that at some time. You do not want to have to reunzip or duplicate the installation just to see what it is. By thinking of what name to give it, you are also thinking of what it is, which will help with organizing. My first 6 months, I just downloaded and accepted whatever name the maker used. Perhaps this information will save you from confusion later! to be continued....

Carolly, you're a good writer, and I like the idea of an evoloving "Notes for Newbies" document. It would be cool to see such a thing posted to the Web somewhere for general reference. As a nerdy word of advice, Windows users might want to avoid keeping large folders and lots of files on the desktop ... they tend to slow the OS down. However, putting folders on the root drive with a link on the desktop, which looks and basically acts that same anyway, won't have any negative effect. I have three Poser-related link-folders on my WinXP desktop, one for recent downloads, one for installed files (periodically gets burned to disc, then cleared out,) and one for the Poser folder itself.

Allie, And now for some words about organization. :) First... nothing is set in concrete. You can always change your organization later by adding or merging files. I can't read your intentions, so don't know what sort of items you are likely to download, but we tend to collect a little of almost everything, because we never know when something is going to be useful or vitally needed for an image. I'm going to tell you my system and setup, but feel free to vary it to meet your needs and to change it as your needs change. Files go through a filter as they get downloaded into the "Poser Downloads" folder. Some of the folders have been merged or pulled out, but the current suite is: "Poser Animals" "Poser Hair" "Poser Characters" "Poser Misc Stuff" "Poser Architectural" "Poser Lights" "Poser Terrain" (which includes backgrounds) "Poser Other" (python scripts, sketch presets, utilities, tutorials) So, If I download a texture for the polar bear, it gets renamed, the artist name gets added, and it gets downloaded directly into the Animals folder. When there are 95 MB in that folder, it gets moved to the Mac for further sorting, and perhaps installation. When you download something, you may have to determine its most important point. A toy panda can go under toys (misc stuff), or cartoon animals (animals). Most stuff will be obvious, anything else, put it where you can find it later. You can always move it if you discover that a section is growing, or you are accumulating props for a particular image. Last year, I added a half-dozen ethnic categories and pulled relevant files from characters, clothing, misc stuff, architectural to put under Greek, Egyptian, Japanese, and Viking... If I am building a scene involving Native Americans, it will help if all their clothing and gear is together in one folder. Put stuff where YOU will find it. So, a zip gets carried to the Mac... time for more sorting. :) I use icon view for this and corral my folders into groups. The Poser 4 folder has all the stuff to run the program, including the Runtime folder, and all my folders of stuff below that. I do not unzip or install anything unless 1) it was purchased and I should check to be sure that the files are ok or 2) I need it for an image. This keeps my Runtime very lean... however, I do have a lot of folders outside of it which need to be managed. let's look at Animals. That folder currently has these subfolders: Horses Donkeys/Mules/Zebras Camels Deer and Elk Dogs Bears Cats Big Cats Gorilla Boars and Pigs Misc Animals (includes giraffes, cows, elephants) Small Critters (rats, rabbits) Dragons (with 12 subfolders) Unicorns/Pegasi/Merhorses Other Mythical (Sphinx, Gryphon, Eyebat) Lizards Dinos Birds Insects Bats Fish Snakes Snails&Worms&Such Frogs Spiders&Such Sea Life Toonish Animals Mech Animals Misc Critter Parts Right now everything animal-related is inside a sub-folder except Trekkiegrrrl's petfood cans and some eggshells. I used to keep dog houses and cat toys over in the Poser Misc folder, but it made more sense to put pet furniture in with the relevant pet. If the camel saddle is in the same folder as the camel, the odds of my finding it have gone up. You will not start with this many folders. I now have 54,000 items for Poser, and other here undoubtedly have more, but started just like you with a dozen zips sitting on the desktop wondering where to put them. Doing it this way has several advantages. I can quickly check to see if I have something before downloading it again. If somebody asks whether "such and such" exists, I can check to see if I have it and who made it. If I'm working on something such as a mermaid pic, I can open a handful of folders, find what is needed, and unzip just those items. Folders are fluid. If you get too many items (say that your characters folder has 1200 items), you can make whatever subfolders you need. Poser 4 and ProPack don't allow subfolders inside of Runtime, but this is outside. This is YOUR library. You get to arrange it to suit yourself. To be continued....

great tips. only learned them after a long while of mass freebie downloads and CDs that were unorganized. to add 2 cents to a great organization method listed above (which I do). save a tumbnail and name it the same as the zip. you'll get a jpg or gif pic, and a zip but the names will be the same so when you look through a directory with 1000 files in the folder you can right click and figure out what that V2-red dress IS. I save thumbs of my purchased items as well, usually a promo shot or something. After a while with so many CDs and so many files, it makes it easy to go through a CD and click on picture tumbs and find real treasutes I had forgotten about. invest in a CD cataloging application. you can then do searches or easly look through a catalog of 50+ CDs and you don't have to keep flipping a cd in the drive to see what's on it. my additions :) really good tips for the new person to have. hauksdottir good work.

Thanks, Foxseelady and Xoconostle. It's taking a bit of time to get this typed, but I only want to do it once (dyslexic) and want it to be useful to others. The problem with making firm statements is avoiding sounding didactic... while desperately hoping that my friends manage to avoid some of the pitfalls and frustration of dealing with so much material. Free stuff here currently has close to 10,000 items and it is only one site out of dozens. Add the stores. Even if a person is extremely selective about what they download, without some system of organization, their directory is going to be a mess. Building a scene in Poser is a lot more fun if an artist can find everything. I have 4 years experience as a reference librarian so I do know something about how to label and file documents so that other people can find them, and how to do it in a neutral way. But even so, I didn't lay out my folders as a complete range of all items, but according to what I personally use. Someone doing martial arts movies or science fiction games might not even have a category for animals... but have an entire heirarchy of weaponry with nested folders. The only important thing is that a person make some folders according to their needs and start the sorting process immediately. I figured that an example with breakdown would help. :) Well, maybe not with my breakdown! ;^) Back to typing... Carolly

Allie, While mentioning visual organization by corraling and nesting folders, I must not fail to talk about using typed symbols to further organize your folders or provide more information about them. Note that certain vendors use these symbols to put their products at the top of your directories. This is to their advantage, and quite possibly not to yours. It may be nice to see the new stuff at top... but not if you have to scroll past 20 shades of nailpolish to get down to your basic figure. And it's like pop-up ads: every vendor thinks their product is better and more desirable than the others, so the use of multiple !!! is growing. Maybe I do want their product at the top of the category... but that should be my choice. DAZ uses symbols to organize the generation 3 models, and reports are that bad things happen if you mess with them. Other than those particular models, feel free to get rid of the symbols you don't want and then apply your own. After all, symbols do more than simply say "new". A physical space comes before everything else in a "list view", and 2 spaces before 1. I've done a quick test, creating a couple dozen folders with various symbols and multiple numbers of them: space ! # $ % & * + - + = @ ^ It doesn't go in keyboard order. Multiple symbols: +++ then ++ then + So, what can you use these symbols for? On my computer, !name indicates that the folder is a group folder. "!books & scrolls" means that the folder has lots of books by various makers. "20poses4posette-smedley" without a symbol means that only one zip or maker was involved, no matter how numerous the contents. I use -name to show that the folder has not only been unzipped, but installed. This puts all the installed stuff high in the list view and makes determining its status a matter of a glance. "-longdress04-serge" is installed whereas "longdress-who" is not, and they are separated. If a folder is down in the body of the list, it hasn't been installed yet, and there might be a reason (such as a pz3 or 3ds in lieu of a standard file). Really important stuff gets spaces. For example, the base character of Vicki should come before all the other Vicki items in that folder. Furthermore, if I have made a neutral character, (totally white, zeroed dials, IK off) that figure should be before even the stock figure from the vendor because it is MY stock figure. If I am working on a character, making morphs or testing textures, I can use symbols to arrange them according to my priorities. Renaming to put files together or to keep them apart gives you power to manage them. Because the ! is now being used by DAZ (it wasn't critical when I started this system), you may wish to choose other symbols... in fact I recommend it. We tend to be visual, but there are times when using the list view is the best approach to finding something. Using typed symbols is like adding batteries to the flashlight BEFORE you need to find your way in the dark. ;) Carolly

.

BTW, folks, thanks for anything you can add to make this better and more complete! If things are different on a PC or if there is a better approach or tool, please mention it. I know there are programs such as Canto and FileMakerPro, but have never used them. Many of the programmers here are better at managing databases than I am, and using spreadsheets and catalogs. Thumbnails are a good idea, too. I wish that I'd started doing it sooner (I only occasionally nab them). I'm not going to imply that my system is better than anybody elses... but it is better than having no system and muddling around and a year later trying to get 20,000 files into a semblance of order. If someone gets started on the right foot, they might keep their feet under them the whole way. Carolly

Allie, ...and now some talk about discrimination... of the right sort. So, you have a model called Vicki. You also have Posette (the standard P4 female). There are free female models such as Sara (at DAZ) or MayaDoll (at Studio Maya) and the lovely ladies from Yamato... most of which are based upon Posette, but are so reshaped that they require their own wardrobes. In the stores you will find Natalia, Koshini, Dina, Supermodel Lori, the DAZ Faerie, the MillGirls and their fairy kin, etc., and even if you are selective you may end up with a dozen females alone in your Characters folder... along with a Troglodyte, talking Teddybear, Gremlin, Neandertal, Voodooie, and all the menfolk, and all of the children. They will all have wardrobes, textures, poses, and accouterments. Do you keep these items with the character, or in another main folder, perhaps with a similar internal heirarchy? Skin textures and clothing textures used to be separated out, but I decided that it made more sense to keep the textures next to the item they enhanced and resorted them back together. Your mileage may vary, however a texture usually only works with one item because of the UVmaps involved. Poses, OTOH, I finally separated out. Poses can often be applied to a different figure and used with a bit of tweaking. Additionally, Schlabber (the master of poses) has often made sets with human and animal together. Wolf and man, lion and woman, woman riding horse, man releasing hawk... do they go with the animal or with the person? The same problem comes up with the combined poses (vampire biting victim's neck is a good example). It began to make more sense to keep them in their own main folder and nested subfolders as needed. My "Poser Characters" folder has subfolders !Vicki, !Michael, !Stephanie, !Natalia, !Children, !Elves & Faeries, !Merfolk, !Eve, !Robots, !Aliens, !Goblins & Trolls, !Dwarves & Hobbits, !Ghosties & Ghoulies,..., in addition to the stock figures. My "Poser Clothes" folder has subfolders for !Vicki-Clothes, !Michael-Clothes, !Stephanie-Clothes, !Natalia-Clothes, !Eve-Clothes, !Children-Clothes.... If I decide later to combine the clothing and the figures into one massive folder, with subfolders for each character, having this sort of breakdown will help make the process less onerous. In the meantime, if I'm downloading fairywings for the PTgirl or a dress for Stephanie, there is a place to put it (and a place where I'll find it later). Clothing usually only fits one particular character, but can often be made to fit others. Some clothing items are props (hats or jewelry) and can be scaled slightly to fit others. Shoes and belts are often stiff enough that they'll transfer with a bit of tweaking. A flowing wizard robe or swirling dress or anything which bends as the character bends across sections of the body is going to be verrrrry difficult to fit to anybody else. Vicki2P4 can wear Posette's clothing, but will not have all the Vicki morphs. Michael2P4 can wear Dork's clothing. Some skin textures can work on other characters. Stephanie was made from Michael's mesh and takes his textures... but can wear Vicki's clothes. There are a few hybrids out there in freestuff, encoded so that you need both original seed figures. While you are sitting there with a bare dozen or so folders, you can decide if you want a character-based system with the clothing and skin textures and poses in unique folders for each character or if you want to keep characters and clothing in their own main folders. Neither approach is wrong, but you should choose a priority. A year from now, if you are looking for a pirate outfit for Michael, are you going to look for Michael and everything which fits him (and hope that something looks seaworthy)... or for "clothing-pirates" to see what can be made to fit his figure, even if you have to heavily tweak and perhaps postwork it? You best know your own problem-solving approach, so you can best determine how you want to handle the various characters. Carolly

Allie, Finally... the junk drawer. :) One folder that you should have is "Misc Stuff". If you have no idea where to put it, it goes in there until you ahve enough others like it to make them a separate folder. You really don't want to leave loose files sitting around the desktop like doorstops to be tripped over. I strongly recommend this. Last week the DAZ freebie was a valentine's set, and Andi gave us a bone gate, and Ockham another python script, and free stuff was full of equally unrelated items. Where do you put a rocking horse or a coffin? The freebies at some site are only available for a limited time: anywhere from a day to a month, typically a week. Other sites archive the freestuff, so you can go back for an item once you realize that you need it. However, links break, artists leave the community, sites vanish, stuff disappears. I recommend downloading only what you think you will need, but nab it when you see it. Example: you might never plan to do a scene with a golfer so you ignore the nicely-made cart and set of clubs. 2 years later there is a contest about "the sporting life" and you want to do a scene with little green moon-men playing golf... you have a deadline... good luck finding the props. OTOH, you don't want to take everything. That leaches bandwidth from the folks generous enough to give us the sweat of their brow. Also many of the props might not fit your style or may be for characters you have no intention of ever owning. Example: lace textures for lingeree... if you have no intention of doing pin-ups and will never buy the lingeree set for a figure you don't even own, why take the texture? Leave the bandwidth for those folks who need all the stocking textures they can find and who actually own the model. (They are probably ignoring the astrolabe or player piano or British phone booth.) This is the main folder which will grow the most quickly, so be prepared to subdivide it as needed... and your needs will be different from mine. I didn't even have a file for buildings or backdrops when starting out... but by the time I had a half dozen castles, 5 gold temples (unoccupied), 4 gazebos, 3 fountains, 2 bridges, and a pear tree it was obvious that some subfolders would be necessary. Example: Buildings was not only established, but further divided into !architectural (includes cottages, mushroom houses, and windmills... and parts of buildings such as walls or balconies), !castles (includes palaces and sandcastles), !bridges, !garden shed and tools (it made sense to keep wheelbarrows with potting sheds), !wells&fountains&pools, and !neoliths. As soon as I get a dozen or more similar items, it makes sense to group them. There are more than 50 subfolders, but they are based upon what I have, not what is available as a broad spectrum of the models here. I seldom download modern furniture or appliances, and avoid bondage or fetish gear... but have a nice selection of bottles, books, carpets, creative tools, fun&games, alchemical supplies, and scientific apparatus. :) The important thing here is to have a flexible folder for all the random props and be prepared to ride herd on it constantly. So, that ought to get you started. Pat and I can tell you where to find the best stuff, or wierdest stuff, or most interesting stuff (or even stuff you might need)... but it wouldn't have been fair to unleash you in the toy department without giving you a wagon in which to put stuff. Carolly

oh and If you are looking for Poser related sites, have a look at www.pixeloceans.com. The resources center has a poser section which lists sites and tells you whether they stock characters, hair, textures etc

Just a quick thought: when you download clothing etc for Vicky, Mike or Steph, make sure that your folder name indicates which version it applies to eg V2 or V3, M2 or M3, Steph or Steph Petite. I'm sure I'm not the only one who has wasted a couple of hours trying to apply a V3 texture to V2!

I didn't see these, so maybe you forgot (or maybe I missed them): 1) To add a character to your scene instead of replacing it, click the double checkmarks at the bottom of the library palette. 2) Yes, using Poser is "art."

I agree that a folder system is a necessity for keeping track of downloads and installations. That's one of the reasons I updated to P5. Without going into the philosophical argument of "feminist vs. masculine thought processes in hierarchical file structuring" (and believe me, this is a MAJOR debate in many fields of upper academic thought) I created file structures in my downloads folder for Poser, then broke it down into generic topics like automobiles, aircraft, animals...etc., then broke that down even further into specific types of items, then into manufacturer if possible. With purchased goodies I repeat the basic concept and use the name of the site that I purchased the items from as the top level folder. So, I have DAZ/Characters/Vickie or /Michael, with /V2 or /M2 inside there to seperate the versions. A little time consuming to create but it makes up for the nightmare of trying to figure things out later. Just my thoughts as I try to finish the last 18 pages of my graduate thesis. (Gawdz, I hate being a grad student at 50!) Tony O

I've gotten to the point that when I download a file, I name it filename_char_author_site, such as (fer instance) 'vickie' for character, 'little dragon' for site, and if it's a direct link, then 'rosity'..;) It helps 6 months later, when you find that there's been a modification, or bug, etc. Also, 6 months later, what does 'v250cn5.zip' mean anyway (I dunno, I made it up..but you get the idea..;)
Look through the threads here for sorting utilities, I think there's one that get mentioned, but can't remember the name..I do all mine in MS Access..and after 2 years, I have over 14,000 items downloaded (so you see how it gets away from you..;)
great ideas up there for the FAQ..wish I'd known this stuff when I started out..

Good stuff Carolly! I go as far as renaming directories throughout the runtime and then doing search and replace in all the related files so that the durn runtime is more managable. For instance, Daz is notorious as to putting V3 in under Characters in the Geometry folder, and M3 in People !!! I like all people to go in People and then toon stuff and robots to go in Characters. Just my preferences, but looking for things is much easier when you have them the way you think.

Digital Dreamer, Good point. I do have my versions separated out for that very reason, and should have mentioned it. Jackson, This is the first thread, just to handle where to put downloaded files. I intend to write another thread on where to install them (which will also deal with organization). After that a thread on how to find and use them within Poser (which will include the infamous double checkmark). Concentrating and typing like this is tricky (the migraine is being nastier than usual today), so it will take a while. I don't see how Dr Geep manages to churn out all his primers with pictures and everything. After I get Allie into the point of loading a figure... I can point her to the real experts who can guide her into handling the various rooms and features. Since she is already a very good artist, who can draw from scratch, I doubt if she'll fall prey to the insecurities of "is it art if I don't make everything myself". If Allie isn't worried about chasing down squirrels to make her own brushes, then using a purchased model probably won't keep her awake. ;) Cedarwolf, If I was setting up an organization for general purposes, it would be more comprehensive, balanced, complete... and less flexible. For example, suppose that I was taking over management of an established archive with several thousand items, and potential for growth. Being familiar with both Dewey Decimal and Library of Congress patterns for categorizing, I'd look at the purposes of the end user and determine how best to break down the mass of data into logical and bite-sized chunks. Example: a book on the use of Hunting Mastiffs in the Middle Ages. Dewey Decimal is set up for average people, someone who owns a mastiff and wants a book of lore and pictures so that he can brag to his friends, so filing it under dog types is proper. LofC is set up for scholars, who are perhaps going to be less concerned about the breed and more concerned with hunting as a sport or prelude to war... and might put it on the shelf next to a book about the use of Lynxes for hunting in the Renaissance. (I've also done science fair projects in taxonomy, but these files are more like books than marine life.) A comprehensive system would include categories for stuff that I wouldn't use, but that others would... and so I'd have to think about how they would look for a needed item and set up folders for that. However, that would also leave a person with dozens of empty folders nested within other empty folders, and perhaps the mass of folders would be boggling. If I have a folder, there is something in it. If I get a dozen or so similar items something which can be logically grouped, I group them and pop them into a folder with a reasonable name. Once that folder starts getting too full (perhaps more than 100 items) or has clear subcategories, I divide again. Misc Stuff: Vehicles has subfolders for Aircraft, Watercraft, Toy vehicles, Trains, UFOs... and some loose odds and ends like the racing luge. Some items can logically go into more than one category. Example: an Egyptian reed boat. It can go with "watercraft" or with "egyptian stuff". I'll drop it into the folder that I'm most likely to search first, based upon the sort of picture I'm most apt to be doing. However, neither place would be wrong. The flexible approach of making folders as they are needed and being willing to move stuff isn't as rigorous as the more scientific approach, but this works in a fluid situation. Someone coming at this from a programming angle, would probably feel more comfortable with a better structured heirarchy. As I said in post #10, there is no claim that this system is better than anybody else's, but it is certainly better than no system. Reorganizing and retrofitting is easier if there has been some organization beforehand... and this will get a newbie thinking about how to organize. Carolly

This is great, Carolly! One thing that I add to my renaming of files is whether or not it's for commercial use. I'll name a files something like: WesternHatHair_Maya_Yes.zip, with the "Yes" meaning that I can use it for commercial projects. If it's not for commercial use, I just don't add anything, or I'll put "No" at thet end. Melanie

So, putting all my newer downloads in a desktop folder named t (random jab at keyboard, my current image project is kept in jtgr), leaving all the pre-crash files on D:..My Documents/3D Stuff or 3D Stuff/objects, leaving the default filename of Freebie.zip (no, I'm serious, its there, thanks Shadri) and probably not remembering to grab the thumbnail, isn't the best way?

searching thru the Character library :10 minutes
zip viewing thru download folders :30 minutes
searching online for an outfit you know you downloaded :all evening
giving up and just doing a NVIATWAS :timeless

Melanie, Good point about the commercial use. Sometimes there is no readme, but the site had oked it. Besides, a tick on the file name makes finding permissable stuff that much faster. Xenic101, LOL! :look at gallery: ...80% naked Vickis despite tons of free clothing available (and downloaded according to the counters)... yup! Poor content management must be the reason. :chuckle with bemusement: I've downloaded files called freebie.zip. poserfree.zip, xmas.zip, contest.zip, present.zip (that last one was a car), but renamed them immediately. Around the holidays some modelers would do things like advent calenders or the 12 days of Christmas where we could see what we were getting, others have concealed it as a surprise. Either way, I am glad for it... and get the gift named and tucked away where it can be used. Carolly

(waves 'hi' to Allie and Carolly)

There is a WONDERFUL disk catalog system called Haxial that I've used for ages now and really love. You can try it for free and then after a while it becomes 'nag-ware' until you fork over the small fee--which, considering all it does and its ease of use, is ridiculously cheap.

Once you get your own naming conventions applied to your downloads, Haxial can give you the exact CD it's on in all of 2 seconds. You just feed each CD to it after you finish burning it and it reads it in maybe 3 seconds and remembers it forever...priceless!

I couldn't do Poser without it, since I have, at the very least, Half-heimers when it comes to remembering where the heck I put stuff!

http://www.haxialsoftware.com/products/diskcatalog/

Hi, Pat! So, if you have 47 CDs sitting on the shelf... and you know that you've downloaded a tabby cat texture at some time, but have no idea when or at what site, you can do a quick name search across a catalog? (I could say that pun was not intended, but you know me. :guilty grin: ) This is a case where "ps_4037b.sit" or "freeposertex.zip" isn't going to help, but "MilCattex-Lisa" will show up in a search. Having a folder for cats and having the texture in the folder would be better, but if you are short of drive space, or are recovering from a crash, or the texture is filed under mermaids because you were making a catfish for her and it seemed logical at the time (don't laugh, at 3am most things can seem logical)... anyway, this gives a backup and a way to find stuff on the backups. :) Carolly

Haxial will take a one word search subject just like Google, so you could enter 'tabby' or 'cat' and it will instantly cough up everything containing either one...just like our cats do hairballs, but with considerably fewer gross sound effects ;o) Pat

Mac users can use a shareware called "Disc Tracker."

Did my previous (long chatty) message get posted, or did it dissappear in the aether when I hit "Post reply?" Allie

Well, there's my answer. When I hit "post reply" I get booted out into a "welcome to the back room" message and have to find my way back to the forum. My first message has just plain dissappeared. My second one posted. Now I'm discouraged. -Allie

Allie, Don't be. :( Long chatty posts can get eaten if you send more than 30 minutes (and it might even be 15 minutes) typing them. Save to the buffer first! (See my notes in your IM.) At least you made it here. {hugs} and welcome to the community. I was getting worried. Now I can start typing the rest of the stuff to get you started smoothly. (For the rest of you lurkers, it helps me to have a mental audience, someone I'm speaking to, a face... otherwise I get really dry and didactic and not very fun to read.) Carolly

Attached Link: http://www.renderosity.com/messages.ez?ForumID=12356&Form.ShowMessage=1689928

Carolly, Say "Hi" to Don for me :o) Patricia

Hi, Pat! Don is doing pretty well. Good color and his art is selling so he has work to look forward to. (After those heart attacks, he needs watching.) I brought him some twiggy bits, but he needs to come over here and look over the rocks for suitable targets. He is just doing amazing little pieces of jewelry. (Since I'm no longer doing the origami sculptures, I'm trying to thin down the rocks and minerals and regain some badly-needed space.) He said that he sold 50 pieces at Pantheacon which he needs to replace before BayCon. A good sign for the economy, and also recognition of his talent. Carolly

Carolly; Yeah, my long chatty message. I will compose in a text editor from now on. I've been real busy with tax season stuff, which is why the long silence. I'm still very busy, but will try to stay more in touch. Can't remember any of what I said in the lost message, except a question I had at the end; would appending download dates on the name (just mmyy, as in 0304) be helpful in long term searching of thousands of files? Glad to hear Don is doing better. Gotta run and make dinner. Allie

Welcome Allie! Appending the dates probably wouldn't help in most cases. Usually you need to know what it is, maybe where you got it, and maybe usage restrictions (commercial vs. non commercial). I can't think of any circumstance when I've ever needed to know when I'd obtained something. Others thoughts on the matter...????

Allie, Dates are not important. Your browser will automatically record the download date on the zip, so why add duplicate information? If I was hunting for a red fractal dragon texture, would I remember that I'd downloaded it on August 17th 2000? Quite unlikely! Your memory might be better than mine, but even so, I suspect that the mental priority list would be dragon, red, texture... and possibly the maker. :) I was quite comfortable with packing a lot of concise information in the DOS 8.3 format, so a Mac with 31 characters seems like luxury. Even so, I still abbreviate a lot... and limit the information to enough for me to spot the file upon a scan. If I was relying upon a catalog sorter, I probably wouldn't abbreviate as much (or I'd be more consistent about it!). Carolly

I thought dates might be useful in case models tended to improve over time. Also, sometimes I remember roughly when I got something better than what I actually got, like "I got this great fantasy thingy for a scene I wanted to do in January, but I can't remember what it was." If it retains the download date without changing when I fiddle with it, that's fine.

The zip should always retain the download date, unless you rename it months after downloading because you didn't do it at the time. ;)

Allie, You did notice that there is now a second thread on acquisitions? See post #30 above for the link. It is not quite done, but I've hit the important items. Carolly

.