To all merchants and designers who are using exclamation marks in attempt to put their folder at the top of the Library list, give us a break!!!!!! You guys have gotten as bad as Photoshop filter designers in trying to grab the spotlight. Think of the people who are using your products, not your own glory. After all, you're designing for your customers who purchase your stuff, not yourself. You'll get glory from creating quality products that adapt well to the work habits of those who use them, not from being at the top of the list, out of alphabetical order. I can understand using exclamation marks to put the INJ and REM files up at the top of a folder, but the rest is pure confusion when it comes to workflow. The same holds for merchants who plaster FREE on every file and folder that they give away. It makes the designer look like there are really serious issues with stooping to make free content. Good PR comes from being gracious, not blatant. Yeah, it's a hard way to make a living, but don't shoot yourself in the foot trying to get attention with bad habits that the users find annoying. It's self-defeating when you annoy who are those paying you.

most of us rename the bloody things anyway, so why not act like merchants and designers and not little school boys trying to see how high up the wall you can piss

LOL at SoulTaker What they don't realise is.. that like school boys... they will eventually piss too high up the wall and it will fall back on them..!

I agree, very childish indeed. We've bought it already, no need to yell for extra attention like that at all. When I see a merchant doing it, I'll mark him. Next time I'm looking for a certain item and have the choice between merchant, the 'yelling ones' get passed and I'll by from another merchant instead. It's not as bad here as it is at DAZ, I've got so tired of all this DAZ stupid marketing and folder placements, that I've stopped buying there.

Do you really think that this is a real probleme? I also rename the files by myself as I always do to find the files more easy.Only in "Textures" are the original names with and without exclamation marks or Free-sigend. Take it easy.....;-)

Yes it is a real problem. We all got better things to do then renaming everything we buy. Merchants should be much more considerate and resourcefull in this area. It's no fun when buying 10-20 items ending up renaming more then half of them (or even all of them).

There are a few things that WILL prevent me from buying products due to the trouble when installing: 1) Excessive amounts of !!!! at the beginning. 2) Non-unique texture names. I tend to mass-install stuff, and I have too much to fix everything. So I do check the readmes before buying when possible, and I don't buy products with one of these two flaws unless it is truly excellent - and most items I would have bought otherwise don't make that bar. So I will say that these practices literally do lose sales.

Hey, why not propose a "poser merchant guidline" to standardize library hierarchy? I know everyone like to use his/her own structure, but i think they are more or less the same.

2) Non-unique texture names.

That bugs me, too. I have CRPro, but it's still a pain to deal with texture names like "red.jpg" or "shirt.jpg."

There's a certain merchant who makes clothing and textures I adore, but I'm really hesitant to buy any more of them, because she names her textures things like "white.jpg." :-(

You'll only be on top for a day. Tomorrow someone will come out with !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! It isn't so much of a practical problem for me, because I find myself re-organizing my Runtime about once a week now, to keep everything manageable. But it is a big badge that says, "I care more about my self-promotion than your organizational structure, so I will use tricks to get around your organizational structure." Just like every single Microsoft program one ever installs completely overwrites all of your file associations, because it assumes that it is the One True Program. The exclaimation points aren't such a big deal that I consciously make that a factor as to whether I buy the product. However, in Poser, whenever I see a folder starting with an exclaimation point, my brain automatically associates the merchant with Microsoft. And that can't be good.

Isn't there some kind of Window file utility available taht will let you do a single search and replace operation on a bunch of folders? I'd really like to move all thosw "!" DAZ Pose folders to the bottom of the list, instead of the top, I generally use them only once-in-awhile. Incidently, I set up MY pose folders with the product name "Jessi Resorts" or whatever, inside it I put a space in front of "real" poses, to float them to the top, MATs go in the middle, and I prefix INJ and FIGs and suchlike with "Z" and "ZZ" to float them to the bottom. I also try to name my MATs with names like "Swimsuit Red Vinyl" and "Swimsuit Yellow Flower", so they group by the item they are for, rather than grouping by "Red", or something. Clever, what? ;-) Poser will let you name Poses with the space in front incidently, but Windows Explorer can't do that. Anyway, anybody want to supply the name of a suitable Windows File Utility?

Phew... I'm currently trying to avoid all 'ranty' threads, but I had to add to this one, just because I'm relieved to see I'm not the only person who get's really annoyed by those stupid !!!!!!!!!!!s

Attached Link: http://www.ghisler.com

Message edited on: 07/01/2005 10:39

The use of "!" characters to force items and folders to the top of the library list, is a way of working around the item and folder limits in P4 an PP.

Which is more preferable when installing a new item, being able to use it immediately or having to reorganise folders until you can make them appear on the list ?

I would say the install.exe's are now a big problem. With the multiple Runtime's and sub-catagories being used, searching out and shifting .exe dumps is a becoming a pain. Especially with all the creative naming of different files for the same product. I admire Bat and a few others for their filing approach...all kept within their cover folders. A dedicated sub/Mat folder takes care of the rest.

"that like school boys... they will eventually piss too high up the wall and it will fall back on them..! " LOL @ ziggie. so you had that happen too huh? This is a funny thread, I thought I was the only one who got annoyed at this. My other gripes are merchants who name their readme "readme.txt" - has it occurred to them I might have some difficulty locating it later? While it may be the only readme they've ever written it's not the only one in my runtime. And self-important merchants who are so certain that you will proceed to buy all their future creations that they take the liberty of foisting upon you a whole elaborate directory tree with the first prop you buy. "Your downloaded files can be found in Characters:Oh-god-I'm-wonderful-Modelz:wardobecollections:milfigures:Vicky3:Summer- collections:pastels:underwear:socks.cr2" And then on the very next product they misspell that first folder so you get a whole new directory tree beside the first one. LOL gotta love 'em ;o)

I don't let them bother me anymore. This has been tossed around since Poser 5 came out, so about 2 years. The one's that are doing it, are not going to stop. I know who they are :)), so I just don't buy from them. It's really easy, and saves me money. They can come up with any reason they want for why they do it, I refuse to get involved in any more pi**ing contests. It's their product, they can do what they want with it, keep it for all I care.

"My other gripes are merchants who name their readme "readme.txt" - has it occurred to them I might have some difficulty locating it later? While it may be the only readme they've ever written it's not the only one in my runtime."

renderosity requires all readmes to only be called Readme.. so I'd shout at them ;)

as to the ! .. I'm working on a set where I want the main part to be marked with a !.. to donote "load this bit first".. but I'm keeping this set in it's own folder - which has no !..

would you all find that acceptable?

Message edited on: 07/01/2005 16:46

"renderosity requires all readmes to only be called Readme.. " They say there must be a readme file and it must be txt format, that's all. They don't rule out common sense in the naming of it.

you try getting it passed and watch it fail ;)

"you try getting it passed and watch it fail" Er... not wishing to get into a ... well, a pissing contest - with you... but I HAVE uploaded several products here with informative names in their Readme.txt files and I did indeed watch, and they didn't fail. I just downloaded 2 of them to check that Rosity hadn't renamed the files. So I'll continue to shout at the merchant

How about merchants who put textures in a file named "texture" instead of using the correct name, "textures," so that the installation creates yet another texture folder?

"Er... not wishing to get into a ... well, a pissing contest - with you... but I HAVE uploaded several products here with informative names in their Readme.txt files and I did indeed watch, and they didn't fail. I just downloaded 2 of them to check that Rosity hadn't renamed the files. " really? they must like you. anyone else that tries to use anything other than the standard "one size fits all" rendo readme.txt gets failed. been like that for over a year. (I was a merchant here as well)

The Readme file on my products has a descriptive name (MexicaFloors_ReadMe.txt) and it is in the marketplace. Anything named only readme.txt in my directory has been overwritten by the latest readme.txt, which will be overwritten by another soon. So if you name it readme.txt, not only can I not find it when I look for your product, it likely doesnt exist any more. As for filenames beginning with !!! or variants -- I delete them and don't use the product -- I do not have time to update my runtime every week -- Poser is one tool in my kit, not an occupation. The alphabetical organization exists for a reason -- if you name your products sensibly then I can find and use them -- and if not then they are sent to the recycle bin.

Yeah, the !!!!!!!!! stuff REALLY bugs me too. And, of course, I'm a merchant. I strive to use unique mesh and texture names because I hate that too. I often use "+" to put individual reset MATs at the top of their own folder but that's about it. And I don't know of any brokerage just requiring readme.txt as the readme name. I use product_readme.txt.

I hate the excuse that the !!!!!!!!!!!!!!! don't matter because I can rename... without consistancy between the .cr2/.pp2 and MATpose files in a single product it can be a nightmare finding them much less renaming them. Then to find the damn texture and geometry files!!! Also, sorry to say, I have a ton of content, suffixing with the figureinitials would be nice... with even an merchant like BATLAB I can not always remeber what is V2 or V3 and having to load to find out is a huge drag... I am trying to re-organize folders now and I wish I could group by figure without having to open things up. JoeShmo/RomanticSrhirt V3.cr2 Characters/JoeShmo/RomanticSrhirt V3.pz2 Geometry/JoeShmo/RomanticSrhirt V3.obj Textures/JoeShmo/RomanticSrhirt V3/shirt red.jpg Textures/JoeShmo/RomanticSrhirt V3/shirt blue.jpg Textures/JoeShmo/RomanticSrhirt V3/shirt bump.jpg You wouldn't believe how deep some of the merchant geometry folders are nested! Each sub-folder with a cryptic name. Geometry/JSC/litewav/projects/clthes/RS/shirts/sh_bueBM.jpg Ugh! Try to navigate back in Materials Room where the paths are not shown? Sorry for the hyper-vent :)