Forum: Poser - OFFICIAL


Subject: The Rules for Content Providers (yes, I'm looking at you)

Keith opened this issue on May 11, 2007 ยท 124 posts


nomuse posted Sat, 12 May 2007 at 7:01 PM

Lot of contradictions in this thread. Which rather underlines the problem a conscientious merchant faces. We'd like to do right. But what is right (beyond, of course, better quality control) is not always obvious. For that matter, we'd like to pass Rendo testing. Historically the Rendorosity testing procedure has been random and undocumented enough that many merchants -- perhaps the majority of merchants -- have been unwilling to experiment. They'd rather use what passed last time, then take a chance and throw away all their hard work by trying something new. I know people who have had products fail testing due to not using "readme.txt" as their readme, or placing it inside the Runtime folder but not inside a folder named "readme." I've been failed for placing anything outside of Runtime, readme or not (and yet, on different occasions this has passed -- go figure.) So on the one side, merchants tend to be extremely conservative. Rendo has not been good towards support of alternate file structures, naming schemes, or use of non-standard options (like mtl files instead of MAT poses). On the other side, many questions have no clear "best choice." Take the contradiction implicit in the first post in this thread: "unique file names" versus "no long file names." Excuse me, but if I have a high-heeled shoe that fits Victoria 4, with say a red texture, AND it isn't the first high-heeled red shoe I have made, then a suitably unique name is going to be pushing the character limits for thumbnail display. Making this human-readable instead of machine readable (aka "My_V4_HighHeelShoe_Strappy2_RedLeather_BUMP.jpg" versus "V4s4c00404bm.jpg" only compounds the problem. And are folders an option? Again, within this thread, arguments against nested folders, arguments for them, and strong disagreement as to whether items should organize by merchant, figure, type, item, or character. Plus of course the folder scheme that works for textures might not work for the figures directory, and if the poor end-user has to delete or move the thing they'd really prefer a consistent scheme. For instance: I'm reworking a couple of old products to fit both the original PT girl and the new(er) Laura. Should I folder them by my own store ID, by the figure name, or by the items -- with then stuff for both figures stuck in the same folder hierarchy? If I do split up by figure, how can I possibly guess what the end-user has used to separate those figures, and how can I make it simplest for them to move my folder tree into theirs? I can't offer alternate or multiple zips, installs, or runtimes (not by current Rendo rules, I can't.) I could make two products, but I don't want to make people pay twice. Could I offer the L3 fit as a separate download available as an email link? Lots of problems inherent in that as well. This post is not meant as an excuse for poor organization, by me or anyone else. Nor do I want to stop at identifying the problem. Please, let's discuss, and maybe somewhere out there there IS a most-logical solution. I for one will gladly adopt it. Just to share, this is my current organization: Runtime .......geometries .................Princess ...........................Music_set ..................................lg_condenser.obj et al. I have also been attempting to strike a balance between length of file name, sufficient identifiers, and readability. On my current set a typical file is something like; Runtime ......library ...........props .................Music_set ......................Smart_props ..............................L3_vocal_NC.pz2 but I'm afraid the name length would compound ridiculously if I had to include merchant, set, and purpose within the individual item name.