hi all,

I'd like to have your feedback on Poser Lib organisation. Like some other people (see thread "Can anyone beat this?????") I'm facing Gb's of useful Poser stuff, but unlike most I AM going to redo the structure completely. Since it's too much for having one runtime, and having everything in it's own runtime is not a handy way either, I'm looking for something in between.

One route to go is organise by Character first (V3, M3, ...), then objectclasses (Clothes, Hair, ..) then styles. This unfortunately separates similar styles for V3,M3. Combining logical Character pairs in one runtime separates Clothes etc for the females-group (V3, S3, A3) so I could organize by Objectclass first (yes, I do run Wardrobe Wizard too). But a third way is going by theme, having scenes, clothingstyles and the like grouped together as the first entry.

So, how do you have your stuff organised in a multi-runtime environment? Just curious in the first place, but all suggestions and experiences are welcomed too ...

Thanks a lot, regards,
aRtBee

i have a comment but first I want to see what others have to say,,,

I have a goofy way of doing this lol

Because I have a LOT of room on my computer, I can get away with this. Not everyone can. I installed a version of Poser for every 2 figures. Poser is installed in my program files, my documents and on my desktop. One for v3 and aiko, one for 'Just guys' and one for Koshini figures and TheGirl. All 3 work well too !

That was just my lazy way of doing things, but it worked really well for me !

Dont laugh lol

I have 15 runtimes.

Poser - strictly default install
Download - this is kinda a misc runtime. i put my robots, toons, troll, E-f and G2 figures, rikishi etc.
Animals - all my animals
ApolloMax - I dont use him much so i keep him separate
Buildings - insides and outsides and modular kits for buildings.
Cyclorama - just stuff for cyclorama, I may delete this one.
Davorama - all davorama sci-fi stuff, buildings, modular kits, etc.
DAZ People - everything for Daz human characters, i have far to many poserworld sets that span the figures that i really coudn't find a way to separate even the men from the women.
Props - i guess this is best described as man made stuff. furnater, weapons, electronics, instruments, etc.
Vehicals - cars, boats, trains, planes, space ships, bikes, mechs, etc
Working - I use this as a temporary storage place for things im working on or when i want to save a figure dressed and set up for a scene i am working on.
Dennis - It started as only dennis, but i have other toon human figures here too
Materials - MT5 files. generic materials that could be used anywhere
Microcosm - all things directly related to microcosm/skydome
Nature - plants, trees, rocks, grass, etc.

why do i divide my stuff this way? It suits the way i work.

when i am putting in microcosm, i jump between figures, poses and materials till i have it like i want it. then i may go to DAZ people and put in figures, dress them, change the textures, move to the next runtime. I usually end up jumping back and forth near the end when i am doing the final tweeking, but for the most part i can do what i need in each and move to the next.

aRtBee: good point. My peeves are:

1. Switching between runtimes is tedious. Have I missed some hotkey? The only way I found is to click all the way up the hierarchy and then click down into another runtime. Hard to believe that it is done like this on purpose.

2. You had to keep cr2, pp2 etc all separate. This is better in P6, but you still have to rename the extension. Sometimes it is easier to keep all the bits together in one directory. Basically all Poser library management is open heart surgery by poking around the filing system manually. You can't drag and drop a bunch of library items from one place to another.

3. Can't save props with lights. If you have a set and have moved lightsources to all the lightbulbs in the scene, you can't save it in one place, you must save the prop and the lights seperately

4. library items save with the preview, not with the last render. Arrgh. If you add transmapped hair, you can never see the thing in the preview.
   The workaround to render something, save it as a png, scale it down and copy it into the right place manually is ridiculous.

5. No library group for full pz3 designs, so you can see little pictures of your designs in progress. (Like in Vue)

6. No system convention where to store morphs.

7. No system convention where to store readmes/eulas. There should be an XML file or something for each item, so you can get the information who made it, when you bought/downloaded it, if you can use it for commercial use etc, by clicking on some button or hovering the mouse.

8. No easy way to add new items in a place of your choice. Some items install to directories that the creator decided on (starting with!!!!) other will make a new runtime. I manually move everything into the places where I want them. I have my own library organisation like you described in your first post. It gets quite deeply nested otherwise you never find anything again.

Considering how much Posering is about content, you would have thought this would a high priority to make all this as easy as possible.

I use one runtime with sub folders branching from my main library pallette, I've gone into how many times before and I'm not doing it again, sorry!

Find a way that suits how you work, that's always the best way!

Single runtime suits my way of working and despite what you'll hear from some peeps that haven't even tried it, there is no excessive load times except for the initial start up of Poser and we're talking seconds here not minutes or hours!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Quote - aRtBee: good point. My peeves are:

1. Switching between runtimes is tedious. Have I missed some hotkey? The only way I found is to click all the way up the hierarchy and then click down into another runtime. Hard to believe that it is done like this on purpose.

There's a drop down some where at the top of the library...I always forget about it though.

Quote -

1. You had to keep cr2, pp2 etc all separate. This is better in P6, but you still have to rename the extension. Sometimes it is easier to keep all the bits together in one directory. Basically all Poser library management is open heart surgery by poking around the filing system manually. You can't drag and drop a bunch of library items from one place to another.

I tend to use the subfolder system.  So V3 runtime has clothing under figures then it's separated by fantasy, modern etc.

Quote -

1. library items save with the preview, not with the last render. Arrgh. If you add transmapped hair, you can never see the thing in the preview.

Have tried having smooth shading on in the preview?

Quote - 5) No library group for full pz3 designs, so you can see little pictures of your designs in progress. (Like in Vue)

There is a project palette thingy mentioned in the previews for poser 7.  I'm hoping this is what that is.

Quote -

1. No system convention where to store morphs.

You mean the external ones?  Yeah, I don't like like.  I tend to just save the figure in a new file to keep track of them.

Quote -

1. No easy way to add new items in a place of your choice. Some items install to directories that the creator decided on (starting with!!!!) other will make a new runtime. I manually move everything into the places where I want them. I have my own library organisation like you described in your first post. It gets quite deeply nested otherwise you never find anything again.

  Yeah the whole moving things around sucks a bit afterward.  But that's why hogwarden is god.

Just a tip, consider which library items you use most.  I just created a new folder in several libraries (most importantly in Pose) that sits at the top that I copied my most used folders into.  I tend to use figures, hair, textures, etc., far less often than pose folders so this makes sense for me.  I mention this because "most used" doesn't really fit into a lot of categorization schemes (sort by type, sort by figure, whatever).

A.)  I never just install a DL.  I always extract to a seperate folder; rename the each directory(Except Geometries, Props, and Textures) to the same thing.

B.)  A typical Scene for me involves alot of work on just one figure.  I find no problem locating things organizing Character, then by Technicality(MATs, MORs, Clothing, Favorite Character Sets.)  Then by Figure Parts(Especially for MATs, i.e. Head, Body, Eyes, etc.)  Even if I spend a time/day(s) going through my M3 stuff for V3.

C.) Not having seperate Runtimes requires a certain behavior.  If this is your computer, you'd like to use Poser alot, and do'nt mind using Windows, Hibernation, then one Runtime would work great.   But if you think you'll be opening and closing Poser frequently, it will add a minutes to your load time.

Quote -

Quote -

1. Switching between runtimes is tedious. Have I missed some hotkey? The only way I found is to click all the way up the hierarchy and then click down into another runtime. Hard to believe that it is done like this on purpose.

There's a drop down some where at the top of the library...I always forget about it though.

Really??? I missed it all these years? Where? I have been clicking on everything near the top of the library, but I can't find it. Could you try and tell me where it is and I will take back everything bad I have been thinking about EF.

Quote -

Quote -

1. library items save with the preview, not with the last render. Arrgh. If you add transmapped hair, you can never see the thing in the preview.

Have tried having smooth shading on in the preview?

Well yes, but then the hair turns to helmets. It is a really silly feature, but the community has learned to live with it. (Like 1 level undo.)

Quote -

Quote - 6) No system convention where to store morphs.

You mean the external ones?  Yeah, I don't like like.  I tend to just save the figure in a new file to keep track of them.

The new binary morphs are a step in the right direction, but still half hearted. The morph data must live with the obj, the figures should just contain the dial values. The current system assures incredible duplication of data.

The new binary morphs hardwire the location of the pmd file into the cr2 file, so then you can't move the files around any more.

Quote -

Quote - 8) No easy way to add new items in a place of your choice. Some items install to directories that the creator decided on (starting with!!!!) other will make a new runtime. I manually move everything into the places where I want them. I have my own library organisation like you described in your first post. It gets quite deeply nested otherwise you never find anything again.

  Yeah the whole moving things around sucks a bit afterward.  But that's why hogwarden is god.

But EF are cutting their own flesh by making it difficult. From which version did people spend more on the content than on the core program? P4 or P3?

Well, at the moment I am creating a completely new installation of Poser and due to the experience with my existing installation with about 15 runtimes, I am not sorting the things into 38 runtimes.

Although, this is only possible due to the PRPCd together with Advancded Library or P3dO Explorer. Switching between the runtimes would be a nightmare but with these tools it is no problem.

In my new installation I rate each and every freebie if its worth to be installed or not. To be honest, more then 60 % of my downloaded freebies (about 10,000) will remain uninstalled. If I need them, P3dO Explorer will help me, to find the needed Item (I hope so).

I have multiple runtimes and I use advance libray for poser found here http://neocron.lunarpages.com/library/ this means no more running between libraries in Poser specially as Poser doesnt let you know which runtime you are currently in.

I gave up sorting yonks ago, and decided my time is better spent creating renders.
So, here's what I do to keep sanity:

1.  Install in major categories - Humans (males, females, kids,hair), non-Humans (anthropomorphs,realistic,toons), Environment (plants, buildings, landscapes), Thematic (seasonal,genre), and  Physical Poses  (not MAT poses).

2.  Use Semidieu's ShaderWorks to add all the runtimes into Poser libraryprefs.xml

3.  Use Dizzie's Advance Library to visually sight all my content. ( if not using Semidieu's program, then have to go extra step of using P3DO Explorer)

4.  Use Tromnek's PRPCdaemon to load items directly from Advance Library into Poser 6sr3.  Very important to have step 1 done,or else Poser asks for content path each time.)

There, no more fussing over content organisation.  Just do the creating part.

(These are all freeware utilities, at this time.  Except for Poser 6, of course)

hi all,

thanks for the comments so far, I'll do a wrap-up later on. In the meantime I'm curious:
 - about the comment David Harmon is going to make
 - about the 38 runtimes Jules is (not?) planning to deploy
 - about the current whereabouts of ShaderWorks. All links I can find on Google of runtimeDNA appear dead. The toolkit looks promising though. Suggestions anyone?

regards,
aRtBee

As for Semidieu's ShaderWorks, he talks about it over at the Runtimedna website's Poser 6 forum.  Also, he changes the links to it at his website from time to time, so best to check his latest posting or ask him direct. 

Attached Link: http://poser.rois-sorciers.com/ShaderWorks/

The actual website is http://poser.rois-sorciers.com/ShaderWorks/

For my organisation, here is what I do:

I put all textures and geometries in the main Poser 6 runtime folder. Then I have created external libraries (without textures and geometries). That way, I can move the files between the external libraries without having any references errors.

The main structure is this one:

Poser 6 - original stuff
Download - Temporaray stuffs
MAT and Effects - Materials, lights, etc...
Female Gen3 (V3, Steph, Aiko)
Miki
Females (V2 others)
Maya Doll
Furrette
G2 Males (James, Koji-Kelvin)
Males G3 (David, M3, Freak)
Apollo Maximus
Males (M2, others)
Cyborgs
Baby
Hairs (all hairs are here)
PoserWorld stuff (this is the only exception - textures and geometries are here)
Animals Fantasy
Animals Real
Clothes Actual
Clothes Fantasy
Clothes SciFi
Env Actual   (Env = environnement - architecture, accessories, etc...)
Env Fantasy
Env Nature
Env SciFi
RPG Characters (saved figure for my RPG illustration)

But, everyone has his own way to do. I saw another thing... Someone has EVERYTHING in the main runtime. Poser take some time to load, but after that, you never need to switch between runtimes. Also, using the little shortcut (the triangle on the top right of the library palette), you can browse your whole library really quickly).

But, everyone has his own way to do. I saw another thing... Someone has EVERYTHING in the main runtime. Poser take some time to load, but after that, you never need to switch between runtimes. Also, using the little shortcut (the triangle on the top right of the library palette), you can browse your whole library really quickly).

That's exactly the way I prefer to do it, I find it works for me. As you say no switching between runtimes, easy browsing of library and also easy to do back ups!

As for the loading time, I don't find it an issue at present, it's only on initial load up at the start of the day and isn't a problem for me!  [;-)]

Thanks for not laughing at my backwards way of doing it lol It just works REALLY well for me!

Personally I would never laugh at anyone, we all have the way that suits our workflow and that's all that matters in the end!!  

I probably have way more separate runtimes than I need.....but even though my house looks like a disaster zone....I gotta have my runtimes over-organized to the max for some odd reason. (I'm just slightly crazy)

I have a separate runtime for each of my main figures and all their items, runtimes for similar figures that I don't use on a constant basis, a props runtime, a hair runtime, one for projects so main runtimes don't get too messy.....and even one just for materials. (just to name a few)

I know the last one sounds really really wierd, but it's easier for me to remember where all those downloaded materials end up. I don't mind switching between runtimes, because I can easily and quickly get to the items I need knowing where they are. Yes, it does annoy me on occasion when I forget something, or make changes halfway through, but for me, it's much easier 98% of the time than my old runtime where everything was all in the main Poser runtime.

HEJ, can someone put me out of my misery and tell me if there is a fast way to switch runtimes, or if that was a red herring. (**Tirjasdyn?)

**The single menu to access all figures, poses, props etc at the top is fine, but I can't figure out how to switch to another runtime other than clicking up all the way to the to top the hierarchy and then down again, which can take half a dozen clicks or more.

if you click once in the library then you can use the backspace key to go up one level.

I usually just hit the backspace key about 6 times and it will usually make it to the runtimes level.

that would be the fewest "clicks"

Although, this is only possible due to the PRPCd together with Advancded Library or P3dO Explorer. Switching between the runtimes would be a nightmare but with these tools it is no problem.

OMFG thanks for the tip!  Advanced Library + PRPC together bring the library MUCH closer to what the Poser library should be in the first place.  How do these things escape my notice for so long?

Question, how do I make loading into Poser the default for double-clicking on an Advanced Library thumbnail?  Right now it wants Carrara and I don't know how to change this.  Also, how do I use P3DO explorer to convert all those RSRs?

I figured out that I need the Poser plugin pack at the P3DO site, but I have another question.  It looks like the "Runtimes Mode" is what I want but the button is greyed out.  Why is that (because I have Poser running?)?

I figured out how to get double-clicking working too (didn't quite get the instructions in the error message the first go round, heh).