EZFinder - Advanced Content Manager for Daz Studio [released]

Comments

• wsterdan Posts: 3,109

  February 24

  Thanks for the info; from your post here, it looks like the product is Windows-only; if so, you might want to note that fact on the actual product page. If not, let us know and I'll buy it for my Mac.
• Lindsey Posts: 2,011

  February 24 edited February 24

   Does EZFinder work with DAZ Connect installed products? 
  A product's .duf files are located in folder named by the product's SKU in:  ...My DAZ Connect Library\data\cloud

  Post edited by Lindsey on February 24
• EZ3DTV Posts: 1,524

  February 24 edited February 24

  Lindsey said:

   Does EZFinder work with DAZ Connect installed products? 
  A product's .duf files are located in folder named by the product's SKU in:  ...My DAZ Connect Library\data\cloud

  If it is an injectable item Duf, Cr2, Obj... and it is "in your Daz library", EZfinder will find it and allow you to organize it with your other items.

  EzFinder searches your entire Daz library.

  If Daz Connect items are installed outside of your Daz Library i.e. C:\Users\Public\Documents\My DAZ 3D Library\Data\Cloud\

   EzFinder will not find them. I believe you can relocate entire Daz Connect library by changing the Content Directory Manager settings.

  (Please do this with caution) Much care has been taken such that Ezfinder never alters your Daz library in any way other than the PA Folder EzFinder is installed in. 

  Post edited by EZ3DTV on February 24
• EZ3DTV Posts: 1,524

  February 24 edited February 24

  wsterdan said:

  Thanks for the info; from your post here, it looks like the product is Windows-only; if so, you might want to note that fact on the actual product page. If not, let us know and I'll buy it for my Mac.

  I apologize that EzFinder is strictly for Windows 10 and 11 only. I may one day port the program to Mac. I do not have a timeline on that project yet.

   

  Post edited by EZ3DTV on February 24
• FrankTheTank Posts: 1,526

  February 24

  I am mostly worried about the potential for my Daz library to become corrupted. inb4 it can't happen... Is it possible to just install the EZFinder and nothing else? All i want is a good browser for my content. I prefer as clean an installation as possible. I don't want or need the ability to inject or open files in Daz from EZFinder or whatever. I just like the idea of a standalone browser that lets me quickly find and "favorite" my installed content.
• EZ3DTV Posts: 1,524

  February 24

  FrankTheTank said:

  I am mostly worried about the potential for my Daz library to become corrupted. inb4 it can't happen... Is it possible to just install the EZFinder and nothing else? All i want is a good browser for my content. I prefer as clean an installation as possible. I don't want or need the ability to inject or open files in Daz from EZFinder or whatever. I just like the idea of a standalone browser that lets me quickly find and "favorite" my installed content.

  EzFinder is one install, not several/many. Daz Install Manager installs one program with many applets in it.

  EzFinder scans your library, that is it. It does not alter your library in any way. If you delete folders and move files in EzFinder your Daz Library "always" stays untouched.

  I have not found a scenario yet where EZFinder can corrupt the Daz library. 
• wsterdan Posts: 3,109

  February 24

  EZ3DTV said:

  wsterdan said:

  Thanks for the info; from your post here, it looks like the product is Windows-only; if so, you might want to note that fact on the actual product page. If not, let us know and I'll buy it for my Mac.

  I apologize that EzFinder is strictly for Windows 10 and 11 only. I may one day port the program to Mac. I do not have a timeline on that project yet.

  No need to apologize, the last thing I expect is that software developers automatically support two platforms, especially if they normally only use one.

  My only concern is that it's not mentioned on the product page; without the declaration that the product is "Windows only" someone may purchase and have to return it when they find out it doesn't work for them.  
• Random Posts: 235

  February 24 edited February 24

  Am liking EZFinder quite a bit, especially as that non_DAZ store items are indexed also. Some of my basic categories like architecture or props have thousands of items so to scan through them looking for some aspect that will be good for a scene I'm building there are lots of pages of very little thumbnails. I have two initial suggestions. One, is give the option to make the thumbnails larger in size on the whole thumbnail sheet (if you do click on a thumbnail you get an enlarged version on the right but that's not what I mean). Two, scrolling to the next page of thumbnails requires moving the mouse into postion on the arrow and clicking. It would be so much quicker/easier to use keyboard buttons, eg. page-up, page-down, instead. Also, if possible an option in scanning for items in a folder in the intital scan would be the ability to exclude a particular sub-folder(s) in the scan.

  Post edited by Random on February 24
• Artini Posts: 10,476

  February 24

  Big plus for creating this support thread. It is really important.

   
• Greybro Posts: 2,606

  February 24

  I am intrigued.
• Random Posts: 235

  February 24

  First day out it was $5 with coupon.
• EZ3DTV Posts: 1,524

  February 24

  Random said:

  Am liking EZFinder quite a bit, especially as that non_DAZ store items are indexed also. Some of my basic categories like architecture or props have thousands of items so to scan through them looking for some aspect that will be good for a scene I'm building there are lots of pages of very little thumbnails. I have two initial suggestions. One, is give the option to make the thumbnails larger in size on the whole thumbnail sheet (if you do click on a thumbnail you get an enlarged version on the right but that's not what I mean). Two, scrolling to the next page of thumbnails requires moving the mouse into postion on the arrow and clicking. It would be so much quicker/easier to use keyboard buttons, eg. page-up, page-down, instead. Also, if possible an option in scanning for items in a folder in the intital scan would be the ability to exclude a particular sub-folder(s) in the scan.

   Thank you for your interest in EzFinder! One: The logistical architecture of the image display grid was a nightmare to get working fluidly. At first images took forever to load and did not populate smoothly and pagination was a miracle that it was even possible with such huge folders with conceivably hundreds of thousands of items in them.  Scaling the images would have meant repaginating the entire list of files in the folder each time you scale. (Believe me I thought of this) This would have also broken other aspects of the image display grid. I chose to make it work flawlessly instead of having scaling features which could have broken the fluid way it paginates. So, zooming will probably never be added. There is one workaround, right click your desktop and click display settings and move up or down the “scale” amount and the images will enlarge or reduce in size. That is the only way around the logistical issues of having extremely large folders full of thousands of files. Two: I too dislike clicking the pagination button to paginate, this is why I added left and right arrow page navigation. It only works after you click in the white “page box”. This sets the keyboard focus to the pagination area and then right and left arrow keys will paginate for you. Three: The main scan needs folders like Runtime, People, Environments… to aid in its classification of items so it relies on the standard structure of the Daz library. For simple scans of folders use the “Import External” Scan or the “Project Scanner”. Import external will scan a folder of choice with items like (small subset dufs) characters, hair, shaders…  The Project scanner scans (large scene dufs) your project folder allowing you to organize them, be it, that large scenes can sometimes be sluggish when paginating through them. The Import External scanner can also scan custom base directories provided there are not large scene files in them.   
• EZ3DTV Posts: 1,524

  February 24

  Artini said:

  Big plus for creating this support thread. It is really important.

   

  I am here for your inquiries. :)  
• Charlie Judge Posts: 13,368

  February 24 edited February 24

  Is it possible to use this with a very large library on an external HDD? Some of us have 8 Tb to 10 Tb libraries and ssd's to support that size library are cost prohibitive.

  Post edited by Charlie Judge on February 24
• SageWindu Posts: 35

  February 24 edited February 24

  Hello. I haven't had a chance to play with EZFinder just yet, so consider this a bit of a "primer" question: can I use the program to uninstall items I no longer need, or would I still need something like DIM for that?

  Post edited by SageWindu on February 24
• Random Posts: 235

  February 24

  EZ3DTV said:

  Random said:

  Am liking EZFinder quite a bit, especially as that non_DAZ store items are indexed also. Some of my basic categories like architecture or props have thousands of items so to scan through them looking for some aspect that will be good for a scene I'm building there are lots of pages of very little thumbnails. I have two initial suggestions. One, is give the option to make the thumbnails larger in size on the whole thumbnail sheet (if you do click on a thumbnail you get an enlarged version on the right but that's not what I mean). Two, scrolling to the next page of thumbnails requires moving the mouse into postion on the arrow and clicking. It would be so much quicker/easier to use keyboard buttons, eg. page-up, page-down, instead. Also, if possible an option in scanning for items in a folder in the intital scan would be the ability to exclude a particular sub-folder(s) in the scan.

   Thank you for your interest in EzFinder! One: The logistical architecture of the image display grid was a nightmare to get working fluidly. At first images took forever to load and did not populate smoothly and pagination was a miracle that it was even possible with such huge folders with conceivably hundreds of thousands of items in them.  Scaling the images would have meant repaginating the entire list of files in the folder each time you scale. (Believe me I thought of this) This would have also broken other aspects of the image display grid. I chose to make it work flawlessly instead of having scaling features which could have broken the fluid way it paginates. So, zooming will probably never be added. There is one workaround, right click your desktop and click display settings and move up or down the “scale” amount and the images will enlarge or reduce in size. That is the only way around the logistical issues of having extremely large folders full of thousands of files. Two: I too dislike clicking the pagination button to paginate, this is why I added left and right arrow page navigation. It only works after you click in the white “page box”. This sets the keyboard focus to the pagination area and then right and left arrow keys will paginate for you. Three: The main scan needs folders like Runtime, People, Environments… to aid in its classification of items so it relies on the standard structure of the Daz library. For simple scans of folders use the “Import External” Scan or the “Project Scanner”. Import external will scan a folder of choice with items like (small subset dufs) characters, hair, shaders…  The Project scanner scans (large scene dufs) your project folder allowing you to organize them, be it, that large scenes can sometimes be sluggish when paginating through them. The Import External scanner can also scan custom base directories provided there are not large scene files in them. 

  Understood about not having a thumbs zoom feature. And the scroll feature you have works perfectly. My Daz content is set up differently as I have almost nothing in the main Daz folder so I need to use the 'import external' on everything. So if I import 'props' but want 'props/plants' separate I can do that separtely, but all the plants will still be in the original 'pros' scan too which I don't want but it's o.k. More than a wish than a complaint. I really appreciate all your hard work and thanks for your answer. I'll check out the project scanner in the near future. Still setting things up.
• fibyken Posts: 47

  February 24

  I install my DAZ Studio content to a custom directory rather than the default one. I also installed EZFinder into that same custom directory. After running a scan, EZFinder reported that it found around 400,000 items. However, when I browse the results inside EZFinder, it only seems to display items that were installed in the default DAZ content directory, not the ones in my custom location.
  Has anyone run into this, or know what might cause EZFinder to ignore non‑default content paths?
• Cerrag Posts: 256

  February 24

  I had already purchased this program yesterday without seeing the video, but I have to say now, after watching just one of the videos off this content creator's Youtube channel, he made me want to buy it *again lol!  The one I watched was 'EZFinder Daz Studio Content Scanner and Organizer | Ez3DTv' and even tho I was already completely enthused with the product's written capability, seriously, after seeing it in action, this thing is da-bomb diggity .  It was hard to keep watching cause I just wanted to pull up the program and start messing around but then I was like, I can't cause I don't have a clue what I'm doing!  :D   I think I'm just about prepared to start using it but need to watch some more videos first.  They're just too entertaining lol, and of course informative.  I just can't believe someone made something so completely and utterly useful and so very much needed for Studio and it's waaaayyy long, Long overdue.  Kudos to this creator and sure hope he'll continue to support it as it's a one in a million kind of thing imo.  
• maurice.fiege Posts: 0

  February 24

  fibyken said:

  I install my DAZ Studio content to a custom directory rather than the default one. I also installed EZFinder into that same custom directory. After running a scan, EZFinder reported that it found around 400,000 items. However, when I browse the results inside EZFinder, it only seems to display items that were installed in the default DAZ content directory, not the ones in my custom location.
  Has anyone run into this, or know what might cause EZFinder to ignore non‑default content paths?

  Same for me.

  After a couple of scanning retries I read the manual again and realised that you have to keep your files exactely where DAZ Installer puts them. Otherwise it won't work. If I scan with DAZ Studio open in the background and EZ using it's library, I only get a small batch of my stuff. Over the years my collection growed and since there was no usable tool I used the file system as my "database organisation". Worked OK for me but this tool might have been exactly what I was looking for the whole time.

  When I scan with my folder structure as base I get exactly zero compartments.

  Strangely enough, the tool obviously finds my stuff since there is data in it's folder for Compartments, etc. Checked the jsons in it, which show defenitly my custom located files. Alas they don't show up in the tool. I tried "importing external", which also gave me no results.

  The "project scanner" was the only scanner that gave me slightely usable entries, but that is not the way the tool was actually disgned for and it also is a tideous work to scan every folder one by one. 

  Because the mandatory standard sorting I'm afraid this tool is no use for me, which is a real pity, since it looks great and the functions advertised are hilarious.

  Will there be an update or at least a workaround to support a non standard file datatbase?

  IMHO there must be an info/warning about the mandatory standard DAZ sorting on the DAZ.com product page. Especially when people are supposed to pay 200$ for it just to find out the tool might not work for them.

  Cheers,

  Maurice

   
• EZ3DTV Posts: 1,524

  February 25

  fibyken said:

  I install my DAZ Studio content to a custom directory rather than the default one. I also installed EZFinder into that same custom directory. After running a scan, EZFinder reported that it found around 400,000 items. However, when I browse the results inside EZFinder, it only seems to display items that were installed in the default DAZ content directory, not the ones in my custom location.
  Has anyone run into this, or know what might cause EZFinder to ignore non‑default content paths?

  EZFinder uses a single consolidated library path by design. It scans the first library it encounters in DAZ Install Manager, so if you have multiple content directories configured, make sure the library you want EZFinder to scan is at the top of the list in DIM. 

  Every item in your scan results, virtual folders, and compartments is stored as a portable relative path — so if you move your library to a new drive or transfer it to another machine, everything works without rescanning. Supporting multiple library roots would break this, since two libraries can contain identical folder structures, making it impossible to resolve a relative path back to the correct file. While DAZ Install Manager allows multiple content directories, DAZ Studio itself works best when content and its supporting data live together under one root. When files are spread across drives, it's not uncommon to encounter missing morphs, broken material presets, metadata that's out of sync with what's actually on disk or scripts not finding their content.

  The practical reality is that a large DAZ library needs to live on a single drive big enough to hold it. For users whose libraries have grown to several terabytes, that often means investing in a large NVMe drive. Many of us have been through the process of outgrowing a drive and migrating to a bigger one — sometimes more than once. The alternative is manually reinstalling less-used products to a secondary path through DIM one at a time, which can take weeks for a large collection. EZFinder chose to be straightforward about the single-root requirement rather than offer multi-library support that would sacrifice the portability and reliability users depend on.
• EZ3DTV Posts: 1,524

  February 25

  Looking ahead, a future version of EZFinder may support running multiple instances simultaneously, each with its own user data profile and each pointing to a different library root. This would give users full multi-library coverage without compromising the portable relative path system — each instance remains a clean, self-contained world with its own scan data, compartments, and virtual folders. No architectural changes to the path system required. 
• EZ3DTV Posts: 1,524

  February 25

  In the meantime, EZFinder does include an "Import External" scanner that can serve as a workaround for users with split libraries. This feature lets you point at a folder from your secondary library — such as a People or Props folder — scan its contents, and merge the results into your existing compartments alongside your primary library data. This effectively gives you access to content from two library sources within a single instance of EZFinder. However, this comes with caveats. Because the imported content lives outside your primary library root, the paths it generates won't follow the same portable relative path conventions that the rest of your scan data uses. This means your scan data could become tied to a specific drive layout, reducing portability. There is also a risk of data inconsistency if the external content is moved, renamed, or reorganized after import. EZFinder also includes a "Heal Scan Paths" feature that pairs well with Import External. The process has two steps: first, locate the JSON scan file that Import External created — right-click the scan folder and find the JSON file for that scan. Then click "Heal Scan Paths," which will detect the original path root stored in the scan data, ask you to confirm it, and open a folder browser where you point it to the actual location of the scanned content directory. EZFinder rewrites all the paths in the scan file to match, creates a backup of the original, and saves the mapping so future runtime path resolution works automatically. If you move your secondary library to a different drive later, you can heal the paths again without rescanning. Between Import External and Heal Scan Paths, users with split libraries have a workable way to get both libraries into EZFinder today — just be aware that externally imported scan data uses absolute paths rather than the portable relative paths of your primary library scan.
• EZ3DTV Posts: 1,524

  February 25

    EZFinder has been developed and tested on SSD storage. It should work fine on a traditional HDD, if DAZ Studio runs
    well on your setup, EZFinder will too, though the initial scan will take longer. If you're running EZFinder from a
    HDD, I'd love to hear how it performs for you.
• Charlie Judge Posts: 13,368

  February 25 edited February 25

  EZ3DTV said:

    EZFinder has been developed and tested on SSD storage. It should work fine on a traditional HDD, if DAZ Studio runs
    well on your setup, EZFinder will too, though the initial scan will take longer. If you're running EZFinder from a
    HDD, I'd love to hear how it performs for you 

  With some perserverence I now have EZ-Finder working on my system (I messed up my first scan attempt and nothing showed up even in the left panel and had to start over)

  I have a very large DAZ library (~8Tb, over 33,500 products) stored on an external HDD and a pretty fast system (Windows 11, AMD Ryzen 9 7900x, 64 GB Ram, RTX 3090) That runs DAZ Studio well. My initial scan took about 12 hour and the HDRI scan took another 8 hours. EZ-Finder took me a bit of time  to get used to but seems to be working OK  

  Initially I was disappointed that only the left panel was populated and I had to experiment a bit to figure out the left panel and how to populate the other panels. I also found that using the library button to locate a product and then load it to the other panels is also useful.. Injecting a product into DAZ Studio only takes a minute or two for it to appear in my scene. I haven't tried EZ-Shader yet but it looks like it may be useful.

  Post edited by Charlie Judge on February 25
• ArtAngel Posts: 2,035

  February 25

  Firstly I do not personally know this PA nor have I ever had contact with him, simply an observer. This PA is social and he does not edit his videos. What you see is what you get, no fluff. No short cuts. He makes time for everyone and is extremely interactive with his live feed, which can result in long videos but he does address all concerns and viewer queries. I think this product is brilliant. In DIM downloads for DAZ my purchases exceed 4 TB. It will scan large projects and large duf scenes. The PA did not only utilixa the PA meta data, added additional meta data to the existing meta data. It will find all 3Delight shaders and auto populate them as IRAY which comes in handy with 4.24+. It does not make any changes to your DAZ library. If you delete items from EZFinder it will not affect your installed library. You can tell it where your library is and that can be any drive C D f J K L. When you search environments in Smart content you know you have more scenes, more shaders than the thousand or two DAZ populates and this finds all those gems be it 20,000 or 50,000. This is a crazy good product. It took me years to organize my manual downloads because Smart Content sucked. Now it doesn't

  I suggest everyone watch this: 

  

   
• EZ3DTV Posts: 1,524

  February 25 edited February 25

  Charlie Judge said:

  EZ3DTV said:

    EZFinder has been developed and tested on SSD storage. It should work fine on a traditional HDD, if DAZ Studio runs
    well on your setup, EZFinder will too, though the initial scan will take longer. If you're running EZFinder from a
    HDD, I'd love to hear how it performs for you 

  With some perserverence I I now have EZ-Finder working on my system (I messed up my first scan attempt and nothing showed up even in the left panel and had to start over)

  I have a very large DAZ library (~8Tb, over 3,500 products) stored on an external HDD and a pretty fast system (Windows 11, AMD Ryzen 9 7900x, 64 GB Ram, RTX 3090) That runs DAZ Studio well. My initial scan took about 12 hour and the HDRI scan took another 8 hours. EZ-Finder took me a bit of time  to get used to but seems to be working OK  

  Initially I was disappointed that only the left panel was populated and I had to experiment a bit to figure out the left panel and how to populate the other panels. I also found that using the library button to locate a product and then load it to the other panels is also useful.. Injecting a product into DAZ Studio only takes a minute or two for it to appear in my scene. I haven't tried EZ-Shader yet but it looks like it may be useful.

   Great news! EZFinder works with HDD storage, including external drives. The initial scan will take longer than on a SSD, but after that first scan, you can use the Append scan feature to add new products incrementally, which takes a fraction of the time. EZHDRI also has an Append checkbox and is even faster. I had to be cautious about HDD support since I hadn't tested it on a library running from a hard drive, but users have confirmed it works well.

  A quick tip on Search: it works in two modes depending on context. If you have content loaded in the thumbnail grid, search filters what's currently displayed. If you clear the grid first (using the Clear UI button), Search switches to searching across your compartments in the left panel instead. You can also double-click or right-click any compartment to load it into the thumbnail grid right-click also gives you the option to inject content directly. 

  Thanks for the update Charlie Judge! I am glad you got it to work! In theory, it should work quite well with a HDD. System memory is used to paginate, and it should not take any longer to load any item as it does in Daz itself.

  Post edited by EZ3DTV on February 25
• EZ3DTV Posts: 1,524

  February 25

  ArtAngel said:

  Firstly I do not personally know this PA nor have I ever had contact with him, simply an observer. This PA is social and he does not edit his videos. What you see is what you get, no fluff. No short cuts. He makes time for everyone and is extremely interactive with his live feed, which can result in long videos but he does address all concerns and viewer queries. I think this product is brilliant. In DIM downloads for DAZ my purchases exceed 4 TB. It will scan large projects and large duf scenes. The PA did not only utilixa the PA meta data, added additional meta data to the existing meta data. It will find all 3Delight shaders and auto populate them as IRAY which comes in handy with 4.24+. It does not make any changes to your DAZ library. If you delete items from EZFinder it will not affect your installed library. You can tell it where your library is and that can be any drive C D f J K L. When you search environments in Smart content you know you have more scenes, more shaders than the thousand or two DAZ populates and this finds all those gems be it 20,000 or 50,000. This is a crazy good product. It took me years to organize my manual downloads because Smart Content sucked. Now it doesn't

  I suggest everyone watch this: 

  

   

  ArtAngel, thank you for this, really, you nailed it. The fact that you've got 4TB+ of content and EZFinder is helping you rediscover what's in there is exactly what it was built to do. People have tens of thousands of items in their libraries and it's easy to lose track of what you own, especially the older gems that still hold up. Knowing that EZFinder is surfacing all of that for you is exactly what I was hoping to hear.

  And you're right, I don't edit the videos. What you see is the real deal, mistakes and all. I'd rather spend that time making the product better and answering questions in the live feeds. I appreciate you taking the time to write this up and share that video link. Comments like yours are what keep this going.
• Artini Posts: 10,476

  February 25

  EZ3DTV said:

  Looking ahead, a future version of EZFinder may support running multiple instances simultaneously, each with its own user data profile and each pointing to a different library root. This would give users full multi-library coverage without compromising the portable relative path system — each instance remains a clean, self-contained world with its own scan data, compartments, and virtual folders. No architectural changes to the path system required. 

  Great. Looking forward to this version.

  I have my libraries mostly on 2 external SSD drives  and some items on C: drive.

   
• Artini Posts: 10,476

  February 25

  Just one more question.

  I do not use Smart content at all.

  Will EZFinder still work in such cases?

   
• bambooji Posts: 43

  February 25 edited February 25

  Artini said:

  Just one more question.

  I do not use Smart content at all.

  Will EZFinder still work in such cases?

   

  I read from another comment, that it uses Smart Content.  And won't work without Smart Content.  

   

  Post edited by bambooji on February 25