UE5 Deadline Job Submission Error - Mapped Drives Token Replacement Issue

Deadline
1

I’m using Unreal Engine 5.3.2 and aiming to perform remote rendering using the Movie Render Queue.

The plan is to execute this on-premises, without utilizing any cloud services.
I have three PCs in total: a main workstation and two rendering PCs. All run on Windows 10 and are connected via a local network.

I’ve already completed the installation of Deadline. In the Deadline Monitor, I’ve configured the following settings:

  • Mapped Paths > Global Rules

    • Path To Replace: UnrealEnginePath
    • Windows Path: ${env:UNREAL_ENGINE_PATH}

  • Mapped Drives

    • Drive: U: \${job:user}\Projects

In Mapped Paths, the Unreal Engine installation path is specified using an environment variable.
Mapped Drives mount the drives on the working PCs based on the user name.
Each PC has a unique user name for access.

The Deadline Job Preset is configured as follows:

  • Executable: UnrealEnginePath\UE_5.3\Engine\Binaries\Win64\UnrealEditor-Cmd.exe
  • ProjectFile: U:\DeadLineTest\DeadLineTest.uproject

When I submit the job with these settings, I encounter the following error:
Scheduler Thread - Error mapping U: to \${job:user}\Projects: The network name cannot be found

From the error, it seems that the ${job:user} token is not being replaced with the user name. Is it not possible to use tokens in Mapped Drives?

2

Hello @bflat

I think the tokens do not work at with drive mappings. I will try to reproduce the issue and report back here.

Also the path output from token does not seem to be a UNC path which is required for Mapped Drives.

3

Hello, zainali

Thank you for your prompt response.

I appreciate the information about the Token not functioning with Mapped Drives.

Regarding the UNC path error in my initial question, it seems that the backslash \ disappeared, possibly due to Markdown formatting.
While it would be ideal to mount network drives as the U drive, it appears to be challenging.

The reason for wanting to use Mapped Drives is that in UE5, it’s not possible to open project files with UNC paths.
For instance, if the project file is located at
\\pc1\Projects\DeadLineTest\DeadLineTest.uproject
attempting to open the project results in the error
Failed to open descriptor file pc1\Projects\DeadLineTest\DeadLineTest.uproject

Since tokens cannot be used, are there alternative methods to achieve network rendering without UNC paths in this scenario?

Thank you very much.