HDA Name

[Magnus Pettersson]

I don't know if I'm blind and dis-functional today but I cant for the world seem to figure out, or find out, how to change an already created Digital Assets name? i mean the name that is listed in the operator manager, the name the node gets in the network view when putting it down (not the label that is listed in the "TAB Menu")... I looked all over the help and in type properties and i see the current name listed as "Operator type" at the top but that's not editable and its also in the variable $HDA_NAME .. Can I change it? and how? =)

[SpencerL]

I don't know if I'm blind and dis-functional today but I cant for the world seem to figure out, or find out, how to change an already created Digital Assets name? i mean the name that is listed in the operator manager, the name the node gets in the network view when putting it down (not the label that is listed in the "TAB Menu")... I looked all over the help and in type properties and i see the current name listed as "Operator type" at the top but that's not editable and its also in the variable $HDA_NAME .. Can I change it? and how? =)

its not a straight forward process. You would need to go into the Operator Type Manager and right mouse button on your existing HDA and copy it. Copy and save it to the new name. Its also the way you would version your otls.

Edited December 7, 2009 by SpencerL

[Magnus Pettersson]

Ahh thanks a lot for the help, that cleared up a few things! Its always frustrating spending hours and hours just for finding out these small things =)

While I´m at it with HDA´s, what is a good way of saving my DA´s in a organized way? I have a created a HDA that also contains other smaller hda´s and custom coded vex nodes. Right now i have all different nodes saved out in their own otl files but I´m wondering how people usually organizes it? Do u use one otl file for every DA you do or put several of them in one otl?

Should i put all assets i created that is used in "bigDA" into one otl file called lets say bigDA_v001.otl and whenever one of the nodes inside changes i version up the otl file?

But then again, some of these da`s can be used for other stuff as well that does not concern bigDA and some is very specific and probably only will be used inside "bigDA". And if, lets say in the future another effect DA is made, "anotherBigDa", that also uses one of the smaller DA´s that bigDA uses, then i guess im back at that it would be smarter having the smaller DA´s in its separate otl?

[symek]

Ahh thanks a lot for the help, that cleared up a few things! Its always frustrating spending hours and hours just for finding out these small things =)

While I´m at it with HDA´s, what is a good way of saving my DA´s in a organized way? I have a created a HDA that also contains other smaller hda´s and custom coded vex nodes. Right now i have all different nodes saved out in their own otl files but I´m wondering how people usually organizes it? Do u use one otl file for every DA you do or put several of them in one otl?

Should i put all assets i created that is used in "bigDA" into one otl file called lets say bigDA_v001.otl and whenever one of the nodes inside changes i version up the otl file?

But then again, some of these da`s can be used for other stuff as well that does not concern bigDA and some is very specific and probably only will be used inside "bigDA". And if, lets say in the future another effect DA is made, "anotherBigDa", that also uses one of the smaller DA´s that bigDA uses, then i guess im back at that it would be smarter having the smaller DA´s in its separate otl?

That is a big question! Generally the whole flexibility of hdas can work for you or against if you overlook some aspects of your pipeline. Say your bigHda shares some smallHda with other bigHDA. Now you feel like you need to start a new branch of developement of a smallHda in purpose of one of bigHda. It can be very tricky to separte changes so they won't affect another bigHda. Many of these problems raise from a fact that Hdas are not asset versioning system, as one may think of it. If you really need one (what is almost sure in case of bigger systems), you may easly find yourself in a position that you need to turn off a half of Hda's subsystem to allow your versioning work properly. For example, Houdini's inclination for installing random HDA found in a path, makes it very difficult to manage assests , so the only way to avoid unexpected exchange of your asset deffinition "just before" final render is to remove all hdas from a path.

Anyway, this is an endless topic. I would consider keeping one hda per single otl file and keeping definition as granual as reasonable and needed. Much like classes in OOP.

Another way is to separete development storage and users storage of hdas, so you create your hda as separate assets and otls, but at the end you pack them into a single file, kind of module. Thus it's easier to keep a track of a "realizes" of toolset.

[Magnus Pettersson]

Thanks a lot for the information symek! I will then keep all different hda in their own otl files. We have a repository system here we use to do dev, scripts, shaders and for some projects and so on. And that way i will be keeping development storage and user storage separate since users asset definition wont change until i check in the new file. I think we wont have any problems yet with accidentally destroying final renders because changed asset definitions and such since our houdini team here is very small at the moment

For versions i think i can use the repository system one for now and if i want to update an asset definition when some shots is already finished with the old definition, then i can update the filename and hda´s version name so it have both the v001 and v002 definitions loaded into houdini =) I guess it might need to be changed in future if the houdini team grows lot but for our scale right now i think it will work fine, i hope haha or it will be like shooting myself in the foot