I had that problem. For about 3 or 4 months, I could only post attachments to an upload thread. It eventually went away with an update to Flash.

Adding a new image to a new alpha mesh, or adding a new bump to go with that new alpha mesh, is the same. The only difference is that bump do not need their corresponding material definition. Instead, you'll add 4 lines to your existing txmt's. (see pic)
So it is the same process. You clone a txtr, change its name,(replace Base by NormalMap import instead of build(to replace your image) Make sure you change the Format to Raw8bit, fix TGI...
Basically, if you have : body, body_alpha, body_alpha2, and they all have their own txtr and bump, you'll end up with 6 txtr, but only 3 txmt.
The only step I skip in this tut, is to fix the bump in Bodyshop instead of SimPE...because I do everything in SimPE.

Thank you, I will look into that!

Does anybody know why after 5 months of not playing sims, when i log back in some of my cc objects are flashing blue?! It looks like the mesh was deleted or something but i havent even touched my downloads folder?! Does windows delete your cc or something?

How big are your .cache files? just taking a chance here. I am deleting them as soon as I am done playing and never let them grow a tiny bit because I am that determined. lol

I always delete my cache files before playing, but never after...does it do something if its left in my folders after i am done playing?

I just wanna say, I have never deleted my cache files, and I've never had a problem with them.

Oh no. I just want to be sure I do not forget. before or after does not matter. In fact, all that matters is to not let them grow too big in size as they can get corrupted.
Deleting them each and every time like i do is not at all necessary. I am just used to do it like this.

That's because you don't have a lot of CC. If you have a lot of CC, the cache files get too large and the game can't read them to load them. It's not corruption so much as there appears to be a file size limit for the Groups cache in particular. (And maybe the cigen one, which Bodyshop generates, but I don't use Bodyshop very much, so I'm not sure.) For me, once that hits about 2.5MB, I have to delete it. Anyway, when the caches are too big, the game load either aborts or hangs at a point before the splash screen even appears. I have ~8GB of CC in my main game, and I have to delete caches roughly every other time I load the game in that account or else the game will not load. On the other hand, in my "creating" account -- where the only CC is what I'm currently working on plus a few things for taking preview pics so there's less than ~100MB all told -- I've never had to delete caches. So, the more CC you have, the more often you'll have to delete caches, and if you don't have much, you'll probably never have to do it.

But I really don't think that caches will have anything to do with getting blue flashing in a game where there's been no additions or deletions in the Downloads. Blue flashing is missing textures, which is most often caused by having a repositoried/slaved mesh in a game where you don't have the master mesh that holds all the textures. If no files have been deleted, then for some reason the game isn't finding the file that has the textures. One suspect would be an antivirus program interfering with game files. I've heard they'll do that sometimes, quarantining files that it erroneously thinks are suspicious, though it's never happened to me. Another thing might be, if you've been screwing around with organizing CC and putting things in subfolders, you may have subfoldered too deeply, with too many folders-within-folders, and the file name (which includes all the characters in the file path going all the way back to C: if you've installed on your C drive) is exceeding the character limit, which if memory serves (and it might not, since I turned 55 the other day ) is 255 characters.

This is something to think about since i do subfolder a lot! Thanks for the advice, and happy late bday!!! <3

Thanks.

The other thing to keep in mind when organizing CC is that the more subfolders you have, the slower the game will load, simply because it will take the game longer to read longer file paths than shorter ones. The difference isn't that noticeable if you don't have much CC but if you have a lot, you can shave minutes off your load time simply by having fewer subfolders. So, if you're a person who's concerned about game-loading time, I'd recommend reducing the overall number of subfolders of your Downloads folder as much as you can. I know that advice drives uber-organizers who also want shorter load times nuts, but...yeah. Of course, if you don't care about load time (I don't, myself), then subfolder to your heart's content! So long as you don't exceed the character limit, of course.

Yeah...i don't care about loading times, in fact i wish the loading time was longer! My game takes about 20 minutes to load , i usually do stuff while it's loading anyway.

I did that. I had a lot of subfolders and subs to the subs. My folders were like nesting dolls. I got rid of all the subfolders, and my game loads like lightening.

Nesting dolls
I was, since I started downloading, far too lazy to organise anything - I simply use the names of creators (and when I feel the folder by one creator is a bit stuffed, it changes to MichelleA, MichelleB, MichelleC, MichelleD.......)

I have no idea why people would disagree with you about this. But I guess they'll disagree with me, too, because I don't care about load time, either. For one thing, I'll leave my game running for days if I'm in a playing mood, so I don't have to load it often. And when I do, I do other things while it loads, too. I don't even really know how long it takes lately, since I don't sit and watch it load. I know it's less than about half an hour, though, because I'll often start it loading and then take the dogs for a walk, and we're usually out for about half an hour doing that, and the game's waiting for me when I get back.

I did reduce the number of my subfolders, though, simply because I'm strange and find it easier to find things when everything's less organized. I'm one of those people who puts things away and then forgets where I put them.

Happy Birthday @iCad

PS. Total grabbed those recolours of the bespoke set you just made.

ahah! happy Birthday Icad. Blue flashing..i read pink. Like that gives me an excuse...lol

from my understanding, there is a scholarship for teens that reach level 3 of any career.

Is there a cheat to change the number of days left in the season? The aspiration reward only lets me change the season itself and always sets it to 5 days left of the season that I choose.

I want to be able to change it from 5 days left to 3 days left or 1 day left.

There's no cheat that I know of, but there's a modded object that will allow you to set the season lengths to whatever you want. You want the "Season and Weather Controller" in this archive: https://simfileshare.net/folder/15690/ It's a little green vase that you'll find in the Misc/Misc category. Place it on a lot and click on it to set things as you want. Unfortunately, it's not global. You'll have to set things on each lot.

ETA: Thanks for the bday wishes, Jo and Rosebine. :lovestruc

Thanks for the link. The notes are a little confusing to me - are the 'set season length' settings on this permanent for the lot it is used on? Meaning, it I set a season to 3 days do I then have to set it back to 5 before it rolls over to the next season so that future seasons are normal? I really just want to 'skip forward' a few days in the season when sims graduate from college in the middle of a season and move into a new lot.

I know when i saw the disagrees i literally rofled lol...ok ok people it was just my opinion!

Nope, by setting the season length, you're just telling the game how many days the current season has left on that one lot. So, if you move them into a new lot, which by default will make that lot in the neighborhood's first season with....one?....day left? Or is it five? Well, whatever. When you use that object, you can tell it to make it the third season with three days left. When those three days pass, you'll be in the 4th season with five days left, like normal.

If you're worried about days of the week, you might want this, too: http://modthesims.info/d/318007/day-setter.html

ETA:


Maybe they were just disagreeing with you saying that you wished the load time was longer. Either way...Well, whatever, people!

The Sim Manipulator will allow you to change the number of days as well as the day, time, and season.

It works well when you move a someone outta a family home to be able to put them back in time and season sync with everyone else in the neighborhood.

I just found this awesome site called "TS2 Lot Database" where you download clean versions of the games' existing lots (community and residential) but unoccupied. I'm wondering if I can download my favorite lots without the premade Sims in them so I can place them in my new Mega-Uberhood. Would it work or is there a risk of corruption because the houses are the same? I'm pretty sure by "clean", they mean they've cleaned out any references etc.

Edit: Hmmm, perhaps I got too excited. I was installing the O'Mackey's "cleaned unoccupied" house with Clean Installer and it had these: "Packaged Family" and "Packaged Sim Data" inside, perhaps I best not install these lots....