The borderline-OCD inventory sorting thread

[AyelaNewLife]

I need to pick your brains.

I try to keep the various bits of my inventory organised, to make things manageable; but my sorting systems that I came up with as a three week old account with one set of jeans hasn't really scaled up that well. My 'great plan' was to make a folder for each creator, and simply dump that creator's clothing in there, with a separate folder for boxes. Something like this:

Essential Extras is for a couple of bits like my glasses, those leg jewels that are in two thirds of my flickr pics, coverups to make dresses half decent. Loose Clothing is for unwanted free gifts from places I don't shop at, a few props and accessories, and about 40 things called "Cosmopolitan Group Gift"  - it's a total mess.

Now this worked great when I was brand new - less so now. To try and make things manageable, I only kept folders for creators that I was a regular shopper at in my main Clothing folder, and made a subfolder for other labels that I only had one or two bits from (same system, so Boxes subfolder under each creator). That worked great when I had 8 or 9 extras, and I could remember what was in each. I now have 37 folders here, and I have no idea what's in half of them. And it all looks like this:

So yeah it's a mess. And it needs to change. Because right now I've effectively 'wasted' a few thousand lindens on perfectly good clothing that I don't wear because I never consider them, just because of my bad sorting system.

How do you guys sort out your stuff? Does it help you choose what to wear, without falling back on the same 3-4 easy to remember combinations all the time because searching for that one top you think you might have from a shopping event in June is too much effort?

Bonus questions: should I delete the boxes, and just assume that I'll never need to get another copy? I have both Slink bodies (never really wore HG, but wore Physique for months), and currently wear Maitreya; should I delete the Bellezas and the other body versions to save space? Should I only do so if the box exists as a backup? What about stuff I don't think that I'll ever wear (but isn't defective), separate dumping ground for that?

Basically I'd love to read your essays on how you keep your inventory at least vaguely sane; not just the clothing section either. Teach me, oh wise ones!

[Love Zhaoying]

I recently created these types of Inventory folders and subfolders under clothing:

Mesh

- Complete outfits

— Victorian

— Ethnic

- Coats

- Jeans

- Pants

- Shirts

- Shoes

- Shorts

- Underwear

- etc.

Non-Mesh

- Same as Mesh above 

[BelindaN]

My inventory is evolving slowly from utterly random at the start. When I changed to a mesh Avi, that made me separate mesh clothing from non mesh. That was the beginning. Now I have a mesh clothing heading and within that is dresses, tops and bottoms. Any clothing which doesn't fit those categories just sits in clothing.

Then I made an underwear heading, and so far that's not sub divided. Neither is my hair heading, or shoes heading. In objects I have sub headings for rings, chokers and bracelets. everything else sits in objects.

To make things easy I keep my favourite outfits saved so that I can just click "wear" and an outfit will appear. I'm up to number 52 and there are a few /a and /bs in there.

I also keep a colour co-ordinated Word file as a reminder of what I use, and yes I've spent a lot of L$ on outfits I don't wear. On Tuesday I had a bout of shopping madness, and having just gone through my shopping bags, there are a few things I probably will never use, as they don't look so great as in the store.

Whether to delete all the non-relevant fits from one item? I've considered that but the time it would take is better spent in world!!!

[Akasha Sternberg]

 

I´ve now switched from Dropbox to Nextcloudbut the system remains^^

 

[Sagadin]

 

3 minutes ago, Akasha Sternberg said:

I´ve now switched from Dropbox to Nextcloud but the system remains^^

So can you export your inventory and organize it outside of SL??! Tell me more!

BTW I love your dress categories!

[Orwar]

   My system isn't based on creator, but article. I: Accessories (Jewelry - Headwear/Masks/Spectacles - Others), II: Outfits (Formal - Costume), III: Jackets & Coats, IV: Shirts, Jumpers & Vests, V: Trousers & Kilts, VI: Footwear.

   Don't really have a whole lot of clothes though... For no gender-stereotypical reasons whatsoever. Creators refusing to make quality men's clothing is just sad.

[AyelaNewLife]

1 minute ago, Orwar said:

   My system isn't based on creator, but article. I: Accessories (Jewelry - Headwear/Masks/Spectacles - Others), II: Outfits (Formal - Costume), III: Jackets & Coats, IV: Shirts, Jumpers & Vests, V: Trousers & Kilts, VI: Footwear.

   Don't really have a whole lot of clothes though... For no gender-stereotypical reasons whatsoever. Creators refusing to make quality men's clothing is just sad.

When you say outfits; is that something you put together yourself (eg this top plus these jeans)? Or an item of clothing that covers the entire body?

(Same question aimed at Akasha)

9 minutes ago, Akasha Sternberg said:

Also thanks

[Sagadin]

My system works like this.

Animations

 --AOs

--Poses (this is  bit of a mess, I'd like to go through and organize by creator)

--Tools (things like lighting and pose stands go in here)

Body Parts

--Bodies (I have a couple of different bodies each has its own subfolder with further sorting into essential bits and extras that came with the body)

--Extras (anything extra bodily speaking)

--Eyes

--Feet (really just for separate Slink feet)

--Hair 

--Heads (a few different mesh heads are in here with each brand in it own folder with necessary HUDS, ears teeth, etc)

--Shapes

--Skins (organized by creator)

Clothing

--Accessories (with subfolders for chokers and collars -- amazing how many of those one can accumulate without much effort!, earrings, glasses, other jewelry, piercings, bags, mouth objects (I smoke far to much in SL!), hats, toys, etc.)

--Dresses (with subcategories like Club Dresses, Cocktail Dresses, Minidresses, Miniskirts, Gowns, Long skirts, Prints, Lacey -- not perfect but evolving and some fit more than one category so they might get copied)

--Lingerie (with subcategories)

--Makeup (it is kind of like clothing!)

--Outfits (with subcategories like Pants and Top, Skirt and Top, Dress and shoes, Costumes, sometimes I copy individual items from sets into their own place under, say, shoes)

--Pants/Shorts

--Shoes (woefully unorganized, only done by designer)

--Stockings/Socks

--Tops (with subcategories)

And lots more detail, but that's a rough idea of my sort of sorting system.

Often designers help take care of designer level sorting with their folder naming, but not always.

 

Good luck in your efforts!

Edited October 4, 2018 by Sagadin

[Clover Jinx]

6 minutes ago, BelindaN said:

Whether to delete all the non-relevant fits from one item? I've considered that but the time it would take is better spent in world!!!

Multi-task! I often do this when I am waiting on a lucky chair or chatting at breakfast. Use the filters to search for things you want to delete (like all those unpack scripts) and then just delete them! Just be sure you are only deleting the items you want to delete, it is easy to delete whole folders when things are filtered.

I recently started sorting clothes by designer because I have been purchasing more, then I want to sort by clothing type. I generally keep out my size and the color hud (if there is one or just the colors I mainly wear) and the original box in case I need a different color quickly or the hud messes up.

It's frustrating when you can't find something. I was working on a blog post and remembered a piece of furniture that would have been perfect. I could not remember the name of the item nor the store or creator. I wasn't even sure which alt it was on! 

 

 

[Akasha Sternberg]

13 minutes ago, Sagadin said:

 

So can you export your inventory and organize it outside of SL??! Tell me more!

BTW I love your dress categories!

no hun, but I dress like this:

Hop on my posestand and get naked

open the external folder on my HDD - browse through stuff -

find something and put it on inworld

continue till outfit is complete^^

[Clover Jinx]

2 minutes ago, Akasha Sternberg said:

no hun, but I dress like this:

Hop on my posestand and get naked

open the external folder on my HDD - browse through stuff -

find something and put it on inworld

continue till outfit is complete^^

She manually did her own "wardrobe" by taking pics of all her stuffs! She's brilliant like that.

Edited October 4, 2018 by Clover Jinx

[Sagadin]

1 minute ago, Clover Jinx said:

She manually did her own "wardrobe" by taking pics of all her stuffs! She's brilliant like that.

Wow!

[Akasha Sternberg]

1 minute ago, Clover Jinx said:

She manually did her own "wardrobe" by taking pics of all her stuffs! She's brilliant like that.

brilliant allright XD Desperate and lazy more likely ? But yeah it keeps me out of trouble ...sometimes...a bit

[Callum Meriman]

42 minutes ago, AyelaNewLife said:

How do you guys sort out your stuff?

Body 1
   > Top
      > Shirt
         Shirt Folder
         Shirt Folder
         Shirt Folder
      > Coat
         > Formal
            Coat Folder
         > Casual
            Coat Folder
   > Pants
      > Jeans
      > Shorts
     >  Underwear
Body 2
     same structure
Body 3
     Same structure

I use links to duplicate a folder into mutiple bodies

[Clover Jinx]

6 minutes ago, Sagadin said:

Often designers help take care of designer level sorting with their folder naming, but not always.

^This. Also don't be afraid to rename things to help *you* find it in your inventory. I'm constantly renaming folders and sometimes items because I'm not going to remember that my favorite pair of brown boots is "*MyStoreInitialsTooLazyForFullName* someobscurewordforbrown anotherobscurewordforboots"

[Love Zhaoying]

2 minutes ago, Clover Jinx said:

anotherobscurewordforboots

Growing up in Texas, there was a style of boots which were called, “corner roach stompers”. Not sure I was creative enough in my early youth to make that up myself.

[AyelaNewLife]

Just now, Clover Jinx said:

^This. Also don't be afraid to rename things to help *you* find it in your inventory. I'm constantly renaming folders and sometimes items because I'm not going to remember that my favorite pair of brown boots is "*MyStoreInitialsTooLazyForFullName* someobscurewordforbrown anotherobscurewordforboots"

.:::!!!@@~~~ShoesRUs~~~@@!!!:::. Athena - #9

It was infuriating just typing that out.

At least you can rename folders; most clothing is no-mod and thus no-rename; but that's okay if you keep each item in it's own folder.

[Orwar]

29 minutes ago, AyelaNewLife said:

When you say outfits; is that something you put together yourself (eg this top plus these jeans)? Or an item of clothing that covers the entire body?

(Same question aimed at Akasha)

Also thanks

   Whole body clothing, or clothing that comes with both a top and a bottom in the same package. I 'should' probably put the trousers in the trouser folder and the top in the jacket or shirt folder, but eh... Meh.

[Laoise Rumsford]

[Love Zhaoying]

Just in case, I store the “box” in subfolder for each item (and name the subfolder “box”).

[Sukubia Scarmon]

...and then there's me, just having everything in the inventory folder - Well, I started sorting a few things, but never finished that, since I get distracted pretty easily. For every thing I sort into my subfolders, I get a trillion new that get never sorted.
My spotify playlist is a huge mess. I have a folder on my hardrive where all the pictures I ever saved get into - that folder survived 3 PC's. It's a huge mess.
Never take a look into my drawers. It's, you guessed it - a huge Mess!

I'm really bad at organizing. But hey - I find everything I'm looking for!

[Blush Bravin]

I tried all kinds of inventory management ideas, but until I started using the CTS Wardrobe nothing really worked for me. I was constantly looking for things and not being able to find them no matter how well organized my inventory was. I had lots and lots of sub folders very much like what many have shown already, but somehow I still found that I didn't really know what I had in my inventory. Getting the CTS and having everything in a visual inventory with amazing sorting features is what finally made my inventory work for me. It's work but I find it's worth every bit of work I put into it.

Edited October 4, 2018 by Blush Bravin

[Janet Voxel]

I started an organization project back in the summer.

So far I’ve:

Put all of my applier clothing in one big folder.

Organized my footwear into categories: shoes, boots, sandals, sneakers, misc (for ribbons and jewelry), etc.

Organized my hair into categories: So far I’ve done colors. Blonde, Brunette, Red, colorful.

Organized my skins.

Organized my shapes.

Brought all the stuff out of that other folder for stuff you buy from MP.

Accessories: broken down into sunglasses, purses and bags. Jewelry is further broken down into earrings, necklaces, bangles, tiaras and headpieces.

I have my bodies, heads and body parts Organized.

Dances and AOs organized.

Just by doing that I found 76 boxes I’ve never opened.

 

On my “to do” and ongoing list:

Poses need work. I have them in a folder, but I’m going to throw them in an anypose stand at some point.

I’m working on junking all my boxes, that I’ve unpacked

Ive started clothing. I’m doing the “only” clothing now. You know the stuff you get from gatchas that are only for one body. Once I do that. Then I’ll work on outfits, and pieces.

Vehicles

Houses/skyboxes

Furniture

I figure I’ll have my inventory like I want it by the spring.

 

 

Edited October 4, 2018 by janetosilio

[Love Zhaoying]

For scripts:

- Folder for each project, prefix folder with “aa” or “!” to get it to rise to the top.

- Each folder has “backup” subfolder with prior script versions 

- Each script has version as part of name.

I still had to create a database awhile back to document all the scripts and interfaces.

So..hope I never get that a-nal about clothing!

[BelindaN]

7 hours ago, Clover Jinx said:

Multi-task! I often do this when I am waiting on a lucky chair or chatting at breakfast. Use the filters to search for things you want to delete (like all those unpack scripts) and then just delete them! Just be sure you are only deleting the items you want to delete, it is easy to delete whole folders when things are filtered.

I recently started sorting clothes by designer because I have been purchasing more, then I want to sort by clothing type. I generally keep out my size and the color hud (if there is one or just the colors I mainly wear) and the original box in case I need a different color quickly or the hud messes up.

It's frustrating when you can't find something. I was working on a blog post and remembered a piece of furniture that would have been perfect. I could not remember the name of the item nor the store or creator. I wasn't even sure which alt it was on! 

 

 

I didn't know about the existence of lucky chairs until yesterday, and I've never seen one, despite intensive shopping trips........