Can you store a folder in an object?

[Anna Nova]

I tried dragging a folder into an object, an the contents of the folder arrived, but not the folder structure.  Is there any way round this?

I'm looking at ways to preserve a folder structure.

[HunniHope]

no you cant have folders in an object. You can drag a folder into it but only the folder contents will be moved/copied

[Ardy Lay]

Just a suggestion:

For my two use cases, I made a prim for each folder, dragged a folder's contents to each prim, then either linked the prims or took them into inventory then dragged each into another prim to contain them.  Both rather lame workarounds.

[Mollymews]

8 hours ago, Anna Nova said:

I tried dragging a folder into an object, an the contents of the folder arrived, but not the folder structure.  Is there any way round this?

I'm looking at ways to preserve a folder structure.

when we want groups of related items in object contents then a way to do this is we can name the items into folders and subfolders. For example

a\a\item1
a\a\item2
a\b\item1
a\b\item2
b\a\item1
b\b\item1
b\b\item2
c\item1
c\item2
d\item1

4 top level folders: a\ b\ c\ d\

folder a\ has 2 subfolders \a\ \b\
subfolder a\a\ has 2 items in it
subfolder a\b\ has 2 items

folder b\ has 2 subfolders \a\ \b\
subfolder b\a\ has 1 item
subfolder b\b\ has 2 items

folder c\ has no subfolders and 2 items
folder d\ has no subfolders and 1 item

we can (with script) read the names and parse them into a 'file directory' JSON or list as we prefer. Our script then managing the file directory

when items are no-modify (we can't rename them) then we can write a notecard 'file directory' and read the notecard. Example

a\a\name_of_some_no_mod_item
a\b\name_of_a_second_no_mod_item
c\another_no_mod_item
d\and_another_item

Edited May 17, 2022 by Mollymews
typs

[Anna Nova]

So the answer is that you can't store a folder in an object, but you can write a script to recreate a folder structure from the contents of an object.  Cool, I'll work on that.  Thanks everyone.

[Jennifer Boyle]

13 minutes ago, Anna Nova said:

So the answer is that you can't store a folder in an object, but you can write a script to recreate a folder structure from the contents of an object.  Cool, I'll work on that.  Thanks everyone.

OMG! I want that script!

[Mollymews]

1 hour ago, Anna Nova said:

... you can write a script to recreate a folder structure from the contents of an object.  Cool, I'll work on that.  Thanks everyone.

if you do write a file directory manager script for others to use (like Jennifer for example) then I suggest that you go with the notecard method. People in general understand how to write descriptive text formats in notecards. AO, AvSitter, etc

will be a lot more straightforward for them to format the file directory notecard, than it will be to individually rename every item to be included in the contents. Is also pretty slow to rename object content items when is lots of items. Tediously slow sometimes

the script can on startup check for the file directory notecard which has some common name prefix assigned by you. Like "File Directory". A prefix name allows people to label the notecards with their  own extended name descriptor. The script parsing the notecard name(s) for the prefix. Example named notecards

File Directory : My Stuff In This Red Object

File Directory : My Other Stuff in This Other Green Object

[SarahKB7 Koskinen]

No need to invent folders for Contents Tab, it already exists: another prim with its own Content Tab inside the first Content Tab. Repeat until really confused and losing track of what's in where....

Edited May 17, 2022 by SarahKB7 Koskinen