Migrating categories in DS4 to a new computer
anders_4fd42b674f
Posts: 0
I decided to edit this post in order to make it easier to find the solution for random googlers. Please note that what I describe below is for migrating content categories from OSX to Windows. I have not attempted the reverse and cannot state with any accuracy if the process is identical the other way, but it should give you a head start.
0. Do not make any modifications on your mac during this entire process. You can keep it entirely as it is and will end up with two functional installations. This is heartily recommended since it's easy to make a mistake.
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1. Install DS4 on the windows machine. When installing make sure to manually enter the CMS (Content Management Service) database location to a directory of your choosing.
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2. Let the installation finish and then start DS4. Enter any serials you need, do whatever you wish, it doesn't matter. Now go to the content manager and add the poser and DS runtime locations for the content you've copied from your mac. Make sure you do not re-organize it but keep the file hierarchy identical. When you're done simply close DS4.
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3. Manually stop the CMS, this can be done via the start menu or by simply searching for "daz" via windows search.
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4. Navigate to the CMS database directory and delete -everything- in it.
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5. Copy the CMS database files from the mac to the windows machine.
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6. Download the Valentina studio database editor from http://www.valentina-db.com/en/downloads/valentina-studio, it's free but will only function for 10 minutes at a time. This will be plenty enough for our purposes.
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7. Start Valentina studio and go file-open database, navigate to your CMS directory and open Master.vdb. Switch the view by going view-as tree, or simply hit ctrl+2.
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8. Now navigate to database-master-tables-sysdatabase and update the two entries there to reflect your proper path. In my case they were;
d:\daz 3d\database\master.vdb
d:\daz 3d\database\ContentDB
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9. File-save the database and exit Valentina studio.
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10. Now copy the file ContentDB in the CMS directory and name the new file ContentDB.vdb. This is vitally important since Valentina studio will not be able to locate the data otherwise.
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11. Open Valentina studio again and open the database ContentDB.vdb.
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12. Navigate to databases-contentdb-tables-tblBasePath. Update all of these to reflect wherever you put your old content on your Windows machine.
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13. File-save the database and exit Valentina studio.
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14. Restart the Daz CMS. Start DS4 and marvel at your categories being intact.
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Everything below this point was my initial post asking how to do this before I figured it out. I decided to leave it intact in order to make the thread easier to read. But you do not need to read any further if it already works.
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Salutations all. Let me start off with a hope that I'm not duplicating a thread here. I've been googling all day trying to figure out how to do this but most of the links either relate to DS3 specific queries or dead pages. I've also tried the daz docs, daz wiki, the old forum via forumarchive.daz3d.com, et cetera.
Let me break it down. I've got DS4 installed on computer 1 (an iMac). On that computer I also had all of my content which I've meticulously categorized. Now I've installed DS4 to computer 2 (a Win7 laptop) and I simply copied over all of the content directories, let me layout the exact structure.
On the original iMac the absolute path was; /Internal HD/DAZ3D/
Append to this the following directories for each runtime directory;
CONTENT_DAZ
CONTENT_MAIN
DATABASE
On the new laptop the absolute path is; /D:/DAZ3D/
CONTENT_DAZ
CONTENT_MAIN
DATABASE
The database directory contains the DAZ content management service entries. When I installed DS4 on the laptop I pointed the management service to that particular directory, hoping it would pick up on the existing data. Upon launching DS4 I then added the relevant runtime directories for both Poser and DS formats. The content shows up fine in the content library but the categories was entirely blank, it didn't even have the default category.
Assuming it was broken I stopped the service, deleted the content of the DATABASE directory and restarted. Now the Default category shows up but all of my own hand-crafted ones are gone of course. Phew, this post is getting long, let me summarize it;
How can copy the categories from computer 1 (iMac) to computer 2 (Win7 laptop)?
I'm totally fine with doing some regexps in case the management service records absolute paths instead of relative ones. I just need to get told what files contains the data and what format it's in. I noticed that both the ContentDB.vdb and master.vdb are binary, otherwise I'd just have search+replaced it.
Many thanks in advance.
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Comments
Did you reimport the data? (Content Libary tab -> Options -> DB Maintainence -> reimport metadata)
I also remember when I migrated, I this issue as well, it worked after reimport and I think this alone did not help, I stopped and restartet the CMS manually via the start menu items.
Many thanks for replying mate. Reimporting the metadata seems to only relate to meta data on some of the daz items. When I categorized my content on the iMac I categorized a ton of old poser content that contains no such meta-data. Or at least nothing is showing up. I probably made my initial post a bit too long since the basic question is rather simple, I just wanted to make sure I didn't leave anything out by mistake. Let me rephrase it.
What is the procedure for installing Daz Studio on a new computer and keeping the existing categorization data? There has to be a way since you can't be expected to re-categorize all your content every time you buy a new computer so I'm probably missing something obvious but I just can't figure out what.
I also categorized my old stuff, after migrating to the new computer with complete fresh install and then reimport the database, everything was back including the categories I made.
What I did was just coping the old database data to the new maschine. Else I did it like you. Install the software, point the CMS to the new Daz Studio Content directory.
After that I first had nothing in the Categories, as well as nothing in Smart Content. Then I did reseted the database, reimported all content and the standard stuff was there again. After reading the old forum I did the above said stoping/starting of the CMS and everything was there again. I guess also categories etc. are written somewhere in the database or in the main content folder. Don't ask me ;-)
So in other words it just doesn't like me :)
I believe I struck gold when I was going through the forumarchive even more. Located http://forumarchive.daz3d.com/viewtopic.php?t=179107
Going to be giving it a whirl tomorrow, getting a wee bit late. I'll make sure to post in case it works so other people can see it in the new forum, or weep in my morning coffee if it doesn't.
Unfortunately the tutorial above didn't apply since it's flat out impossible to even temporarily create OSX paths on a windows system. My next step was to locate a valentina database editor and open master.vdb which did contain a couple of hardcoded absolute paths, specifically for the master.vdb and the contentdb. A handful of queries later I managed to fix those, but the DS4 log file is still complaining about not being able to open databases using the old mac path. To make matters worse the rest of the CMS files don't appear to be valentina databases, or at least their official tools refuse to open them.
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WARNING: contentmanagement\dzvalentinaobjectdatabase.cpp(42): DB Register Open error: Stream read error.
DB Register Open error: Stream read error.
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WARNING: contentmanagement\dzvalentinaobjectdatabase.cpp(42): DB Open error: File "/Volumes/Internal HD/Documents/DAZ 3D/DATABASE/ContentDB.vdb" does not exist.
DB Open error: File "/Volumes/Internal HD/Documents/DAZ 3D/DATABASE/ContentDB.vdb" does not exist.
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Does anyone know what format the rest of the CMS file are in, alternatively which file contains additional hardcoded paths? Is there really no official way of doing this besides totally recategorizing all your content again?
Didn't realize you were trying to move between Operating Systems. I'm not quite sure how to handle that. Let me ponder it.
Many thanks mate. Really do appreciate the help. To partially answer my own question above it appears that there's basically two databases. The master.vdb which is a single file, and then the ContentDB which is split across a number of files. I'll list them here in case anyone wants to take a stab at it, or for future reference via googlers.
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ContentDB - This file has no file extension, it appears to be a simple layout for the database containing the tables and links.
ContentDB.blb - Can't seem to open it no matter what I do, guessing it's a binary blob.
ContentDB.dat - Guessing either this or the one below is the main data archive.
ContentDB.ind - See above.
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Now, it appears that all of these files form the second database. For some ungodly reason I can't get them to open a single database no matter what I attempt with Valentina's official editor. I realize that you're supposed to open the "ContentDB" which then references "ContentDB.vdb" but there's no such file. I'm assuming the rest of the files form this single file when amalgamated, but I'm not sure how to accomplish this.
Booyah! I need to stop posting before I've fully exhausted an area. It turns out ContentDB can in fact be opened, and there's a slight discrepancy between the way CMS on windows and osx stores its databases. I'm back in business baby, all categories intact (or so it seems). I've got to go turn on the BBQ for the family but I'll detail the entire process in this thread later on in case anyone wants to do it in the future, all it took was some file renaming, sql-queries and de-referencing some files.
There we go, tutorial available in my first post. I'll put a sock in it at this point, just relieved I managed to figure it out. Was not looking forward to another 48 hours of categorizing content.
Excellent tutorial tyvm. :)