Workfiles App Project Folders

[tokejepsen]

Goal

To allow the Workfiles app to show folders to open scenes/projects.

Motivation

There is an increasing amount of hosts that does not encapsulate a scene or project within a single file; Unity, Unreal and Toon Boon Harmony. For these hosts the Workfiles app is current useless.

Implementation

It should be a relatively small code change https://github.com/getavalon/core/blob/master/avalon/tools/workfiles/model.py#L79

The bigger issue would be how to support enabling directories.

We could have a custom file extension to represent directories:

import avalon.api

def file_extensions():
    return [avalon.api.workfiles_folder]

This would allow for a combination of directories and files for example in the case of using both directories and zip files.

Or we could have an optional method on the host modules workio.py:

def enable_directories():
    return True

[mkolar]

I like it. @antirotor what do you think in respect to unreal for example?

[antirotor]

I like it. @antirotor what do you think in respect to unreal for example?

From Unreal perspective I am still trying to fit Workfiles app into it, but so far no luck. We are now using Unreal in task context. And when running Unreal on task, it will create its project directory under task work dir. If you run Workfiles app from Unreal then, what should this app show? Unreal Editor instance is per project so opening another project means closing existing Unreal Editor and running another. Closest use of Workfile app would be for managing levels in Unreal, but that is already built in functionality in Unreal Content Browser.

But on other applications this change is 👍

[BigRoy]

This could be good. Let's give it a go.

Unreal Editor instance is per project so opening another project means closing existing Unreal Editor and running another. Closest use of Workfile app would be for managing levels in Unreal, but that is already built in functionality in Unreal Content Browser.

To continue this sidetrack for a brief moment.

It could instead maybe show the Project's "Levels"? Which is actually the "scenes" kind of representation for Unreal Engine. You can have any amount of levels within a single project.

With Unreal it's more likely to have on "all-encompassing" project that everyone shares (e.g. with Perforce/Git LFS) and then work on the assets in it, then dropping them into individual Levels where needed.

[antirotor]

It could instead maybe show the Project's "Levels"?

That was my thought also but this would duplicate already existing functionality in Unreal that artists are probably more familiar with.

[BigRoy]

That was my thought also but this would duplicate already existing functionality in Unreal that artists are probably more familiar with.

What specific functionality? :) What would be odd in Unreal's context is more that you wouldn't usually "increment" a version but keep it the same Level name and just commit/push the changes when you've done them. So in that sense the Work Files tool would still be odd in Unreal.

Anyway, let's see if we can keep this discussion on track for the other cases and continue discussion on Unreal in #498 and #517 (referencing them here so these notes can be found)