Asset store download folder?

Hey guys,

When you download something from the asset store usually and choose NOT to import it to your project (so its not in your project assets folder) but it stays in the list of assets youve downloaded from the asset store and if you create a new project you are able to import those downloaded packages into the new project.

My question is where is it copying the downloaded packages from? I can't seem to find it anywhere I'm sensing theres something Im totally missing

 

someone on irc answered it for me =)

C:\Users\accountName\AppData\Roaming\Unity\Asset Store

 

Good to know... why the heck is it in that folder? I would expect to download stuff into my actual project folder...

 

If you choose to "Download and Import" rather than just "Download" it will place a copy in your project folder. Otherwise, the files are not tied to any particular project, so they are placed int he shared data folder on your local machine.

 

Even better to know!!!
Thank you

 

Yuck! What an awful place to store content assets! I've got a tiny SSD C: drive for fast OS, and a huge, RAID D: drive for all my work. I'd very much like to have a say in where assets are store, whether or not they're going to be used in my current project.

 

Perhaps you can raise a request to the unity team on our behalf =)

 

On a mac it's located under "~/Library/Unity/Asset\ Store".
I guess you could symlink it to another location.
On Windows that would be a NTFS symbolik link. (Attention: I did not try that yet)

 

They should allow us to set a preference for where we want it to download to or at least popup a message when it's done with the location.

 

Thanks I need it ..

 

It is possible to change you profile storage location on Windows.

 

the point is to hide it actually, optimally it would be in an encrypted container to prevent illegal handing over as it happens now as you can simply copy and forward them

 

Well it seems you've succeeded in hiding them even from Unity. Surely the Unity app should know where these packages are and automatically include them in the list offered by "Include Package..."?

 

I can't find the where Unity places the downloads on Mac Lion. I can't find the "~/Library/Unity/Asset\ Store" location anywhere. Not even a spotlight search came up with it.

 

If you haven't already found it, it is due to Lion hiding the user Library folder.

You can easily bring it up by typing "open ~/Library/Unity/Asset\ Store" in a terminal window.

 

or install totalfinder and make it show system folders and tada its there again

 

There's an awesome app for Steam that automates moving folders from one drive to another for the aforementioned SSD/RAID scenario. SteamMover also allows you to run the commands manually. When you select the folder, it spits out the following commands:

xcopy /E /V /I /F /Y "c:\program files (x86)\steam\steamapps\common\<game name>" "D:\steam\<game name>"
cmd /C rd /S /Q "c:\program files (x86)\steam\steamapps\common\<game name>"
cmd /C mklink /J "c:\program files (x86)\steam\steamapps\common\<game name>" "D:\steam\<game name>"

So that should give you an example of how you could "symlink" your asset folder.

edit:
Ran successfully.

C:\Users\leprasmurf\AppData\Roaming\Unity>xcopy /E /V /I /F /Y "C:\Users\leprasmurf\AppData\Roaming\Unity\Asset Store\*" "D:\Unity\_Assets\"
<snip>
6 File(s) copied

C:\Users\leprasmurf\AppData\Roaming\Unity>rd /S /Q "C:\Users\leprasmurf\AppData\Roaming\Unity\Asset Store"

C:\Users\leprasmurf\AppData\Roaming\Unity>mklink /J "C:\Users\leprasmurf\AppData\Roaming\Unity\Asset Store" "D:\Unity\_Assets"
Junction created for C:\Users\leprasmurf\AppData\Roaming\Unity\Asset Store <<===>> D:\Unity\_Assets

 

there's no need to install totalfinder

 

For windows users:
1. open file explorer (WinKey + E)
2. type %APPDATA% for the path, then click ENTER
3. Select Unity folder and goes to Asset Store..

or simply type this into the file explorer

%APPDATA%\Unity\Asset Store

 

I myself have limited space on my OS harddrive. Rather than buck the system, what you can do is actually change where your APPDATA is stored. http://www.windows-commandline.com/2009/07/change-application-data-location.html

The best workflow for including packages is by creating a new project and checking off the things you want (listing everything you've downloaded from the asset store). But once your project is created and you want to bring in something else that you've already downloaded, there doesn't seem to be a nice way to do it without manually pointing to this hidden directory. If there is, please let me know as that is what drove me here.

 

I have found it.Thank you!

 

Above, where the path is, there you must write the path for the folder to open.

 

In the Asset Store, when you gave downloaded something, you can 'Open Folder' on its page

 

Or just click and hold on the Finder Go menu (next to View) and while the drop-down menu is showing, press the keyboard option key. "Library" will appear in the Go->drop down menu. Select Library and the Library folder will open and you will see the Unity folder

 

Why would they encrypt or hide it? The buyer has bought and paid for the assets they have.

You can create a hard link from the hidden folder to your D: drive. Google 'NT filesystem hard link', and of course you can do the same in osX with ln but without the need to google and download special purpose software.

 

I find it annoying that the packages are not downloaded in a selectable destination....after all I don't get the point of encrypting, since you can just save the whole project, zip it and give it away. I don't believe that there is a concern about piracy of items sold on the store, since each of the seller has a list of username and purchase receipts, so if you are in doubt, you can always ask the person using your assets, for their info to check their license.

The problem with the packages and assets is that if you have a small internal HD, you are forced to import all, save the project on the external drive and open a new one, with the result that you get a ton of single files that defy the purpose of a Unity package.

As much as I love the idea of having folders that I can explore, would be maybe time to make something different, so we kill 2 birds with one stone.

I envision a package with assets and code, in the same way as an OOP library/DLL/Framework is used: include it, use what you need from it and be done...altho chances are that we will never get to this point, unless someone with a lots of degrees and well known, speaks up and make it happen.

 

I think its interesting to know it's now possible to vote for that feature here;

http://feedback.unity3d.com/unity/all-categories/1/hot/active/ability-to-change-the-download-d

Lets get rid of this issue together

 

Good move Sir

 

With all these replies...no one simply said

Unhide the folder (thought your Control Panel and Folder Option) and move the folders to your wanted area

 

The problem is how to fix the issue of not having a selectable download folder...there are various work around.

Is not a deal breaker, doesn't take the sleep away at night for sure (compared to the other problems that I deal with, especially code wise), but would be nice to see it fixed

 

I do it like this. All Assets from Unity are all updated and seen on another drive and C drive is free, you just have a link in c that points towards the new location.

Move Asset Store, not copy but move to your desired drive.
Example C:\Users\Chris\AppData\Roaming\Unity\Asset Store

to

D:\
Asset Store is now directly under drive D:

Now open the command line as shown below.

Press Windows start buttom or click start and type cmd and press return.
Then type cd\ and press return again.

Now link Asset Store with this command. Using your User name.
G: is where I moved Asset Store to.
C: is where it was.

mklink /j "C:\Users\Chris\AppData\Roaming\Unity\Asset Store" "G:\Asset Store"

Press return
FINISHED

 

Thanks for the hint, but keep in mind that many, me included, works on both Mac and Win, which means that if you want a shared dir, it is quite a mess.

On Mac I just made a symlink, and I am working like that, downloading things one at time, renaming them accordingly, and moving them in specific folders (like for the tutorials, where you have also the pdf files and not only the package).

Altho once you move them, the store has no clue if you download it already or not, which makes a bit messy the process of updating packages, when a new version is out. That's why I would rather prefer a native solution: you set in the editor where the stuff goes, and the store knows what did you download, where it is and organize/update it accordingly.

 

C:\Users\accountName\AppData\Roaming\Unity\Asset Store ----> Note: here AppData is a hidden folder

 

Sorry for raising a zombie thread (not really?), but moving the location of this folder can't be that big of a deal, can it? Can anyone from UT comment on this? Is it even entered into a Fog/Bug/zilla case anywhere?

 

hi

 

Thanks :*

 

Thanks it was helpful

 

The issue is still there; any hope for a customized location for the asset store download? The amount of packages is getting quite unmanageable now; especially using small SSD

 

If you do it like I said further up in this thread you will have your complete assets folder on another drive and yes Unity can still check for asset updates and even if you delete an asset it will know and let you download it again. I then use Grab Yer Assets to do everything else with my assets within Unity.

 

a great solution to SSD users (not only for unity, for all folders) is to install http://schinagl.priv.at/nt/hardlinkshellext/linkshellextension.html
with this, move folder to another drive and then with right click pick as origin link, then on previous (original) location right click and put "destination link" and you have a linked folder that windows think that are same folder.

Not a tool for a regular user, but with little knowledge of what are you doing it is a really good tool

 

Thanks for that.It looks very good and I will give it a go later on another system. It does then what I mentioned, but makes it more automatic and easier for many folders. As Unity 5 stil has this asset ssd problem, people are going to have to get use to using something like this and lern what a hard link is.

 

Thanks..

 

You now have 2 Asset Store Folders
- Asset Store
- Asset Store-5.x

So you are going to have to make a new hard link for the new folder as I described further up.
It will look like this

mklink /j "C:\Users\Chris\AppData\Roaming\Unity\Asset Store-5.x" "G:\Asset Store-5.x"

remember to first move (not copy) but move the Asset Store-5.x folder to your new drive before doing the hard link command.

As you see I moved my folder to drive G

 

Fascinating that after almost 5 years, this is still an issue

SSD are cheaper, but still I dislike to have packages hidden in service folders, without being able to manage the destination. Even Poser is finally able to customize where the packages are downloaded, so there is hope for Unity too

 

Thanks eagleeyez that was very helpful

 

for me, my directory is ~/Library/Unity/Asset Store/Unity Technologies/Unity EssentialsSample Projects/downloaded.unitypackage I doesn't know your computer, think this could help you

 

Yes - I had the same problem a few months ago. It's always been this folder so far and apparently it does not bother enough people to raise enough attantion for Unity to consider making changes.

Personally I'd also love to have the folder be changeable like the GI cache.

And yes - even after 5 years this still seems to be an issue.
Didn't even notice how old this thread was.

 

This is a serious issue for me as well. It doesn't take long to have the asset store hidden folder reach VERY large sizes. Why can't Unity let us pick another drive to store these files? iTunes lets us do this, for example, and Apple is pretty concerned with copyright etc.

 

The reason why assets are stored in C:\Users\[AccountName]\AppData\Roaming\ respectively in the User Application Library on Mac is: because it belongs there. It is data related to an application, and to that one application only, so it belongs into the application data storage. The "store data wherever you want"-policy of older Windows system actually creates a huge mess and now Microsoft struggles hard to get people away from it. Other OS have been more restrictive for a good reason. So actually, Unity is doing it right.

If you want to have a clean system install on an SSD, for example, than you should not move single files or folders around, messing up the system logic, you should move the whole users folder to another drive.

 

Asset Store Foler on Mac for Unity 5

~/Library/Unity/Asset Store-5.x/