Categorizing all my downloaded hair... Any advice on how to keep my sanity?

[BlueSoup]

Oh, all my downloads are completely organized, I just wanted to know about the wonky file names.

[ZephyrZodiac]

I think there's a thread about this further down the page.

http://www.moreawesomethanyou.com/smf/index.php?topic=2212.0

There you go.

[BlueSoup]

Thanks ZZ. 

[ZephyrZodiac]

You're welcome.  hope you find what you need to know.  I'll probably try it sometime too, I've got a lot of old make-up etc. with long file names, so I really haven't a clue if there ones I want to keep or not!

[BlueSoup]

I don't have all that many, considering how many files I have, but it'd still be nice to change stuff so it makes more sense to me.

[ZephyrZodiac]

Yes, but it'd be nice if all make-up, hair etc. makers were to rename them and give us package files instead of sims2packs!

[noname]

All you people with Datgen problems, make sure you are using the 10/19 developmental release instead of the 10/3 official release. I had horrible crashing problems too until I installed the last one. Too bad the project is over with

[dewshine]

Yeah, Charliene, I tryed the 10/19 version.  It didn't crash, but it didn't really work right for me either.  I guess it was too simple for me to figure out?  Anyhow I think datgen is a cool tool for those folks who are scared by all the numbers in simPE.

[Gwill]

All you people with Datgen problems, make sure you are using the 10/19 developmental release instead of the 10/3 official release. I had horrible crashing problems too until I installed the last one. Too bad the project is over with

I wish I had horrible crashes.
I just have dull crashes.  When I search for anything (which the program seems to force me to do, rather than just letting me tell it which folder I want it to look in), the program searches, and when it's searched through most of my files, it just stops responding.

[cristalfiona]

Thats what happens to me, except, it seems to actually be after its searched all the files, when its loading them into Datgen. I have the latest release too, as I redownloaded it after it crashed the first time.

[ZephyrZodiac]

Maybe you need to slim down your folders and just give the program a few at a time to load.

[dawnkeeper]

I wish I had horrible crashes.
I just have dull crashes.  When I search for anything (which the program seems to force me to do, rather than just letting me tell it which folder I want it to look in), the program searches, and when it's searched through most of my files, it just stops responding.

I used to have that problem til I realized I was a dork and should never ever no matter what scan for files. There are just some files that will always make it puke. Now I go into my downloads with clean installer, find all the offending hair files, move them to an offending-hair folder, and make a list. Then when I open DatGen, I only open the four files per hair mesh at a time. That way it never crashes. Then I use the hair toner and ref the list I have (when the names are not intuitive) to bin the hair correctly. Then it is lather, rinse, repeat. Until all the offenders stop offending so much.

Although this is all fine and dandy but now the new version of DatGen I cannot figure the process out at all. *sigh* I think I am going to try and locate the old version.

[Gwill]

I thought I'd give you all an update.

I'm still at it.  I'm still not playing the game, because I've moved all my non-hairy downloads out to do this.  I'm still tearing my real hear out.

I've deleted the hairs I know I'll never use.
I have completed all the fantastic hairs from sites I couldn't possibly live without.  I cheated and downloaded them all again, sorted them nicely into subfolders and ordered them into the correct bins one by one.
All the hairs that had their colours in the filename (in either of the three languages I can understand) are sorted into subfolders and SimPed into the apropriate hair bin.  I've even fixed the ones that were incorrectly named, or I just disagreed with the definiton (what some people call light brown is definitely blonde in my book).

Now I'm stuck with all the files called b4db081b56e2328e4bb4f940861973a2.package and worse.
Currently I'm using CleanInstaller to try to move the ones with the colour mentioned in their description into subfolders.  And looking through the textures of the ones where the creator thought it more important to inform me who made the skin than give any sensible description of it, and see if I can figure out which of the textures are a complete waste of space, and which ones actually say something about what colour the actual hair is.

I'm already very annoyed at people who have textures of 4 different colours in a pack where obviously only one of them is used.
I might go crazy within the next few days and decide to go on a crazy vandetta and kill all sloppy modders.  Or I might take my medicine and fall asleep as usual.

And the worst part of this?  In exactly 12 days I'm going to Hong Kong, and will be away from my computer for at least 3 months, probably 4 and a half.

[Pegasys]

Okay, part of this is coming from the part of me that someday wants to become a professional organizer...

You know those reality-TV shows, like "Clean Sweep" where a tough-minded prof. organizer says "Out it goes!" and the person being organized just weeps?

Well like that, I would say to all those indecipherably-named files - just DELETE them! You've done a good job, you already have the "fantastic hairs" from sites you can't live without.

OR, the gentler way is to simply place them into a folder elsewhere, (in a virtual attic) and ONLY if you really remember and miss a particular style do you hunt through them at a later time.

Wouldn't you rather be playing the game? (I only say this because you said you were "tearing your hair out", if you love categorizing hair, then go for it!)

[angelyne]

I thought I'd give you all an update.

I'm still at it.  I'm still not playing the game, because I've moved all my non-hairy downloads out to do this.  I'm still tearing my real hear out.

I've deleted the hairs I know I'll never use.
I have completed all the fantastic hairs from sites I couldn't possibly live without.  I cheated and downloaded them all again, sorted them nicely into subfolders and ordered them into the correct bins one by one....).

Now I'm stuck with all the files called b4db081b56e2328e4bb4f940861973a2.package and worse.

You have already said you got all the fantastic hair  you couldn't possibly do without.  Ditch the rest.  You probably won't miss them.  Go on press the delete key.  A brief moment of pain and then you will be okay.  Then you'll wonder why you didn't do it before.

ps. lol Pegasys.  I read your post after I posted mine (bad girl I know).  I guess we think alike

[Gwill]

There's a massive difference between "can't live without" and "want to have in the game".

The game gets incredibly dull if all sims have the same hairs.  Even if (and maybe especially if) they are fantastic haris.

[angelyne]

Well your game right now consists of sorting through hair.  So that's duller than any other scenario I can think of with the game.

What I would do, if i was you, is put only a few hairs in the download folder (and nothing else) and use Body Shop to identify what they are.  BS loads in about 30 seconds when you have a blank game and an almost empty download folder.

But if it was me, I'd just start over.  You'll find new hair and find the ones you liked again.  Sort all your hair by folders and include a jpg of the hair.  This way you will never have to play the "identify the hair from the texture game".

[Swiftgold]

It takes some extra work, but I've found this to be very useful, as suggested in another thread. In SimPe paste the name of the package into the 'Text List' section of the package itself; it usually has the recolorer's name in it. If there isn't a text list you can create a string - and it's useful in that if there isn't a text list section in the package at all, the package likely isn't even working in-game anyway. It's pretty easy when you just copy-paste the file name from the Open dialog in SimPe, when you go to open the file.

When you do this, you can then mouseover the hair in Bodyshop or CAS and see exactly what file it is, so when you switch between the ages you can see that it's blonde for the kids' hair and then suddenly jumps to black in the custom mesh, etc...

(Thanks to whoever suggested this in a previous thread)

[Gwill]

I'm all done!  Finished!  Complete! Free!
My game is back up and running!

After finishing figuring out the colours, and subfolering I used Datgen for the last dirtywork.
Btw thanks CharlenieHead, the 10/19 developmental release worked, despite my sceptisim.  It doesn't do nearly as thuough a job as I did with simpe, but I was sick of it all.

[ZephyrZodiac]

I wouldn't even want to start!  Just makes me think - don't download any hair where the maker doesn't make it clear what you're getting!

[Gwill]

I'm really glad I did this.    It was really dull and time consuming, but I think it's worth it.
Now I'm going to kill all my townies and NPCs so I can regenerate them with fancy hair!

In the future I'll categorize hair as I download it.

[angelyne]

Why kill off your townies, just give them makeovers

[Gwill]

Killing them is a lot more fun.

[Baa]

Hrmm.. So I decided to categorize my hairs too, since I've only got a few dozen. The only problem is, I can't find the Hair Toner. I downloaded the latest DatGen and extracted the 10/19 release to the installed location... But hairtoner doesn't seem to be there.

I'm probably just overlooking it but I don't see it in the plugins list...

[angelyne]

Cruel sims mommy!

I personally wouldn't want to have a mass killing of my sims because that would considerably increase the amount of sims in my 'hood and that can be bad.  I don't think it matters if they are dead or alive when it comes to too many itirations errors. 

Could be wrong, but I wouldn't take the chance.

Hrmm.. So I decided to categorize my hairs too, since I've only got a few dozen. The only problem is, I can't find the Hair Toner. I downloaded the latest DatGen and extracted the 10/19 release to the installed location... But hairtoner doesn't seem to be there.

I'm probably just overlooking it but I don't see it in the plugins list...

Do it the hard way with SimPE.  It will put hair on your chest !