Please, from a "one man, one .hiplc" perspective, what would be an ideal way to toggle Sopimport's Load from disk versus import "live" from sops?

The attached solution, is it a right way to do the toggle?

Also, can the Sopimport`s Layer Save Path be written to disk without downstream USD ROP?

ikoon
Please, from a "one man, one .hiplc" perspective, what would be an ideal way to toggle Sopimport's Load from disk versus import "live" from sops?

The attached solution, is it a right way to do the toggle?

Seems like a reasonable solution, yes, if you need to keep the option of switching back to the SOP Import available. If there is more than one such switch, I might add a Context Option (https://www.sidefx.com/docs/houdini/ref/contextoptions.html) in order to switch them all at once with a single control.

Also, can the Sopimport`s Layer Save Path be written to disk without downstream USD ROP?

There's no internal save mechanism in the SOP Import—it requires a USD ROP at some point if you want to put the USD to disk. You don't necessarily need to branch it off, though. As long as there is no Layer Break between the SOP Import and the USD ROP at the bottom of the tree, the Crag layer will be saved when that ROP cooks. That said, I'd probably leave the ROPs as they are but put a Layer Break right below the Switch so as to avoid re-saving that data unnecessarily.

Hello Bryan, thank you so much for explanation! I did not even know about such use of Context Option, neat!