can Carrara use the CMS without DS installed?

Mistara

what is the relationship between carrara and content management system?
i really only want it for the autofit and autofit clones.
Smart content doesn't make sense to use,what with the clones. i wanna be able to see my v4 dresses if V4 isn't the figure selected.

has anyone experimented?

had a thought of keeping 4.6 on old pc.  was installing 4.8 on new pc, but ...
animations and groove tracks are going to fill up 2 terrabytes pretty fast.

dunno.  tempted to reformat, reinstall windows, and only install carrara and the sony suite s/w

Thanks. 

chickenman

I use smart content all the time it is not the same as in studio, it justs lists all your content in alphabetical order.

If you have a CMS issue you need studio to rebuild the CMS as Carrara does not have the tools at the moment.

Things such as reset database, re import metadata.

dbdigital2

You also can't add your own metadata or create catagories without Daz Studio.  If you use DIM (Daz Install Manager) to install the content, then the default metadata will be added.  Even if you don't use Daz Studio for rendering/scenes, it is worth the install for the content mangement.  That is if you want to use the CMS system.  Also to install the CMS system you need to install Studio anyway, last I knew there wasn't a installer you could get seperate.  Studio takes about 200mb last I checked, which is nothing compared to a runtime.  If you want to use the CMS I would say install it.  Also 4.6 I *think* only has the older CMS system Valentina instead of the newer PostgreSQL which is in general more stable CMS system.

If you do go with the Valentina system (the latest version of Carrara can use both) here is a tip...never EVER have more than one Daz program running at one time.  So if you have DIM running, don't start Studio, if you have Studio running don't start Carrara etc.  More than one running at a time is a sure fire way to corrupt the database.  I corrupted mine more than once, and I eventaully found out to NEVER run DIM at the same time as Studio or Carrara.  It may not apply to Carrara since it is only reading the database not making changes, but I have never been bold enough to try it.  Takes too long to receate the database.  I am sitll using Valentina...going to update soon though, if nothing else so I don't have to worry about running DIM at the same time as Carrara or Studio.

chickenman

when you install the newer version of Carrara you have no choice but be on PostreSQL.

I have had Studio, DIM and Carrara all going to no ill affect to Carrara and the Database.

I only use studio to do DB maint and nothing else.

Mistara

i do have a separate installer for the cms.  tryin to remember which s/w it was under ...

huh, it's not actually ogre.   calling it ogre is stuck in my head, prolly 4 eva and eva

Mistara

how do you verify if carrara is seeing the cms?

ProPose

The way I understand it is that CMS creates the database that Carrara reads,  So if you have content in you Smart Content tab then it is save to assume that CMS is working.  If not then it isn't.  There is no way to start or stop CMS fron within Carrara as you can in DazStudio.  If you have an empty Smart Content tab in Carrara, then start Daz Studio,  start CMS, then close Daz Studio, and restart Carrara and you should have a populated Smart Content folder in Carrara.  At least that works for me, as I add or remove different Content Libraries frequently depending on what I'm working on.

Edit to add:  When you start CMS in DAZ Studio, you may also need to re-process the meta data in order to create the database that Carrara will use.

fixmypcmike

If you need to do this, start Carrara before closing DS, because the CMS will be stopped when DS closes if nothing else is using it.

ProPose

Fixmypcmike said:

If you need to do this, start Carrara before closing DS, because the CMS will be stopped when DS closes if nothing else is using it.

I'm using Postgres CMS.  When starting Carrara 8.5 this service starts automaticaly.  I think the issue is that Carrara can't create the content database but it can read it.  That's the reason for running your content library through DAZStudio first in order to create that database.  Once that database is created it doesn't matter if DazStudio is open or not, the database is already created.  Carrara will read that, which populates your Smart Content Tab.  If you add more content, or switch to a different content library,  then that would need to go through DazStudio in order to create/update the database.  You can use mutiple Content Libraries, as long as the data is created/updated in DasStudio first.