Having a well considered folder structure and good file naming conventions for your game project is just part of good game development practices. The reality is however, that it is the rare studio and team that is actually able to stick to these ideal methods.
Mudstack supports both a structured folder based set up as well as a more contextual grouping of files.
Sometimes you just want to see all subsets of files associated with a specific level in the game, or by the character modeling team or some other contextual logic. With only a folder based file organization system, this is impossible to do without duplication of files. That’s where libraries come in.

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What Are Libraries, Exactly?

Think of libraries as a tag with special properties— they get their own view in mudstack. When a file gets added to a library, you can see it from that library view without the context of its folder hierarchy. Mudstack reports on the review status of library content in the form of a library health indicator. Deleting a library has no impact on any files in that library, except the removal of the library property from that file’s metadata.

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How to Use Libraries

Teams commonly use libraries to group files by level, sprint, team, and asset type to view these collections without the distraction of a folder structure. The imagination is your limit when it comes to the purpose of a library. Because libraries are cheap in mudstack (remember that deleting a library does not delete the files within!), you can try out a few different contextual groups to see what makes the most sense for your team.

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Adding Files to Libraries

From any search view, you can select one or more files and add the selection to one or more libraries:
  1. Right click after selecting files and choose Add to Library, or
  2. Use the right sidebar to click the Add to Library button
Once you’ve completed this step, you’ll be able to explore and designate the specific library or libraries you wish to incorporate your selection into. Additionally, you can add a file to libraries via the file details view. Simply navigate to the file info tab on the right sidebar and click to initiate the process.

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Syncing Libraries

When on the desktop app, any changes you make to a library places it into the push table for syncing with your cloud workspace. If you apply a library to a file, that file gets added to the push table. When mudstack pulls any new library changes from the cloud, these changes will be available to you locally.

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Removing Files from Libraries

The easiest method of removing files from a library is to go into that library and select the files you want to remove. Next, you can click the delete icon next to the library name in the right sidebar to remove these files from the library.
Remember that removing a file from a library does not impact the file itself other than the removal of the library association from its metadata!