Welcome to the Designer Homes Website

Home | Rules | Assessment Criteria | Tips and Tricks | Removal Policies Home Ranking & Definitions | Preparing for Upload | Code Testing Policy Contact Us

Before uploading a world, a builder may wish DH staff to preview it unofficially. Builders are welcome to submit urls to the DH Inbox for such purposes. Send us contact information when doing this as well so that we can respond (email address, MSN).    Please read all of the directions here & all of the assessment criteria before uploading your world.

Upload Process:

The uploading process is somewhat different from the Mall's because of the extra resources & features we've added for Homes. It's divided into 3 screens: 1) The Name, Quantity & Price, the WRL file & thumbnail. When 'Continue' is pressed, the object is created in our database. 2) The next screen (screen 2) allows 2 more things - the ability to add a description of the home, & the ability to upload a ZIP file full of world resources which will be unzipped by the server into the same directory as the home. Click here to view a screen cap of this screen 3) Confirmation Screen. In order to access screen 2, there must be a successful output variable from the first screen. This is a security feature. The proto for those who haven't found it on the upload page is located here

What to have ready to upload:

Make certain that your wrl file is gzipped.   Place all of the textures & audio files used (except UM textures), into a separate folder on your comp. Go to the Edit menu & highlight them by  "Select All" then go to the File menu & click "Add to Zip". Name the group & zip the group together into a file that has a .zip extension. This is the resource file that will be uploaded for your world.  Do not include the .wrl file in this .zip file! Be also sure that your resource files are not in a folder within your zip file.   Prepare a thumbnail but do not include this in the .zip file with the textures.   Submit a working email address to the DH Inbox when you upload your world so that we can communicate with you more easily.  The message length limits for Inbox messages & the 'we want to work with you on this' (reject) notices is prohibitive for DH Staff.     Houses require a mandatory House description to be entered upon upload. Please have this ready and save a copy of the description to a txt file so you can use it again should you receive an assessment.   Prepare a thumbnail but do not include this in the .zip file with the textures. Remember that the max size for thumbs is 512x512.

Additional Information:

The price cap on DH house worlds is 9999cc.   Once a world is accepted & dropped, builders are required to maintain the stock for it in the store. It is recommended that when first uploading, builders stock a world with at least 100 instances. Worlds are not at present removed from stores & it is required that the stock not reach 0 or remain at 0 should that happen. If necessary, DH Staff will restock homes which the builders have neglected to restock, or contact builders whose worlds are not properly stocked & request that they restock them.     It is permitted, but not encouraged, to reprice a world. Repricing to a lower price does shortchange those who have already purchased the world however, so if a builder decides to reprice lower, it is recommended that they offer buyers a rebate on the difference. More than one adjustment in the price of a world is not permitted.   When naming a world, use the same criteria used in the Mall regarding unacceptable characters & length of the name. If necessary DH Staff will rename your world to allow for the addition of drop date & price information.   DH does not accept limited uploads or personal uploads.   The type of worlds accepted includes those with buildings suitable for homes, shops,  galleries, RPs, & themed displays (for example, a racetrack for car collections, a farm setting for animal collections, a marine setting for aquatic collections). It is not necessary for RP & themed display worlds to contain elaborate building structures.

INTERIM UPLOAD RULES Creators may submit one world for consideration at a time. When that world is accepted DH will consider another world unless the artist decides to abandon the world in which case they may do so provided they notify DH of that intent. Creators are asked to give Designer Homes an email address upon upload to the DH Inbox in order to receive a Quality Assessment report if the DH Staff deems one necessary. If you receive an assessment please take the time to go over the it carefully & make certain that you address all of the issues in your rebuilding. The issues identified are required changes unless otherwise specified - for example, on occasion we make suggestions which are clearly noted as suggestions.