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Not to mention scripts needing to be redesigned for encrypted stuff. The biggest disappointment for me is that of all the needed improvements DS could benefit from encryption was top of the list. Remember when Smart Content was meant to be the saviour of search confusion and DIM was going to solve content installation problems? Based on past experience I predict that Connect won't solve these problems either. There are a number of third party content search apps out there which I own and none of them solve the difficulties of searching huge content folders containing obliquely named files.
What interests me are the improvements to IRAY. Has the lag between adjusting a scene and viewport updates been solved? The reason I use Octane Render is that the viewport updates in real time rather than going black for ages. I find that unworkable.
You may not be aware but smart content is actually very popular with new users. I know PA's who started after smart content was introduced and it is all they have ever used. The same is true for DIM. There are many people who have only ever used that method of download and end up confused and frustrated with products that come to them via zip.
As far as the realtime view.. It takes about 2 seconds to update on my computer after I have made an alteration in the scene. It doesn't go black, just to an untextered view for a moment.
The more stable version of IRay is the only thing this release has going for it. DAZ really needs dynamic clothing and hair.
I'm glad IRAY's working for you. Not sure how that negates my criticism and why those of us who use Octane Render prefer the way it updates instantly. Isn't that level of improvement that IRAY should be aiming for? Concerning Smart Content many of us don't find it very "smart" and judging by the number of threads on here about DIM that isn't foolproof either. How is it possible for DAZ to know who uses Smart Content and how often, let alone whether it successfully does its job? My point was that of all the updates that could have improved DAZ, including faster IRAY viewport updates, I was not hoping for a new search engine.
Remember that DAZ doesn't develop Iray, they simply use it in DS. So those kind of improvements may not be in their hands alone.
I am one of those who can never find my content, mainly because the search box never works. I can type in "victoria" and it will always return "no results found," even though I have V4,V5,V6 and V7. I haven't installed 4.9 because I don't want any of my scripts to break, so I don't know what they have added or not added, but all I need is to be able to type in the name of something, or one or two keywords (Armour, Shirt, Genesis 2 etc) and I'd be happy. A section for newly added would also be good, and when all else fails, it would be nice to be able to go to the download page and to find the "map" there. Smart content worked a little better, but that also seemed to choose it's days to work.
Encryption is making me very nervous, for a few reasons:
I'm worried that we won't be able to export items to another program to adjust something- a process that I use all the time, and that we won't be able to use the products in other software, which means that we are tying ourselves into the Daz ecosystem, which is great for Daz, but never good for the consumer. It also means that should Daz ever stop being supported, or, as tends to happen sometimes, a new version of their software breaks something, that content will become completely useless. I'm not happy to spend money on something that I have no guarantee will work in 6 months time.
I don't know if this is a concern, but I am worried that we won't be able to back up our libraries, or transfer files to other computers. Bandwidth is quite expensive where I come from, and not all of my computers are connected to the internet, so I tend to download on one pc and then work on another.
I have also never seen DRM that hasn't become a nuisance in the end, and that ultimately stops the pirates anyway, so for now I will simply avoid all encrypted products, until I know a little more about it.
I'm also nervous about the store page being added to the software, as there is a fine line between convenience and annoying advertising. If Daz respects our privacy, and places the store in a place that we don't ever have to see if we choose not to, (And can still use smart content) then I can probably let that one slide.
Anyway I'll keep an open mind, but my spidy senses are starting to tingle
Export functions have not changed, you can still export your files to other software.
You can still backup your libraries, and use the "offline install packages" to download once and install on multiple computers instead of downloading from DS on each computer. (be careful though, you need to copy the package to the Connect directory, not move them, as they are deleted after install)..
As for the store page in DS, it has its own tab that you can close very easily.
Export functions are not affected.
It has been stated that there is a "poison pill" option that can be released to unencrypt the files if they stop supporting DS
You can back up for the current system, and you can use the data on a different system after connecting DS 4.9 to the store once.
The store page is a tab in Smart Content, it doesn't have to be open (and wasn't open fro me by default). It doesn't send daat to daz unless you use its search function.
Okay- thanks for the feedback. That does settle my mind a bit. I hate DRM, but I also don't want to see vendors being ripped off. That said, I have never seen any form of DRM that isn't bypassed by pirates within days, so ultimately I think that pirates will still pirate, and those who will buy will still buy anyway. I personally don't think you will see any change in sales because of this.
Daz knows who smart content works for because of Customer Service and who and why they contact the company for support. They know that a large number of the people who have trouble finding something or who can't get a product to work correctly at some point say "I was moving files around to organize" and hope against hope that better smart content will encourage them to use it instead of moving all sorts of files around willy nilly. I'm sure that they get new users who can't find things but at least they can help them. Once the end user has started moving things around then helping them gets notably harder.
So, in a nutshell, DAZ knows users love smart content, because people who contact customer support often broke their content by moving files around?
They know that users who feel they need to organize are more often the ones who contact CS for help finding things or getting products to work properly. I recall several years ago when they human surface shader was first given away with Daz characters. Hundreds of people posted in the forums for months that it did not work. What did all of those people have in common? They had "organized" their content. Things like moving all those messy files like "scripts" and "shaders" out of studio to a nice clean organized folder structure away from the program. Most of those people were experienced users who felt confident they knew what and why to move files around.
They know new users like smart content because they adopt it and continue to uses studio rather than throw their hands up and wander away. They also tell the company why they like it and what they wish was improved. That improvement is something that Daz has worked on based on user feedback over time. It isn't perfect yet but it is vastly improved and they are playing catchup with thousands of products.
See, I find Smart content (or more specifically the default categories) an unmitigated mess. Things are placed in categories I'd never think to look in, anything a top level category becomes almost impossible to find, I have no sense if a particular item (usually wearables) is part of a larger set or not, metadata is missing to use older materials on newer versions of products so those materials either have to be retrieved from Content Library or otherwise found in the unsorted "materials" category that relies entirely too much on things being set up correctly. No way to tell what shader the material you're selecting uses. Ugh. A complete disaster. I love the concept, but I found Daz's early execution lacking... a lot. Even the current version I find only slightly better. The only thing I could have done that I didn't was adopting Custom Categories earlier, which would have made Smart Content less of a mess.
I moved my stuff around and I never contacted Customer Support when I couldn't find something, since 90% of the time it was because the vendor had named the folders something that didn't match the product name. Heck, by having my stuff moved around, it was Easier for me to find the new stuff, because it was the stuff that hadn't been sorted yet. I only abandoned my organization when Metadata came out (as I said, I love the concept of Smart Content) and moving stuff around broke that. Even then, I have separate runtimes for Genesis (all versions), Millenium 3, Millenium 4, Props and Sets, toons, Animals and Yes, even Shaders - since a surprisng lot of them don't actually have to be in the core Daz directory to work any more. (all of my poseworks stuff, for example, is in my Shaders directory.) I still had a fairly decent organization within those multiple runtimes, though I wanted to go back to my more thourough organization from before. I just never took the time to do so.
Now comes Daz Connect. The DRM doesn't bother me (I don't like it, but it doesn't bother me.) But now I realistically *have* to categorize, since if I want to take advantage of the smaller (and faster) updates, I'll eventually need to re-download everything I've picked up from Daz over the past 10 years through Daz Connect. And if I want to find them, I'll need to make my own folders for the shortcuts - at which point, I may as well be working with my own categories anyway.
I have no doubt that the number one complaint was that people couldn't find stuff. Heck, I don't even doubt that there are plenty of new users who actually like the way the default Smart Content is set up (if only because they haven't realized they can make it work even better for them with a little work on their part). But as a user who "felt the need to organize" there are plenty of us who knew exactly what we were doing and once we learned what couldn't be moved (and later discovered that some of them could be moved), had no problem with moving stuff around to suit our own purposes. And I for one am less than thrilled to basically have to start organizing all over again or else be stuck with the mess that is the Default Categories for any new products.
The thing is that it seems logical enough to me. I expect clothing to be part of wardrobe, that a folder called people will have the people in it, that props are in props and that if I have a characer selected I will only see the props that work on her or him. I like that if I want to find lights i look at lights and then iray and then I have a group of options for the type of light I might want. I like that accessories are broken into different parts of the body and that I can look at them for just the figure I have selected or for any figure at the click of a button. Finding the other parts of a product by clicking on it and selecting "explore" for me is easy and logical. And I say this as a late adopter. Many of the PA's who started after smart content was added have always prefered it.
A popular competitor already started an ad claiming 'DRM free! Don't let DRM products limit your creativity...'. DRM is disputed; that's a fact. I don't know if Daz really does itself and it's vendors a favor with this technology. People are well-briefed today.
Well if DAZ' encryption works maybe the competitors' vendors will move to DAZ.
I have used Smart Content to find material sets for clothing or hair, but that's it, and I don't always like using them for clothing since often one part of an outfit's materials will work, but another won't (if I'm even using a complte outfit at all.) On a broad level, the categories do make sense, but there are things I'd call accessories that end up in wardrobe, and occasionaly things in accessories I'd call wardrobe (hats are good for that). And many of the sub-categories are either not granular enough or too granular (footwear, for example, or eye colors - which isn't actualy subdivided by eye color. Just one big mess of eyes). Last time I checked in Hair, it wasn't nearly subdivided enough to be of use for me (bangs or no bangs, pony/pigtails are not genericly "long" in my book, etc.). I do way too much mixing and matching with Autofit for being limited to just what works for the selected character and I'm glad they've changed that. I can't quicikly find the actual base Genesis figures in the Figures folder because of all the pre-morphed "Actors" - and I never start from a pre-morphed character - in there and I have to use the top category in order to find them. I don't want to take the time and click on explore to see what else is with every single product that I *might* be interested in using - much simpler to scroll through the full outfits (or characters - I hate choosing a skin and then finding the makeup options won't work), and much less clicking. And with older characters, where the HSS was set as a sub-folder of the main textures - I have no way to tell if I'm clicking on the HSS (which I don't like) or the DS default (which I do).
The Default Categories don't work for me. Never have. If they work for you, great. But they don't work for everyone despite a number of people implying that they somehow should (this is a general, not you in specific), and considering the number of people I've seen saying they don't use Smart Content, I'd hazard that we're not that tiny of a minority.
For a long time, DAZ files for the PC were .exe files. People constantly begged DAZ to go to .zip files like their competitors. Customers wanted to see the content inside the zip instead of just having a black box. DAZ's argument was that .exe files were easier and the organization the .exe files used was best - no one should move anything around after install. A lot of people informed DAZ that they installed the .exe files to a dummy folder, arranged things to their liking, copied the conent to their actual Production folder(s) then created .zip files. When DAZ finally capitulated and went to .zip files, people were thrilled. They could see their content and work with it how they wanted.
Now we have DAZ Connect. Not only can you not see the files before installation, you can't even organize where the executables go. It all has to go to one place. Even back in the old days with .exe files, I could at least organize the .exe files themselves.
If DC works for you, great. That doesn't mean it works for everyone. I have no problem with DC being an option, but I do mind it being shoved down my throat. (DC only content is absolutely an attempt to force me to go to DC.) My DS workspace is customized to my liking, my content organization is customized to my liking, why should I have to take several steps back and give up my workflow?
I rarely use smart content. I only use it if I'm absolutely lazy and don't want to go into my categories to find something. Even then it is usually worthless.
I categorize Items as I buy them in a way that makes it easy for me to find them.
I LOATHE connect and smart content. I prefer DIM. Far easier to find stuff and locate it.
This is the perfect post! Thank you, Crescent.
I can never find anythying in smart content either but I can find the connect only items in the product view of the content library. Once I found them there I added them to my own categories.
I'd give a lot for, say, simple adding tags to stuff rather than whatever it is doing.
And yeah, the number of times I have to go to look at my product library on Daz because I can't find the right search term that works in the application is way too dang high.
What kills me is when the product title bears no connection to the items, so if you have a character with Cascade Leggings, you have absolutely no flippin idea that it's actually a wardrobe item called Fantastic Pants in the Product JoJo's Salacious Outfits.
I often have to rely on knowing what products are, or just... go through all the products in their alphabetical list. Which is extra hard if it turns out to be over in the Poser directories, which are a f'in mess.
None of the categorization I've attempted before has survived a version change, so I pretty much just gave up.
What I want? The elaborate categorization/directory thing, no. I want tags. Like: Cascade Leggings: 'Fantastic Pants,' 'JoJo's Salacious Outfits,' leggings, pants, fantasy, clothes, wardrobe, 'stuff Arboreen likes to wear'
And I want it to STICK.
I've never moved any of my content files/folders around. I install everything manually and never change anything in the content folder. So I've got a completely untouched Content folder set up exactly as DAZ intended but I stil find Smart content to be a lot less useful for searches than the file directory.
As others have pointed out there's little consitency of product names and vendors place them in different folders. A house can be a prop or an environment either internal or external for example. I've three different shader folders and two different light folders despite installing products exactly as DAZ designed. The most consitent folder is the 'People' one but even that has a couple of different pose folders per model. It's all a bit clunky and even now products are being released without metadata. Maybe Connect will solve all this but for those of us who already have gargantuan content folders, reinstalling everything via Connect to take advantage of this isn't an encouraging or even viable prospect.
I really don't see how connect will change any of this. It's the same people delivering the same mess just another way and with more limited ways to mitigate it's effects. It's not how they bring messed up content to us, it#s the people who have to change. And even then, you cannoth tailor-oraganize content for everyone of your users. In the end it will always be people organizing their content one way or the other. Connect it's just gonna make it harder (how much, that's up for debate, using file links, I was told, might not be as bad as I thought - doesn't mean it's good, of course).
I've read through the Connect FAQs and the various threads, but I am confused regarding the encrypted content. Is the content encrypted in my system even after downloading it from Daz Studio? The pc I use for rendering cant access the Internet--it sounds like I'll need to fix that to run 4.9-am I right?
I haven't installed 4.9 yet simply because I am in the middle of a contest that requires a render a day, it's nearing the end and I don't want to DQ over a glitch. I will install it early February.
As someone else pointed out, 4.9 is a point release. Why the I-ray release wasn't 5.0 I don't know, but whatever.
Since DAZ has now provided for shortcuts in the File Content manager where they put the original files doesn't make any difference - you can have a shortcut to them in your directory structure. I am saying that from the description since as I said, I haven't downloaded it yet to test that out. That will also be helpful for unencrypted content, I can not leave all the files where they belong so the DIM can update them correctly, and use the shortcuts for my directory structure.
The only negative is encryption, I don't care about it if it doesn't get in my way, I can see where Carara users have a beef with it.
Like others, I don't think it will give DAZ any protection against piracy, and it will certainly decrease sales.
So you don't use Smart Content and never will? Good for you. Without statistics to support your worldview, you may be in the majority or the minority. I don't know. Forum representation of your workflow preference may not be indicative of the habits of the average user.
Here's a news flash. Some of us do use Smart Content -- and LIKE it. And I'm glad to see that this release has some long-overdue fixes to that system.
Look, I get that DRM is an issue, and I also get that people are upset and some of you may never upgrade beyond 4.8. I have multiple computers and can support multiple installations of Daz Studio. Right now I've upgraded one of my systems to 4.9 and am giving it a test run.
In the meantime, though, we need to remember that this is a POINT RELEASE to FREE SOFTWARE. It's unfortunate that the anger around here is actually clouding the discussion so much so that I can't get opinions and info on what's been upgraded or fixed so I can decided if this upgrade is ready to move over to my primary development computer, or if it should just stay on my secondary.
The Smart Content issue is not whether or not some people like smart content and some people don't.
The issue is that Daz Connect makes Smart Content less optional than it has been, and because enough vendors like it, and at least one Developer thinks those of us who don't like it are foolish intractable dinosaurs (and yes, he did use dinosaurs) it is probably going to continue to become less and less optional as DS moves forward.
You Like it? Fine. I don't care. I don't like that I feel like I'm being slowly strong armed into using it. I have never claimed to be in the Majority, just a larger minority than the Developers seem to think. Maybe I'm wrong. Maybe there are only 10 of us who don't like to use Smart Content. But I seriously doubt it. And maybe you missed it, but I do use Smart Content. I like the idea of Smart Content. What I don't like is the way Smart Content is set up by default. It doesn't fit the way I think. And what I'm ranting about is that now I have to go fix it, because soon I won't be able to ignore it any more.
Yes. People are angry. They don't like the DRM. They don't like feeling like control is being taken away. They don't like being told that the workflow they've developed over the past 10 years eventually won't work any more because it's not the same as what the Developers think it should be. They don't like that all content they download through Daz Connect is going to be shoved into a single directory without their jumping through some hoops every. single. time. they want to change where it installs.
As far as I'm concerned, the only good change is that I can now tell it to ignore context when I do use Smart Content, so If I do use Smart Conent, I can go find that old V4 shirt and use it on G2. I don't render much in Iray, so I have no opinion about that, and all other changes are under the hood enough that I see no effect, one way or the other.
They only included that option because people raised a fuss about being able to still use their Content Library with Daz Connect content in the first Beta thread. If they'd gone with their original plan, Categories and Smart Content would have been the end of it. Which is why I'm finally buckling down to categorize all my stuff my way, so that when they do manage to slip that particular update past people, I'm not caught flat footed.
I love Smart Content. But it only works if every product has accurate and consistent metadata. We aren't there yet. Even new products are released with metadata errors (take a look at Scott Hair installed with Daz Connect!). But Daz is trying to get things updated and fixed. I appreciate that.