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© 2024 Daz Productions Inc. All Rights Reserved.
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Is this a yes or a no??? What does it have to do with keeping zip files and if it does, where do you have to keep them?? I keep all my zip/exe files but not in one folder - will that be necessary?The answer makes a difference as to how Install Manager sees the files.
If you don't have the files either downloaded and in the download directory or installed, by Install Manager, then it will give you a list of files that you don't have installed or downloaded, from your account in "ready to download." It won't show any as updates if you don't have the files in the first place, they are simply ready to download. If you have files downloaded but not installed it will show those in "ready to install." If you download the files but remove the zips, they are no longer ready to Install, so they go back to ready to download. If you have install manager install them, they go into "Installed."
Install manager marks anything that it has installed, which has an update, as having an update in your ready to download list. If there is something that you have downloaded and it is ready to install but there is an update, that product will come out of the ready to install list, and go back into the ready to download list. So while it will tell you there is something new to download, it doesn't actually mark it as an update, because it isn't, as far as Install manager is concerned, an update to what you have installed.
So the answer is yes and no. If you have the zips in the download directory and have downloaded all of them, it will let you know you have new files to download, whether Install manager installed them or not.
So let me see if I can put this into my own words and understand it -
As far as you know now, to be notified of actual updates
1- You have to use DIM to download your files
2- You must leave them in the original download folder (as in all of them in one huge folder with no subfolders and no further organization)
3- You can not change the file names (which I always do since the filenames often make no sense to me)
4- If you do the above and do not install, and a file is updated, DIM will tell you that there is a file needing downloading but unless they are installed, it will not tell you if it is the original file or an update. Unfortunately, even having this option available requires you to follow 1,2 & 3.
5- If you download and install to a temporary folder, all is fine and it will behave UNLESS you delete the files in the temporary folder in which case DIM assumes it was never installed. This eliminates the possibility of using this method to simply assure that you get updates.
Like I said earlier, it seems to me that Daz is in a sense forcing us into using this DIM IF we ever want to know about updated files and find them without it being a huge huge headache :( If they had an alternate method of being notified about updates and finding them in your huge list of purchase, (which is a SERIOUS pain since there are only a few on page so you have to click page after page to find them), it would be a nice "option" for people.
Still think we should have a way to tell DIM where we want the downloads stored. Why is that not possible? Seems totally possible.
http://docs.daz3d.com/doku.php/public/software/install_manager/userguide/configure_install_manager/tips/setup_my_download_locations/start
No, I mean if something gets corrupted or goes missing in my runtimes. I know things are as usual right now, but once the DIM is released for everyone, will that change?
And to ask again...if I use the DIM only to download, will the DIM show me things that are updated, or will that work only if I use it to install as well?
And you are correct when you say, because the DIM has not been released doesn't mean new products do not have new format files...they just don't anyway. Most new products are still coming as installers, not zip files. This is simply a fact. Cleave is the newest freebie...it was installers, not zips. Are you saying that zips are available but we're not seeing them?
Dana
If you don't have the files either downloaded and in the download directory or installed, by Install Manager, then it will give you a list of files that you don't have installed or downloaded, from your account in "Ready to Download." It won't show any as updates if you don't have the files in the first place, they are simply ready to download. If you have files downloaded but not installed it will show those in "ready to install." If you download the files but remove the zips, they are no longer ready to Install, so they go back to ready to download. If you have install manager install them, they go into "Installed."
Install manager marks anything that it has installed, which has an update, as having an update in your ready to download list. If there is something that you have downloaded and it is ready to install but there is an update, that product will come out of the ready to install list, and go back into the ready to download list. So while it will tell you there is something new to download, it doesn't actually mark it as an update, because it isn't, as far as Install manager is concerned, an update to what you have installed.
So the answer is yes and no. If you have the zips in the download directory and have downloaded all of them, it will let you know you have new files to download, whether Install manager installed them or not.
So let me see if I can put this into my own words and understand it -
As far as you know now, to be notified of actual updates
1- You have to use DIM to download your files
2- You must leave them in the original download folder (as in all of them in one huge folder with no subfolders and no further organization)
3- You can not change the file names (which I always do since the filenames often make no sense to me)
4- If you do the above and do not install, and a file is updated, DIM will tell you that there is a file needing downloading but unless they are installed, it will not tell you if it is the original file or an update. Unfortunately, even having this option available requires you to follow 1,2 & 3.
5- If you download and install to a temporary folder, all is fine and it will behave UNLESS you delete the files in the temporary folder in which case DIM assumes it was never installed. This eliminates the possibility of using this method to simply assure that you get updates.
Like I said earlier, it seems to me that Daz is in a sense forcing us into using this DIM IF we ever want to know about updated files and find them without it being a huge huge headache :( If they had an alternate method of being notified about updates and finding them in your huge list of purchase, (which is a SERIOUS pain since there are only a few on page so you have to click page after page to find them), it would be a nice "option" for people.One of us is seriously confused, I think it is likely me.
If Install Manager is going to manage your downloads, with all sorts of filters so you can see what you need to see and only what you need to see, why would you need to organize the zips into sub folders? You aren't running the content from the zips, in DS, Poser, Carrara, Lightwave, Cinema 4D or any other software that reads content directly from the content directory structure.
If you download everything that you needed based on which software you use, using the filters, and have it sitting in a folder, the "Ready to Download" tab will be empty, until you have something new to download, either something new you bought, or something got updated. If it is an update and it isn't installed then it won't be in the update section (you won't even have an update section) but it will have an entry in "Ready to Download" and the count will increase on the tab, so you can see it with Install manager open whether you are on the "Ready to Download" tab or not.
Now if you let Install Manager install it, and nobody has said Install Manager can only install to one Content Path, then when there is an update, not only will the count increase on the "Ready to Download" tab, and the file show up on the "Ready to Download" tab, but it will also show up in a updates section of the "Ready to Download" tab.
You didn't read what I said. The guy was talking about an ISO spec that requires that things are certainly in place before they can even use an application. Are the docs there on the site...maybe so. Does the link definitely work? Dont' know until you try it...can't try it until you know. Conundrum. And yes, links in the installers have been bad in the past, so by past experience one must say that it is possible that it will happen again. This is what he was saying, basically. It's simple logic. In any case, when reports start coming in from people who are actually using it in full release, then he'll know.
Dana
That's a great question! I am also still on Windows XP Pro 32 bit.
Dana
At the moment, I download my installers into sub-folders based on the source. So all my DAZ downloads go in the DAZ sub-folder of the Purchased Downloads directory.
So far so good. No problems using the DIM as a Download manager and continuing as I have been.
After I install, I move the installer into yet another level of subfolder based on if it's a program or plug-in (DS4 Installers), something that uses Genesis Technology (Installed Genesis) or something that is still primarily set up for poser (Installed Products)
I really only do this so that I can keep track of what I have installed.... and now we come to the first pebble in the road.
If I use the DIM as an installer, I don't need to worry about keeping track of what's installed, the DIM will mark it as such. But if I install it manually, I can't move it without the DIM thinking that I no longer have the download. So it stays in the folder, marked Ready to Install, and if I'm say installing a bundle but have to pause in the middle, I have to hope I can remember where I was...But I'm still not convinced I want to use the DIM as an installer, for various reasons I've expounded on in previous posts.
I'm starting to get the feeling that when it comes to practical use of the DIM, it's an all or nothing situation, since the potential benefits of using the DIM as a downloader may be compromised if you don't use it as an installer as well.
Edit to add: Perhaps a future update of the DIM could include a checkbox or button for "I manually installed this" for those who only want to use it as a download manager?
But, by the current state of the docs, only one folder can be specified (or at least that's how it looks to me - there is a single entry field with a ... button for selecting a location, but no obvious way of having a list of locations that can be switched between). With a lot of files that's going to be a huge folder, eating up a substantial chunk of disc space, and if we want definite update notices we also need the unzipped versions of those files on disc somewhere (though those can be spread across multiple drives). That seems to me a pretty heavy burden, even if we find the filtering in the DIM adequate (and at a glance it appeared to be by app rather than, say, by type of content).
I should add that readmes do list updates, so assuming all readmes are going to end up in the Wiki there is an alternative to relying on forum notices if you don't use the DIM in such a way that it tells you - and the readmes also give some indication of what the update is for. Of course you have to figure out whether that pre- or post-dates your last download, but if you want an automated system it's probably going to have overheads similar to the DIM in any event.
At this point, I think a lot of us are seriously confused. :lol:
Dana
Yes, but unless you know that you should be looking at the readme online, you won't know that you should be looking at the readme online. If I don't know there's an update, I don't know to look at the readme to see what that update is. Who wants to spend hours looking through readmes online to see if there are updates to who knows how much content they have?
As someone else mentioned, other stores have the policy that if there's an update, the vendor notifies you. I've had several notifications from Renderosity vendors recently, and in the past.
Dana
No, I mean if something gets corrupted or goes missing in my runtimes. I know things are as usual right now, but once the DIM is released for everyone, will that change?
And to ask again...if I use the DIM only to download, will the DIM show me things that are updated, or will that work only if I use it to install as well?
And you are correct when you say, because the DIM has not been released doesn't mean new products do not have new format files...they just don't anyway. Most new products are still coming as installers, not zip files. This is simply a fact. Cleave is the newest freebie...it was installers, not zips. Are you saying that zips are available but we're not seeing them?
DanaYes new files show up in the store under Available Downloads as Installers, either exe for Windows or zip for the Mac, and that is a fact. That does not mean that the Zip files for Install manager, which are different from both the Mac installers and from the early versions for some products the new store couldn't handle last summer, are not on the server and ready to go.
If you had Install Manager right now you would be able to get the files through Install Manager. Just because you don't see them does not mean they don't exist. Virtually all of the Poser and DAZ Studio products in your account, from http://www.daz3d.com/new-releases/easy-environments-road-to-hell all the way back to http://www.daz3d.com/victoria-4-2-base (And a little lower on the product id number to make sure we got all of the Victoria 4 products.) will show up in your Ready to download tab, right now. Filtered based on the software you tell Install manager you use (I don't think we have a filter for Interposer or Greenbriar's Lightwave importer yet, sorry about that.). If you owned the entire store, that would be over 10000 products in your list Today.
BTW if you owned the entire store, downloading it and installing it takes about a day at typical Cable Internet speeds. (Yes, we tested that. :) And it will do it while you are out going to dinner, watching a movie, and going out to a club, or sitting home watching the Superbowl. :) )
But, by the current state of the docs, only one folder can be specified (or at least that's how it looks to me - there is a single entry field with a ... button for selecting a location, but no obvious way of having a list of locations that can be switched between). With a lot of files that's going to be a huge folder, eating up a substantial chunk of disc space, and if we want definite update notices we also need the unzipped versions of those files on disc somewhere (though those can be spread across multiple drives). That seems to me a pretty heavy burden, even if we find the filtering in the DIM adequate (and at a glance it appeared to be by app rather than, say, by type of content).
I should add that readmes do list updates, so assuming all readmes are going to end up in the Wiki there is an alternative to relying on forum notices if you don't use the DIM in such a way that it tells you - and the readmes also give some indication of what the update is for. Of course you have to figure out whether that pre- or post-dates your last download, but if you want an automated system it's probably going to have overheads similar to the DIM in any event.Ah. But that location can be anywhere on your computer which is what the question is.
If Install manager has installed the files you do not need the zips as well. Back them up, move them, burn them to DVD, delete them, it doesn't matter, Install Manager doesn't care, it goes by what it has installed, then by what is in the downloads directory "Ready to Install" in that order, before it gives you a list of what is on the server that you haven't downloaded.
And the filters are much more capable that that. :)
So could we install to different directories based on figure, for example?
I would so have loved to have the zip files for new products now rather than having to wait for the DIM. And what if I decide not to use the DIM at all? Will I never see zip files? Or will they start to show in My Downloadable Products once the DIM is released?
And one other thing...it was mentioned that the zip files have to remain where the DIM puts them. I prefer to move those installers/zips to a sub-folder named "Installed" after I've installed them. Otherwise, I have a boatload of installers/zips and I lose track of what I've installed. It would be better if we could move them to a sub-folder like that...for those of us who would use DIM to download but not to install.
Dana
You didn't read what I said. The guy was talking about an ISO spec that requires that things are certainly in place before they can even use an application. Are the docs there on the site...maybe so. Does the link definitely work? Dont' know until you try it...can't try it until you know. Conundrum. And yes, links in the installers have been bad in the past, so by past experience one must say that it is possible that it will happen again. This is what he was saying, basically. It's simple logic. In any case, when reports start coming in from people who are actually using it in full release, then he'll know.
DanaI did read it. Now go look at any document in the Doc Center. Is there an Export to PDF option and an Export to ODT option in the top right corner for every doc in the Doc Center?
I'm not sure if this question has been asked, but can we categorize and rename items as long as it is done inside studio or will that mess up the Installer?
http://docs.daz3d.com/doku.php/public/software/install_manager/userguide/configure_install_manager/tips/setup_my_download_locations/start
AWESOME, thanks for the link!
So could we install to different directories based on figure, for example?Given the names of products, that can be a bit trickier to do it with just filters, but with a little patience, a little effort and a little ingenuity.;..
However if you selected all the V4 items, for example, you could install them to one Content Directory, then M4 to another one., etc.
WOW.. that's hella cool. SO did you guys test just having it do ALL of the Genesis products only? I can tell you right now I have 49.4 Gigabytes of Genesis product exe's and zip's stored on my backup drive ("L")
WOW.. that's hella cool. SO did you guys test just having it do ALL of the Genesis products only? I can tell you right now I have 49.4 Gigabytes of Genesis product exe's and zip's stored on my backup drive ("L") To be honest, once the content got going, we didn't bother with anything that small. LOL.
I did find out that a Mac will lie about how much Harddrive space is left and completely filling a drive on a Mac is a bad thing though.
Just like moving things and then expecting an Uninstaller to work (it won't) Install manager can't track things that Install Manager, itself, didn't do.
Sigh.
Without having tested things, it's seriously looking like it's just not practical to use the DIM for anything in between "just download them" and "Whole enchilada" All or (next to) nothing.
Any of the benefits of using the DIM to keep track of downloads and updates if you choose not also install with it are lost if you move the zips. Not moving the zips leaves a huge mess in your downloads folder, and if you're the type (like me) who can't remember where you left off installing that 17 installer bundle because you had to go rescue a cat... you're stuck re-installing some of it, at least, unless you can move the zips to an "installed" sub-folder of some type.
Again, I make the feature request that the next version of the DIM have an "I installed this manually" switch.
Oh goodie! So even if you don't want to utilize metadata (or only want a subset) you will have no way of preventing more and more entries into the database and more testing of that rule number one.
I've realized after using Smart Content with my Genesis and DS4 stuff that the only reason for me (I'm not referring to anyone else) to use the CMS is to find all the hats in my runtime. Not enough of an incentive.
Is there any way one could have a choice of installing/not-installing metadata on a per file basis? or even per install batch?
Oh goodie! So even if you don't want to utilize metadata (or only want a subset) you will have no way of preventing more and more entries into the database and more testing of that rule number one.
I've realized after using Smart Content with my Genesis and DS4 stuff that the only reason for me (I'm not referring to anyone else) to use the CMS is to find all the hats in my runtime. Not enough of an incentive.
Is there any way one could have a choice of installing/not-installing metadata on a per file basis? or even per install batch?
Open DAZ Studio go to Content Database maintenance and reset database. It is all gone, no trails, no nothing.
If you only want a subset? That is what user data is for.
Metadata for about 4000 products amounts to around 100 MB. In the old days that was lots of HD, but with 128GB SSD drives now being considered small. and typical Hard Drives in the TB+ range, 100MB is nothing.
It is still a 100MB of trash for me which I refuse to keep and who knows how much hog on DS performance. Sorry, but disk space this isn't an argument. The question is - is there way to delete metadata through the DIM safely and completely from DS once it is got installed if we don't have a choice to install it or not?
It is still a 100MB of trash for me which I refuse to keep and who knows how much hog on DS performance. Sorry, but disk space this isn't an argument. The question is - is there way to delete metadata through the DIM safely and completely from DS once it is got installed if we don't have a choice to install it or not?
Reset database. All the metadata goes byebye.
In Runtime/Support delete everything in there, and the Metadata won't even be around to be re-installed. (currently. I'm hoping that's the same with the DIM installed Metadata.)