My wish(es) to Poser content creators.

AA) Please place your poser files under a folder that has your Market "vendor name". This includes Texture files and Geometry files. This way I can find your product files easily by vendor name AND I will know which vendor to credit in my gallery images.

Example of good structure:
:Runtime:Geometry:Vendor_Name:Product_Name:Product.OBJ
:Runtime:Libraries:Character:Vendor_Name:Product_Name:Product.CR2
:Runtime:Textures:Vendor_Name:Product_Name:Product.jpg

This would also avoid the rare instance of unzipping your files into the same folder name already created by another content creator. Doesn't happen often but it's a pain to sort out the files when it does.

BB) Please don't place all your files in one folder. This makes it impossible for us humble content purchasers to reorganise our runtime Libraries folders. Geometries should be in the Geometries folder and Textures should be in the Textures folder.

Example of bad structure:
:Runtime:Libraries:Character:Product_Name:Product.OBJ
:Runtime:Libraries:Character:Product_Name:Product.CR2
:Runtime:Libraries:Character:Product_Name:Product.jpg

CC)  In your files please delete any file path before the the word ":Runtime:". This is a particular problem for Daz Studio (my art  weapon of choice. LOL.) . DS is specific how it follows a file path, so anything before ":Runtime:" stuffs it up.

My limited experience of Poser shows that it slows down loading a file if the file path is wrong, but unlike DS it eventually finds the file; possibly by ignoring everything before the word ":Runtime:", but I'm not too sure on that.

Anyhoot please HELP us humble DS users in this small matter (possibly taking only 1 hour to fix by using a Poser file edit program like Dimension3D's Poser File Editor).

Thank you.

AMEN!!     :thumbupboth:

Has my vote! And, frankly, the path issues should be part of the marketplace QC and acceptance process - NO item should make it to market with file paths that point to the creator's own hard drive structure!

Another thing I would add to all this would be a structure for ReadMe files and locations; personally, I prefer my readme files in a separate folder (and I HATE the "Readme's" folder that DAZ creates - it's a complete waste of time if you want to track down something, not to mention the grammatical error of the apostrophe ;)). They should be something like:

(Poser directory)Read MeVendorNameProductNameProductName_readme.txt
(Poser directory)Read MeVendorNameProductNameProductName_license.txt
(Poser directory)Read MeVendorNameProductNameProductName_promo01.jog

etc. ...

I'm tired of unzipping products and getting "Do you want to overwrite "ReadMe.txt ?" NO, I don't! I also don't want to find it in the Character folder somewhere, nor do I want to find OBJs or textures there. There are so many tools out there to package this stuff - why don't we have any standards?

Quote - Has my vote! And, frankly, the path issues should be part of the marketplace QC and acceptance process - NO item should make it to market with file paths that point to the creator's own hard drive structure!

OMG...I hate that one..and the double runtimes...and the character and pose folders spelled wrong so you end up with two and it takes forever to track stuff down until it dawns on you what is going on...  

obj files in the same folder as the cr2 or pp2 are perfectly valid , and done a lot by bmith micro / content paradise. Its easily fixed if you want them in the deometries folder. 

Personally I rearrange my folders by type of item , so furniture is in one place regardless of who made it. I remember I want a chair , I dont remember that I bought it from Zingblat63 in 2003 :(  

I actually wrote my own runtime index  so I can view and search my runtimes and see the thumbnails.

I also set up my runtime based on type of item - exactly like the furniture example, although I keep the vendor, generally, under whatever subgroup. I want my runtime to reflect the way I work, not the way someone else does; I'm fine with geometry and texture folders being wherever the vendor put them (within reason, of course - I still don't want generic folder or filenames that could result in overwrites) but what I REALLY don't want is something in the Poser file of whatever stripe pointing to a specific location that may not exist on my machine. Case in point, and this is something that DAZ screwed up bigtime, a character that is hard-coded to their pose file locations! Find some way to load the poses other than pointing to the pz2 file itself - I don't want a separate INJ folder and REM folder, so I combined them and renamed the PZ2s accordingly, suffixing them with either INJ or REM so they are all grouped together sensibly, and then when I want to use a character, it bombs because it's looking for the pz2 file in "PosesV3 MorphsEars & Nose INJ" instead of loading and dialing the delta that the pose is based on!

Worse still, a vendor may have their own customized runtime, like mine, and create a character that pulls the pose from that setup, and then it never works correctly for a paying customer unless the customer edits the PZ2 or other file.

The person who makes an installer that prompts for locations within the runtime, so the buyer doesn't have to install and THEN track everything down, move it and possibly edit the files to make them work, is going to deserve every (reasonably priced) penny they get from the Marketplace. I would LOVE to have an installer that asks me where I want to put the readme files! That asks me if I want to put the furniture in Props directly or if I prefer it in PropsFurniture, or the robot in CharactersSciFiRobots. I'd love for that installer to check the references in the CR2 and fix them if the files don't exist or are in a path in the package that doesn't match the path in the PP2 file! But until we get this (Python programmers, are you listening to that last couple sentences? ;-D ), a bit of discipline, common sense and QC on the part of the vendors (and the marketplace reviewers!) goes a LONG way to making and keeping happy customers.

Quote - I'm tired of unzipping products and getting "Do you want to overwrite "ReadMe.txt ?" NO, I don't! I also don't want to find it in the Character folder somewhere, nor do I want to find OBJs or textures there. There are so many tools out there to package this stuff - why don't we have any standards?

I forgot about that one and it's a major headache item too. Especially if the readme file has the link to the bonus zip that some vendors offer. God knows how many bonuses I missed  out on because of overwriting readme's.

Quote - obj files in the same folder as the cr2 or pp2 are perfectly valid , and done a lot by bmith micro / content paradise. Its easily fixed if you want them in the deometries folder.

Easily fixed in Poser maybe but in DS it's a pain. If you rename or move the library folder that has both the CR2 and OBJ in it then DS freaks because the file path is no longer valid.

Same problem for renaming or moving a folder that has both the PMD and CR2. Pity the Poser developers didn't think to create a separate "Morphs" folder when they developed the PMD. I notice some content creators already make their own "Morphs" folder for their Inj/Rem and Hide/Show scripts as referenced by the PZ2 files. This is wonderful, very considerate and greatly appreciated.

With the way Poser is now that can accommodate files in wrong location better than DS, I fear it will lead to lazyness by content creators (both free and for sale) to just throw all the files in one folder and let the user / purchaser sort it out.

I know this may seem like a DS problem and Poser content creators may easily dismiss it. But even though Poser is now more accommodating, it does still slow down Poser to load the files.

I note content vendors place "Not tested in Daz Studio", however they should also add "Poser folder structure not strictly followed" and/or "File paths not checked"...(pause for effect)......I wonder how many sales they'll get if they added those little bits of truth. ;-)

Maybe Renderosity should develop a quality assurance stamp system. The QA stamp will indicate that Poser folder/file structure has been strictly followed, file paths have been checked AND.....(wait for it).....all the files required for the product are included in the zip file (I just remembered that last one. LOL).

I agree with you all , count my vote too LOL

Quote -   With the way Poser is now that can accommodate files in wrong location better than DS, I fear it will lead to lazyness by content creators (both free and for sale) to just throw all the files in one folder and let the user / purchaser sort it out.

I already see this in freestuff.  I have a folder on my hard drive that I put them in until I have time to go thru them and either fix or delete. 

Quote - I already see this in freestuff.  I have a folder on my hard drive that I put them in until I have time to go thru them and either fix or delete. 

Ditto.....Unfortunately one can't complain too much about freestuff. Sigh! Just got to grin and bear it.

Very true...but if it turns into too much time and trouble I do delete.  :biggrin:

I never release anything without passing it first to my beta tester team, that try it in different versions of Poser and DAZ Studio in different computers. Before that I use Content Creater Pro to search for errors in paths and others, and also by hand (search) using my text programming editor Notepad++.
I would recommend every vendor to do this.

 I also use Content Creater Pro and completely delete all the products files from Poser, DS, Vue, Bryce or whatever the program the product is to be used in. Then go through each one and make sure eveything works as it should before uploading. Savea alot of headaches for me as well well as the consumer.
  Svhurby

Thanks for the info...I'm making a list... :biggrin: