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

[dewshine]

I'm sorry about the mix up in my linked post.
The numbers used for face hair and head hair are reversed for Blond and Red. I must have put the info for the face hair down there.  It's been corrected now.  Again, I'm very sorry about the misinformation there.

Best thing to do is sort into correct color folders, load that folder and the meshes, delete what you find flaws with, and catagorize what you have left. 
But that's just my opnion...

[Metalkatt]

Have you considered loading bodyshop to do your hair deleting?  When I go through and clean out the clothes/hair/makeup/whatever in my game, I always use bodyshop... it's faster than in-game for sim-based stuff since it doesn't load all the objects.

[Regina]

Have you considered loading bodyshop to do your hair deleting?  When I go through and clean out the clothes/hair/makeup/whatever in my game, I always use bodyshop... it's faster than in-game for sim-based stuff since it doesn't load all the objects.

I was just going to suggest that.  It takes my BodyShop a little while to load, but it's tons times faster than loading up my game AND CAS.  CAS takes forever in my game to load!  I'm all the time going through and getting rid of stuff--I've found a lot of things just don't look as good in-game as they do in a screenshot.

[Gwill]

Loading time isn't much of an issue for me at the moment.  I've temporarily removed all my downloads that aren't hair.

I don't like to use bodyshop.  It's so bloody dark.  But I'm getting pretty sick of my Harry Potter CAS as well  .
Anyway, I'm down to 855, and some of those might be meshes of things I've deleted.  I feel that I've deleted everything I can't live with, but I bet I'm going to be able to part with some more when I've got through the categorizing.

It's taking time, but I'm getting there! 

[SciBirg]

A word of warning about moving files with CleanInstaller:

That is what I was doing a while back which caused all my downloaded files to be changed to some unusable file format...
So, if you do this, be prepared to risk losing all your files, or you can have CleanInstaller open next to your download directory and use the filenames from CleanInstaller to find which files need moving.

[Gwill]

I move files with cleaninstaller on a daily basis.  Never had any problems there.

[angelyne]

A word of warning about moving files with CleanInstaller:

That is what I was doing a while back which caused all my downloaded files to be changed to some unusable file format...
So, if you do this, be prepared to risk losing all your files, or you can have CleanInstaller open next to your download directory and use the filenames from CleanInstaller to find which files need moving.

A while back, if you unchecked a file in CleanInstaller that would deactivate it.  To deactivate it, it would rename the file and remove the .package extension.  You could have either renamed your files to re-enable it, or used clean installer to do it.

Now, you need to check the files and right click on them to de-activate it.  That's much better and much harder to do by accident. 

[skandelouslala]

Those of you who categorize have a lot more willpower than me...it takes me forever just to go through and delete the ones I no longer  use.

I'm sick of downloading crappy hair...I know it's my own fault but I can't figure out how some creators make it look so good on their sim "models" but in my game it's just wretched.  I think some people must be photoshopping up their sims a bit b/c there is no way some of the stuff I downloaded can be the same stuff the creator used in their picture of it.

I'm much more picky these days though...I can probably deal with the custom hair just being left as custom hair, but I need to go through it one day and delete all the excess copies of maxis styled toddler/child/teen hair that downloading hair leaves behind.  I can deal with going to the mirror if the kid ends up bald.

[ZephyrZodiac]

I don't have that much custom hair at present, so I don't mind it just remaining as Custom Hair!  I can see, though, if you have an awful lot, and that's what you mainly use, it makes a bit of a joke of the turnon/offs!

[angelyne]

Does anyone know how to fix the genetic part of it, so that custom hair is treated the same as Maxis hair.  I saw at least one creator saying that he fixed his hair so they would work the same as Maxis (as well as be in the correct bins)

[aqualectrix]

I find the most difficult part of organizing hair is not categorizing -- which is tedious but simple whether done manually (SimPE or DatGen) or with the DatGen tool.  The difficult part is preparing the files for categorization -- checking what color they are, renaming as necessary so I don't have to check every single time I mess with the file, etc.  No tool can do this, although all of them allow you to see the hair textures if you want to do it on-the-fly.

In essence, there is no easy way to categorize a bunch of (often poorly file-named) hair.  I wish creators would just catch on and distribute the things properly already.  (Some hairs at MTS2 are correct, and all of those at genensims, and I think I've seen a few at TSR2 as I've browsed the freebies now and again.)

A question for those of you who prefer to categorize in a purely manual manner using SimPE: beyond the whole "what is this file anyway?" issue above, why do you prefer the manual method to the at-least-somewhat-automated-method of DatGen?  I've done it both ways, and I'm interested to hear what others think.  I'm kind of surprised to see so many people here advocating the pure manual method.

[dewshine]

Well, datagen sounds nifty... but I cannot get the tool to run correctly for me.  I'm just destined to be a simPE user. 
The main problems with using datagen is that the elder hair ends up having 4 of each style, unless you go back in with simpe and delete the extra ones from three colors.

[yetyak]

I used SimPe mainly because I have it installed.  I've just got 4 different versions of Datgen downloaded.  And the instructions I followed were for SimPE.  I solved the 4 different gray hairs by deleting them all, I have very few elders in my games.  I also delete the toddler and child ones, too, if they are standard maxis styles.  Especially the hair poofs one.  hate that
I think the pure manual method gives you more control over what exactly is being done.  I don't know if Datgen will let you delete the textures you don't want from any given hair, or not use all ages. 

[Gwill]

I would love to use datgen, it looks nice, but it crashes when I try to do anything with it.

[Kristalrose]

I have so many other tools that I have never even downloaded DatGen. 

I worked for 3 hours catagorizing my downloads folder yesterday.  It was such a mess!!  Tonight, I am going to clean it out and see if I can't get rid of a lot of junk.  Question:  I have several files that Clean Installer cannot identify or preview.  Their names are a long series of numbers and letters.  I do not know if they are old Body Shop files from before TS2 was released, or if they are meshes.  I am afraid to delete them.  How can I find out what they are if Clean Installer can't read them?  Would this DatGen help?  Or SimsPE, which I do have but like everyone else, am afraid of.

[nectere]

open the file with Simpe and look for the geometric data container or object data, this should help you determine what it is. Usually files that cant be viewed with clean installer are meshes of some sort or sometimes persons.

[BlueSoup]

The files with the long series of names can be a few different things:  Walls, floors, meshes or bodyshop files.

I think SimPE could be used to identify the file, but I don't know exactly how.  Probably in the Classic GUI part though, in Object Data.

[Kristalrose]

Thanks y'a..   I'm betting they're meshes.  When I was catagorizing, I had an "I don't Know" folder where I put all the things with long names like that, or ambiguious names like, "SummerDreams" that I thought might be clothes but found out it was a wall.  LOL  The Clean Installer was able to tell me what everything was and I right-clicked and moved them to their correct folders, but these, oh, 20 or 30, files had no information except their names.

Blue, I just wanted to tell you that I notice you are always one of the first people here that replies to me and gives me helpful advice, and I really appreciate it.  Thank you. 

[gali]

"Blue, I just wanted to tell you that I notice you are always one of the first people here that replies to me and gives me helpful advice, and I really appreciate it.  Thank you." [Kristal]

That's the main job of the Senators (that, and  irritating JMP) 

 

[BlueSoup]

Aww, thank you. 

Gali, irritating Pescado is my main job.  And I do it well. 

[gali]

Aww, thank you. 

Gali, irritating Pescado is my main job.  And I do it well. 

Blue, you are already professional in this job. 

Did you get my BlueSoup present? It's yummi...

[BlueSoup]

Umm, it doesn't look all thar yummy.  I think there's a bug in it. 

But yes, I am quite the professional at antagonizing El Presidente. 

But he likes it. 

[ZephyrZodiac]

The files with the long series of names can be a few different things:  Walls, floors, meshes or bodyshop files.

I think SimPE could be used to identify the file, but I don't know exactly how.  Probably in the Classic GUI part though, in Object Data.

It sometimes happens that a file that Clean Installer can't identify, SimPE can, so the first thing I'd be inclined to do is view that particular folder in SimPE.  They may be terrain paints from a d/l'd house, for example, and I sometimes wonder if Clean Installer always identifies them.

[BlueSoup]

Even in the case of extremely long random file names, I've always been able to figure out what kind of file it was with Clean Installer, although I'm not saying it's not possible it can't identify it.

It took a lot of identify and move all those files to the right folders though.

Tell me, can the files be renamed without a problem?

[Baa]

The easiest thing to do is to start fresh. 

I finally got around to installing the game on my computer (I wiped it clean) and I organized as I downloaded. Simple as that.