I have been at this for weeks with multiple calls to support.
Example 1:
I use the default houdini submission tool to submit an ifd job (No secondary mantra job, just trying to get ifd’s) on our fileserver to deadline. As anyone who works in houdini knows, a lot of the defaults and a lot of paths are based off the $HIP variable that specifies the folder that the .hip file resides in.
The job instantly fails with:
Error: Caught exception: [’ File “C:/PROGRA~1/SIDEEF~1/HOUDIN~1.376/houdini/python2.7libs\hou.py”, line 54798, in render\n return _hou.RopNode_render(*args, **kwargs)\n’, ‘OperationFailed: The attempted operation failed.\nError: Failed to save output to file “C:/Program Files/Side Effects Software/Houdini 13.0.376/bin/X:\projects/dev/sequences/HOUDINI/TEST/FX/work/houdini/deadlinetest/ifd/test_render.0001.ifd”.\n’]
at Deadline.Plugins.ScriptPlugin.RenderTasks(String taskId, Int32 startFrame, Int32 endFrame, String& outMessage, AbortLevel& abortLevel)
the path to where the ifd file should be looking to be saved is $HIP/ifd/blahblahblah, as you can see deadline has appended the path to the houdini bin folder to the front of what $HIP expands too.
Example 2:
I try to submit the same file only I specify an absolute path for the .ifd
The deadline job writes the ifd’s this time. However insde of the ifd the hipfile is still the incorrect path,
HIP File: C:/Program Files/Side Effects Software/Houdini 13.0.376/bin/X:\projects/dev/sequences/HOUDINI/TEST/FX/work/houdini/deadlinetest/deadlineTest.hip
which the .ifd also used to set the HIP env variable and anywhere that $HIP was used, textures/geo/etc the path had the same issue
this of course results in .ifd’s that will not render correctly if at all.
Example 3:
I place the directory on a local non network mapped drive, either C:\ or even a USB drive E:\ either way both drives are not part of the file server.
I open the scene file that still uses the $HIP variable for ifds/images/textures etc.
I submit using the same submission script
This time the UI brings up a “Local output detected” for the rop that I am submitting and it is able to submit correctly and write the correct ifd’s. The ifd’s it writes have the correct HIP path inside them, and they are able to render correctly with mantra.
Example 4:
Seeing that deadline is having issues with the $HIP variable or more importantly, any file submitted from a network mapped drive, I look to the command line to make sure its not a problem with hython or hbatch. I run hython and open the same scene from the network mapped drive (our filesystem) and run the most basic of basic commands hou.node("/out/test_render").render() which works just fine, creates the correct .ifd’s with the correct variables. I do the same with hbatch/hscript from within the hcmd.exe environment and it also creates the correct ifd’s from the file that is on the server.
Conclusion:
From my standpoint it looks like when deadline goes to use hython it does something to interpret the path of the file or the environment that does not work when the file is on a network mapped drive. I have checked our Drive Mapping and Path Mapping settings. Our installation of deadline is not highly customized, we are just trying to make the out of the box tools work as intended. If there is anything you can think of that would cause the problems I have described, please give me feedback. I have been through the ringer more than once with this, and I understand that your support stays very busy, but currently we cannot use houdini with deadline, the mantra submission works fine, but nothing that uses an hbatch license that is submitted through the houdini submission, from a scene on a network mapped drive, with either the GUI from within houdini or the monitor, works.
Thanks.
-N