barbult said:

ArtAngel said:

Richard Haseltine said:

danmast94 said:

People talking about "sudden influx" and "new products" as if this is a recent issue and not a problem that's existed for a long time. Items constantly end up in the Lost and Found. Metadata is constantly missing (including it disappearing from items that used to have it, thus moving stuff into Lost and Found that had previously been correctly tagged). Daz is responsible for making sure the things they sell work correctly and are managed properly. If one PA mislabels an item or does something wrong, then there's possibly an argument for shifitng the blame to them. When it's a widespread issue that has been constant for years, then it's no longer reasonable to think it's a PA issue and not a Daz issue.

The main topic is the large tranches of content brought over from Renderosity - in some cases there were hundreds of items and Daz simply wasn't able to process all of those to generate metadata. Gicwn that it is starting from scratch there is nothing to stop members from generating product data and posting it themselves - I have already done a few of Lully's products that I purchased from Renderosity, they would just need the store ID and SKU updating to reflect the current Daz store status - if/when I get around to that I start a thread.

While (generally much) older products may lack metadata, and some others may too, it is not common - if this is happening a lot I would suspect it is an instalaltion issue (for example, if you close DS and start DIM immediately it is possible for PostgreSQL to shut down on DS exit and not restart on DIM start, meaning that the metadata won't be added to the database).

To me, it's akin to a sign vendor selling an outdoor electrical sign or lamp, consumers  expect to operate via a power cord, only to find out it's lacking such. Sure I could hardwire the sign but should I have to? I seldom appreciate products that are not fully intact. And, I have wa-a-a-a-ay too many lost and founds. I don't need to accumulate any more. Doing the job someone else neglected to do is something that I am not interested in. How do I avoid these products? Is there a way to flag them prior to buying? If a product lacks readmes is that because it lacks metadata? How do we identify metadata deficient products so we don't waste time buying them? Or . . .  is the answer the only remedy to stop shopping here?

Answered above already by felis: https://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/comment/9309771/#Comment_9309771

 

ArtAngel said:

Richard Haseltine said:

danmast94 said:

People talking about "sudden influx" and "new products" as if this is a recent issue and not a problem that's existed for a long time. Items constantly end up in the Lost and Found. Metadata is constantly missing (including it disappearing from items that used to have it, thus moving stuff into Lost and Found that had previously been correctly tagged). Daz is responsible for making sure the things they sell work correctly and are managed properly. If one PA mislabels an item or does something wrong, then there's possibly an argument for shifitng the blame to them. When it's a widespread issue that has been constant for years, then it's no longer reasonable to think it's a PA issue and not a Daz issue.

The main topic is the large tranches of content brought over from Renderosity - in some cases there were hundreds of items and Daz simply wasn't able to process all of those to generate metadata. Gicwn that it is starting from scratch there is nothing to stop members from generating product data and posting it themselves - I have already done a few of Lully's products that I purchased from Renderosity, they would just need the store ID and SKU updating to reflect the current Daz store status - if/when I get around to that I start a thread.

While (generally much) older products may lack metadata, and some others may too, it is not common - if this is happening a lot I would suspect it is an instalaltion issue (for example, if you close DS and start DIM immediately it is possible for PostgreSQL to shut down on DS exit and not restart on DIM start, meaning that the metadata won't be added to the database).

To me, it's akin to a sign vendor selling an outdoor electrical sign or lamp, consumers  expect to operate via a power cord, only to find out it's lacking such. Sure I could hardwire the sign but should I have to? I seldom appreciate products that are not fully intact. And, I have wa-a-a-a-ay too many lost and founds. I don't need to accumulate any more. Doing the job someone else neglected to do is something that I am not interested in. How do I avoid these products? Is there a way to flag them prior to buying? If a product lacks readmes is that because it lacks metadata? How do we identify metadata deficient products so we don't waste time buying them? Or . . .  is the answer the only remedy to stop shopping here?

Answered above already by felis: https://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/comment/9309771/#Comment_9309771

Richard Haseltine said:

danmast94 said:

People talking about "sudden influx" and "new products" as if this is a recent issue and not a problem that's existed for a long time. Items constantly end up in the Lost and Found. Metadata is constantly missing (including it disappearing from items that used to have it, thus moving stuff into Lost and Found that had previously been correctly tagged). Daz is responsible for making sure the things they sell work correctly and are managed properly. If one PA mislabels an item or does something wrong, then there's possibly an argument for shifitng the blame to them. When it's a widespread issue that has been constant for years, then it's no longer reasonable to think it's a PA issue and not a Daz issue.

The main topic is the large tranches of content brought over from Renderosity - in some cases there were hundreds of items and Daz simply wasn't able to process all of those to generate metadata. Gicwn that it is starting from scratch there is nothing to stop members from generating product data and posting it themselves - I have already done a few of Lully's products that I purchased from Renderosity, they would just need the store ID and SKU updating to reflect the current Daz store status - if/when I get around to that I start a thread.

While (generally much) older products may lack metadata, and some others may too, it is not common - if this is happening a lot I would suspect it is an instalaltion issue (for example, if you close DS and start DIM immediately it is possible for PostgreSQL to shut down on DS exit and not restart on DIM start, meaning that the metadata won't be added to the database).

To me, it's akin to a sign vendor selling an outdoor electrical sign or lamp, consumers  expect to operate via a power cord, only to find out it's lacking such. Sure I could hardwire the sign but should I have to? I seldom appreciate products that are not fully intact. And, I have wa-a-a-a-ay too many lost and founds. I don't need to accumulate any more. Doing the job someone else neglected to do is something that I am not interested in. How do I avoid these products? Is there a way to flag them prior to buying? If a product lacks readmes is that because it lacks metadata? How do we identify metadata deficient products so we don't waste time buying them? Or . . .  is the answer the only remedy to stop shopping here?

Mr_Fluffkin said:

Richard Haseltine said:

If the default category is the only one at that level of the tree with entries in the current state of the filtering then it is hidden and you just see the various categories that it contains.

Yeah, I recognized that. Right after starting DS I first thought my lib was gone/hidden, because I've never seen the default category before and everything looked empty, because default was collapsed. This product was my first one that created categories ouside of the default main category. I hope they are gone now, as I don't want ophraned categories on "root" level in my database...

The categories will still be there - and you will still see the references there if you look in the Content Library pane (Vendor data, metadata from products, is not removed but only hidden in the other content panes - that prevents a metadata update (through DS or reinstalling the product) from overwriting user changes).

felis said:

I overlooked that she is not in default.

You can just rightclick and select Categorize and then place her where she should be. And also the same for the rest of the product.

You can also make a technical ticket and describe that she is wrongly categorized.

Thanks, that worked! And it looks like the installed extra-categories are automatically deleted when everything was re-categorized and there's nothing left in them. At least I hope so, I don't like orphaned database entries. But again, another example of the bad metadata of many products. I thought I had already experienced every possible error, but DIM installing an entire product in a second Smart Content main category was new to me. DS can surprise you again and again. Seriously, maintaining the database/metadata is more complex than DS itself.

IceCrMn said:

Sounds like I'm one of the few that use the drag and drop method?

I use it and the various editing dialogues in combination - some things are easier one way, some the other, and some it's a matter of where I am in the process.

One can simply drag stuff from the "Dumb" content library to the "smart" content and drop it in the appropriate category.

for example if I have a shirt for G8M that doesn't have metadata. I select him in the scene then drag the shirt from the dumb library to the smart library and drop it under "Default>Wardrobe>Shirts". Then export user data followed by re-import userdata to save the changes and apply them.

After that the shirt I added will show up every time I select a g8M in a scene under shirts.

 

For things like scenes and props it's much easier because you don't need to have a character selected first.

Just drag and drop it to the appropriate category in smart content.

I've been using the drag and drop method for years. I thought everyone was because it's so much easier than mucking about trying to edit things by hand.

No, this won't fix inaccurate metadata in store products that come with metadata. I ran into this recently myself. For those products I had to edit the files in notepad, not hard, just a nuisance.

felis said:

That lady is not imported.

Your screenshot doesn't show much, as she will be in any of the subcategories too, as Daz Studio aggregates to higher levels.

I don't understand what you mean by "I still have the categories added by Bell outside of my library to choose from".

Yeah, I know she's not imported, but her metadata is completly wrong. The marked "Default" Lib on my Screenshot holds all standart DS categories, thats the actual smart content library. But DIM installs her outside of it by creating categories outside the normal categories. So I uninstalled her again and the smart content pane shows mny content like before. But if I right clickj any prop and manually assign categories to it, I still see Bells categories outside the default categories. I have 2 Figures categories now i.e., even tho I uninstalled her.

I also find the lack of metadata extremely annoying. Smart Content is the main reason why I shop almost exclusively at the Daz Store. Since the introduction of all the new PAs, it's basically a gamble whether your purchases are smart or not. It's inexplicable why the products aren't at least labeled. It can't be that difficult to write a script that checks whether each product on the store has metadata and flags it if it doesn't. Then you could at least label them in the store. 

But it's not just the new RR items; even products that are already installed suddenly lose their metadata out of the blue. My lost and found also includes about 150 products.
I think with Daz, you just have to accept that from time to time, some products will simply “get lost.” If you make a purchase without metadata, I would generally recommend requesting a refund. Unfortunately, I'm too lazy to do that and end up installing the products manually with the Content Wizard. If, as with RR purchases, you at least knew that there was no metadata included... But you only find out after the DIM installation, that parts of the purchase once again has no metadata, super annoying. Then you have to uninstall it, collect the product photo, PA, SKU, etc. from the shop, and start the Content Wizard. Product photos are usually in WebP format or have dimensions that are not compatible with the wizard, so you need to convert them first too. It's really tedious. And by the time you're done, all the excitement of trying out the product has usually already worn off.

Sounds like I'm one of the few that use the drag and drop method?

One can simply drag stuff from the "Dumb" content library to the "smart" content and drop it in the appropriate category.

for example if I have a shirt for G8M that doesn't have metadata. I select him in the scene then drag the shirt from the dumb library to the smart library and drop it under "Default>Wardrobe>Shirts". Then export user data followed by re-import userdata to save the changes and apply them.

After that the shirt I added will show up every time I select a g8M in a scene under shirts.

For things like scenes and props it's much easier because you don't need to have a character selected first.

Just drag and drop it to the appropriate category in smart content.

I've been using the drag and drop method for years. I thought everyone was because it's so much easier than mucking about trying to edit things by hand.

No, this won't fix inaccurate metadata in store products that come with metadata. I ran into this recently myself. For those products I had to edit the files in notepad, not hard, just a nuisance.

Thank you Richard,

Is there anyway to modify the drive letter in the DIM mainifests so that I could assign a common higher drive letter designation to a removeable drive on both systems I want to access the content on? Also, you mentioned reimporting the metadata. Is that basically downloading metadata from DAZ for the products on the machine? i.e. the database gets rebuilt on each machine with drive letters appropriate for that machine?

danmast94 said:

People talking about "sudden influx" and "new products" as if this is a recent issue and not a problem that's existed for a long time. Items constantly end up in the Lost and Found. Metadata is constantly missing (including it disappearing from items that used to have it, thus moving stuff into Lost and Found that had previously been correctly tagged). Daz is responsible for making sure the things they sell work correctly and are managed properly. If one PA mislabels an item or does something wrong, then there's possibly an argument for shifitng the blame to them. When it's a widespread issue that has been constant for years, then it's no longer reasonable to think it's a PA issue and not a Daz issue.

The main topic is the large tranches of content brought over from Renderosity - in some cases there were hundreds of items and Daz simply wasn't able to process all of those to generate metadata. Gicwn that it is starting from scratch there is nothing to stop members from generating product data and posting it themselves - I have already done a few of Lully's products that I purchased from Renderosity, they would just need the store ID and SKU updating to reflect the current Daz store status - if/when I get around to that I start a thread.

While (generally much) older products may lack metadata, and some others may too, it is not common - if this is happening a lot I would suspect it is an instalaltion issue (for example, if you close DS and start DIM immediately it is possible for PostgreSQL to shut down on DS exit and not restart on DIM start, meaning that the metadata won't be added to the database).

barbult said:

nemesis10 said:

Yep, the PA's I communicate with create their own metadata.  This comes up occasionally when two PA's create assets with the same name and create a conflict or when a PA creates a strange new folder for their products such as "Praps" rather than Props. Customers complain and it must be explained that Daz3d didn't name the character or decide where products go and what the folders are called. So Daz3d has to go to the artist and ask them to change it.

PAs create their folder structure and content filenames, morph names, etc.  File and folder names and morph names are not metadata, though.
Metadata is database information, like asset type, category, compatibility base, compatibility, etc.

Two PAs have already responded to my question, and have confirmed that Daz (QA) creates the metadata for their products. That is consistent with what I have been told in the past.
Edit: Third PA chimed in and confirmed that he has never created metadata for his products himself. Daz does it.

Yes, this is correct.

People talking about "sudden influx" and "new products" as if this is a recent issue and not a problem that's existed for a long time. Items constantly end up in the Lost and Found. Metadata is constantly missing (including it disappearing from items that used to have it, thus moving stuff into Lost and Found that had previously been correctly tagged). Daz is responsible for making sure the things they sell work correctly and are managed properly. If one PA mislabels an item or does something wrong, then there's possibly an argument for shifitng the blame to them. When it's a widespread issue that has been constant for years, then it's no longer reasonable to think it's a PA issue and not a Daz issue.

Oh.... but actually I meant : Are there any so-called "third-party creators and vendors" in this Daz3D store.  The vendors selling products in this store should be all registered Published Artists, so to me they're native. Usually we call those who sell products in other stores as "3rd-party vendors". Make sense ?

Oh, yes.  The daz store is partly a brokerage so that Sickleyield, for example is a 3rd-party creator and sells other products in FlippedNormal, 3dshards, and other stores. Pretty much all the software like Filterforge which you can buy in this store is made by software manufactors who would amused and puzzled if described as part of Daz3d or "native".  Filterforge is sold in a lot of places. Daz3d is a creator in its own right with products such as Daz Studio, those core characters such as Victoria 9, assets commisioned by Daz3d such as the the matching products that go into a core character's bundle.  Thus if you made a pirate core character with a bundle, you might commission pirate themed products like hair, clothes, and weapons, along with textures, and maybe a special edition character for the Premier members. In general, the PA's here are sort of free agents i.e. 3rd party vendors who sell their specific wares here exclusively for a period but can leave if they want to and remove their products.  They aren't "native" or more specifically not traditional Daz3d employees who might have their own lockers at the headquarters.  This whole metadat crunch happened because a bunch of vendors of another store who you might perceive as being "native" left at the same time and came here to become "native" i.e. and expected 3rd party vendor or PA but they never needed metadata because the store was geared more towards Poser users and there was no time to make metadata for the new products.

....

Who provides the metadata: 

• Third-party creators and vendors: 

  When you purchase an asset (like a character, clothing, or prop) from a vendor other than Daz 3D, they are responsible for creating the metadata that describes the asset and integrates it into your Daz Studio library.

• Daz 3D: 

  For products sold directly by Daz 3D, the company itself is the provider of the metadata.

These info. are confusing me. Are there any so-called "third-party creators and vendors" in this Daz3D store ? 

As far as I understand and exp., we purchase products from Vendors, aka PAs from this store. Products from "Daz 3D",  or if you mean products from Daz Originals...  were also made by PAs rather than Daz themselves. They just bought the products from PAs then marked them as Daz Originals.

So, Daz3d does create the metadata for its own products as Barbuilt says.

And I got the very same info. from my PA friends as what @barbult just did : PAs who sell products in this store create no metadata but just asset files as well as content folders. Daz is responsible for creating metadata of the products and creating IM packages accordingly.

Besides, I personally don't think they create metadata by using Content DB Editor... which turns out to be cumbersome.  There might be a tool or script, like RiverSoftArt's Content Wizard that can scan / analyze the product package and auto-generate metadata ~~

nemesis10 said:

Yep, the PA's I communicate with create their own metadata.  This comes up occasionally when two PA's create assets with the same name and create a conflict or when a PA creates a strange new folder for their products such as "Praps" rather than Props. Customers complain and it must be explained that Daz3d didn't name the character or decide where products go and what the folders are called. So Daz3d has to go to the artist and ask them to change it.

PAs create their folder structure and content filenames, morph names, etc.  File and folder names and morph names are not metadata, though.
Metadata is database information, like asset type, category, compatibility base, compatibility, etc.

Two PAs have already responded to my question, and have confirmed that Daz (QA) creates the metadata for their products. That is consistent with what I have been told in the past.
Edit: Third PA chimed in and confirmed that he has never created metadata for his products himself. Daz does it.

Yep, the PA's I communicate with create their own metadata.  This comes up occasionally when two PA's create assets with the same name and create a conflict or when a PA creates a strange new folder for their products such as "Praps" rather than Props. Customers complain and it must be explained that Daz3d didn't name the character or decide where products go and what the folders are called. So Daz3d has to go to the artist and ask them to change it.

barbult said:

Metadata is created by Daz, not by the artist. Please don't blame the artist for the lack of metadata in their products, or for metadata errors in their products. All the blame for metadata issues should go to Daz. Daz just chose not to make metadata for the imported products, because there were so many and it would take a lot of resources to make it. It was a choice Daz made, and so we suffer from that choice they made.

Well sort of... If you have ever had a product with bad metadata or other problems from a third party in the store, you have had to wait until the creator is contacted by Daz3d and they reply since the third party does the metadata and packaging. If it is a Daz product like the core figures then, yes, Daz3d does the packaging.  I believe Sickleyield goes into detail about this in her DeviantArt page. 
More formally:

Metadata for Daz Studio is primarily created and provided by the third-party sellers and creators who develop and sell the assets (models, figures, environments, etc.) that are used within the Daz Studio software. These creators include Daz 3D themselves, as well as many other independent vendors. Users can also update and maintain the metadata using Daz Studio's built-in Content DB Maintenance tool, which processes the metadata queue and reimports metadata for the installed assets. 

Who provides the metadata: 

• Third-party creators and vendors: 

  When you purchase an asset (like a character, clothing, or prop) from a vendor other than Daz 3D, they are responsible for creating the metadata that describes the asset and integrates it into your Daz Studio library.

• Daz 3D: 

  For products sold directly by Daz 3D, the company itself is the provider of the metadata.

How metadata is processed: 

• Daz Studio's Content DB Maintenance: 

  This feature within Daz Studio allows users to manage and update the metadata for their installed assets.

• Process: 

  You can right-click on the Content Library or Smart Content tab and select "Content DB maintenance" to access a pop-up window. From there, you can "Process the metadata queue" and "Reimport metadata" to update your library.

In essence, Daz Studio itself provides the tools to manage and update metadata, but the original metadata is created by the individual content creators and sellers. 

So, Daz3d does create the metadata for its own products as Barbuilt says.

Richard Haseltine said:

gelstat said:

It is impossible to delete a material. Well, I managed to do it once, but I can't remember how.

Have you selected its polygons ((clicked the + next to the anme, for example)? 

 + , - , selected, unselected, export/import. You cannot delete a material with or without polygons. 

A dialog box does appear when you try to delete it, but the tab remains.

You can create a new one, but you can't delete it.