Working with Project/Folders

New folders or projects can be created by right clicking on an existing folder or project in the tree view and selecting Create Subfolder / Create Subproject. The new item is created underneath the selected folder/project. Sub-folders can be added to both regular folders and project folders.

If you click on an empty area, you can choose Create Root Folder or Create Root Project to create new Folders/Project on the root level.

To rename a folder or project, right click and select Rename. Be aware that not all characters are allowed as names, some reserved ones like * { [, spaces, etc... are not accepted.

To reorder your structure, both types of folders can be dragged around after being added to the Server Tree. Only Project folders can contain Sub-Project folders; however, sub-folders can be added to both regular folders and project folders. To prevent folders/project being moved by an unwanted drag operation, this operation can be limited in the User Interface option in the Viz Config section:

This can be either unrestricted (Normal) or only by using the SHIFT key in combination with the drag operation (w/Shift) or can be completely forbidden (No).

Working with Bookmarks

To provide quick access to the most important folders or projects, they can be bookmarked to speed up navigation. Bookmarked folders are added to the Server Tree Bookmark context menu. Right click on a folder or project and select Add to bookmark. This adds your favorite into the bookmark drop menu on top of the server view:

Bookmarks can also be created by dragging a folder to the Bookmarks Icon.

Bookmarks can be deleted by opening the bookmarks menu and clicking on the small trashcan next to the item. Bookmarks are sorted alphabetically by their full path.

History

The asset view automatically adds up to 20 folders and project locations into a history once an asset has been used from within that folder. This applies to actions (like an item has been deleted or double-clicked, renamed, dragged into the scene tree and so on). Whenever an action happened within a folder or project, it is added to the history list. This history is available at the top of the server tree.

Sorting and Filtering Items

You can sort how items are being displayed by using the sort icon next to the Content switcher. Then you can sort by Name, Modification Date, Creation Date, Size and in both Ascending and Descending order. In the Details view the same can be achieved by clicking the corresponding column header. Clicking the header again changes the sorting order.

Underneath the Items view, there is an input field for doing a quick filtering on your items. The filter applies to any part of the filename. As an example, if the content switcher is limited to images and given that your items follow a certain naming convention, you set a filter to "normal", it only shows the normal maps within a folder:

The name and the UUID of any item are taken into account.

Content Switcher

Folders can contain various types of items. To view only a selected type of items, contained in a folder, click an item type tab from the Content Switcher. This also allows multi-selection while holding the CTRL key while clicking on it. If you want to see all of your items, click on any previous selected item, so no one is selected. This replaces the old All tab.

General

The general tab shows basic item properties. On top a large preview icon is shown.

• Name: Shown underneath it, you can copy the name, but you can not modify it here. To rename an item, see Renaming an Item.

• Type: Shows what kind of asset you selected.

• Path: Shown underneath. The location of the item. Please keep in mind, that a linked item can appear in multiple locations. The path shown here is the currently selected one on Graphic Hub. If an asset from the Search result is selected, then it is the first folder link, otherwise the exact path of it.

• Owner: Shows the active user that owns this item. For more information about user and group management, see User and Group Management in the Database Management section of the Graphic Hub Administrator Guide.

• Size: Shows the actual size of the selected item in Graphic Hub. Items on Graphic Hub have different sizes than for example the same file on your hard drive (images on Graphic Hub contain additional data like mipmap levels, preview icons, etc.).

The two date items shows when an item has been created and when it was last modified. Since Viz Artist version 4.4, the time is also shown.

Permissions can be changed on User, Group and World level.

• User: User may overwrite their files and create files.

• Group rights: User can overwrite files which belong to the group they are a member of.

• World rights: User may overwrite files which belong to anyone.

On the bottom, the UUID of the item is shown and be copied to the clipboard with the small clipboard icon.

Links

The Links tab shows the links that are assigned to the selected item. There are two different types of links. References and File links.

• References: Contains all items an item consists of. For example, a scene contains of various Images, Fonts and Geometries. All of these belong to that scene are references.

• Used by: Represent the location the item is being used. This can be for example a scene, a merged geometry etc.

• Folder Links: Represent all locations this item is placed on the Graphic Hub.
  
  

Some files can have quite a lot of References or File/Folder links. While retrieving this information, a spinner is shown:

This shows shows all other objects that use this image. One of these File links is the scene ReferenceClip16_9. If you click on ReferenceClip16_9 in the File Links list, the asset view would jump back to the location this scene is stored in or as in this example back to the first explanation image. A detailed explanation on how to search for reference can be found chapter Searching for References.

If you get an error message when opening a scene

the scene is most probably being used inside a GFX channel or Superchannel within another scene. Check the File Link properties of this item to check which other files is using this:

Keywords

Keywords can be assigned to all types of items. They can be useful for example to categorize or label your items. Keywords can also be used as a search criteria.

To assign a keyword to your selected item, either double-click on the keyword you want to assign or click the small + sign. To remove it, do the opposite.

History

Graphic Hub stores a simple history of what has happened with your items. When a assets has been created or imported, modified etc. This is useful if you need to know who modified or imported something.

Advanced

Special tools can be found in the Advanced section.

• Check for Background Loading: Checks if the selected item is suitable for Background Loading. A message box opens and shows if the item is suitable, or shows why the item is not suitable.

• Verify/Restore: Locates, verifies and attempts to correct a corrupted item.

Simple Search

To locate an item in Graphic Hub, type any property into the search field on top of the assets view. This can be either part of the name, the owner, the type, or keywords. In addition, Graphic Hub add-ons are also included by default.

Some examples:

Advanced Search

If the simple search is not fulfilling your needs, you can use the Advanced Search. It allows you to specify more search criteria in detail.

The default Search Type is Freetext, which means, your search criteria matches on:

• The name

• The owner

• The type

• The keywords.

Graphic Hub Add-ons are also included by default. Search by Name uses only the item's name as matching criteria. To limit the search to a single folder or product including its subprojects/folders, switch the Search Scope from Global to Selected folder. This is for the currently selected folder only. Types specifics which item types to search for. This is more or less the same as for example doing a blue material to find all blue materials, but lets define your type more gradually. By specifying Keywords, your search also includes these in the search query. If you need to find an item by a specific owner, the dropdown list lets you to choose a certain user.

To search for a certain time an item has been modified, for example all scenes that have been changes last week, the modified property can be used. It can be:

• Any time: Uses default value with no range specified.

• From: Uses a start date until now.

• Until: Shows any item modified before the specified date.

• Between: Shows if an item has been modified between two dates.
  

  

Reference Search

There are two different ways to search for references: