AWS Thinkbox Discussion Forums

Custom Sanity check idea - AWS

Hi Guys,

We’re just got setup with AWS and are testing for overflow, and we have come against an issue that a custom sanity check at submission (3dsmax, Vray) would help prevent.

So it seems that if you have a project drive W:\ and a texture drive T:, the AWS machines seem to be able to only have one mapped drive recreated in the cloud to use, so for now we’re making sure all assets for the render to work on the same drive, BUT - we will forget, and i a rush it would be a right pain. Whether this can be changed or fixed is a side issue - but I’d love to here from someone if they can replicate all mapped drives and put the assets in the cloud in the matching places.

So a custom sanity check would be to check for any assets that are not on a specific single drive letter, ie W:. It doesnt have to tell you the file names, or the number of files though that would be great, but it means the artist submitting the job will at least get a warning to check themselves before spending money and it be missing asssets, or error in Deadline.

Sounds like it would be possible, but I have no idea!!

Hi,

You can have multiple drives mapped to the AWS. Not sure if there is even a limit to the number you can map.

If you go to Deadline Monitor - Tools - Asset Server Settings (while in Super User Mode and with no AWS Infrastructure started)

You will see the “Root Directories”

This is where you enter the drives/paths that the AWS Asset Server link will search and map/copy assets to the S3 bucket.

We have several directories it links to that are spread on different file servers.

We list both the UNC path and the mapped letter drive in the root directory list. We are a Windows environment
ie. first entry is:
\serverName1\PROJECTS
Second entry is the mapped letter drive for that PROJECTS folder that we have on all workstations:
X:/
(the slashes are important)
Then:
\serverName2\TEXTURE_LIBRARY
Z:/
etc

Deadline seems to behave with UNC paths better so we make sure we connect to the repository via its UNC path and not the mapped drive.

Richard

But I also agree with your idea for the sanity check.

Artists have a tendency (bad habit) to download textures etc and keep them on their desktop/local drives which are not seen/listed in the Asset Server Settings root directories and therefore would not get copied. So if that happens or they use assets stored on a drive that is not listed in the Asset Server Root Directories, it would be good if when submitting, Deadline could cross reference the file paths with the root directory list and warn of any issues. I guess this should only be necessary if AWS Assets Pre Cache is checked, as you do not need to do this when you just intend to render within your local network.

Richard

Hi Richard, thanks for replying.

Re the sanity check, yes its a bad habbit! I wonder if a basic check could be for any assets being loaded in from a local drive, that would stop that issue as if the job is going into Deadline, its more than likely to be done on another machine and therefore will error.

A second check, that studios could customise, could be for specific mapped network drive letters, in our case L:.

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