Hello!
We have to change the location of our project data - is this possible with Toolkit and what do I need to think about when switching everything over?
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Permanently deleted user This is a great question and something we regularly hear from clients.
Typically because of changes to the IT infrastructure, data locations sometimes need to be changed around for existing clients. This can be a bit tricky, and this forum post tries to give an overview of what needs to be considered. Because toolkit is only one part of the full pipeline, there are often more things to consider than just changing things around in toolkit:
- Generaly speaking, if there is a way to retain backwards compatibility, for example by using symbolic links, this is the preferred option! This way, you can set up your storages so that all new data goes into the new location but existing data which is being referenced still can be reached. Another variation of this would be to add additional storages to an existing project or to let new projects use a new storage (see below for more details).
- For Toolkit, the project root points for the various storages are all kept in the Site Preferences inside of Shotgun. By changing this in the Shotgun preferences, you are switching all of Shotgun and Toolkit to look at a new location. There are some additional steps you need to do, see below for more details.
- Any other part of the pipeline where a file path is being stored will also potentially need to change. This includes references from files to other files, paths stored inside of lists or code or other data etc. Depending on how your pipeline is set up, this may involve opening up lots of files and change paths around to point to new locations. This is usually the tricky bit to change since it involves processing files, either via some sort of batch process or via something that happens when a scene is being opened.
For toolkit, once you have changed the local storage paths inside the Shotgun site preferences, you need to go into a file named roots.yml which resides inside the config/core location inside your pipeline configuration and update that to match the updated storage paths in Shotgun. This needs to be done for all pipeline configurations in the studio.
Alternatively, if you want to keep old projects in one location and new projects in a new location, it is better to add a new local storage and set up new projects against that new storage. This ensures that both old and new projects work side by side.
Another strategy would be to add additional storages to an existing project at runtime - you can read more about this in another forum post.
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