Hello Again.
We been using Deadline 5 for sometime with Max with no problem, but we are getting errors with Maya.
Unable to locate valid MAYA_APP_DIR. Please specify a writable directory where Maya can store user data.
The jobs are set to write to a shared directory on a NAS but we are still getting these errors.
Thanks before hand.
Bin
Can you post a full error report from a job that produces this error? You can find the reports by right-clicking on the job in the Monitor and selecting Job Reports -> View Error Reports. That should help put the error in better context.
Thanks!
Sorry, for not posting this earlier.
Exception during render: An error occurred in RenderTasks(): Dialog popup detected: Title “Error”, Message “Unable to locate valid MAYA_APP_DIR. Please specify a writable directory where Maya can store user data.”
at Deadline.Plugins.ScriptPlugin.RenderTasks(Int32 startFrame, Int32 endFrame, String& outMessage)
0: Task timeout is disabled.
0: Loaded job: test3 (999_050_999_68867055)
0: INFO: StartJob: initializing script plugin MayaCmd
0: INFO: Any stdout that matches the regular expression “FLEXlm error: ." will be handled as appropriate
0: INFO: Any stdout that matches the regular expression "Usage: Render .” will be handled as appropriate
0: INFO: Any stdout that matches the regular expression “Finished Rendering..([0-9]+).[^.]+" will be handled as appropriate
0: INFO: Any stdout that matches the regular expression “.Finished Rendering.” will be handled as appropriate
0: INFO: Any stdout that matches the regular expression “Constructing shading groups|Rendering current frame” will be handled as appropriate
0: INFO: Any stdout that matches the regular expression “.Error: .|.Warning: .” will be handled as appropriate
0: INFO: Any stdout that matches the regular expression “progr: +([0-9]+.[0-9]+)% +rendered” will be handled as appropriate
0: INFO: Any stdout that matches the regular expression “progr: +([0-9]+.[0-9]+)% +computing final gather points” will be handled as appropriate
0: INFO: Any stdout that matches the regular expression "progr: writing image file . (frame ([0-9]+))” will be handled as appropriate
0: INFO: Any stdout that matches the regular expression “progr: +rendering finished” will be handled as appropriate
0: INFO: Any stdout that matches the regular expression “[PROGRESS] Completed frame*” will be handled as appropriate
0: INFO: Any stdout that matches the regular expression “.[PROGRESS] TURTLE rendering frame 100.00.” will be handled as appropriate
0: INFO: Any stdout that matches the regular expression “.Render complete.” will be handled as appropriate
0: INFO: Any stdout that matches the regular expression “[PROGRESS] Percentage of rendering done: (.)" will be handled as appropriate
0: INFO: Any stdout that matches the regular expression ".[PROGRESS] TURTLE rendering frame ([0-9]+.[0-9]+)." will be handled as appropriate
0: INFO: Any stdout that matches the regular expression “.RIMG : +([0-9]+)%" will be handled as appropriate
0: INFO: Any stdout that matches the regular expression "V-Ray: Building light cache” will be handled as appropriate
0: INFO: Any stdout that matches the regular expression "V-Ray: Prepass ([0-9]+) of ([0-9]+)” will be handled as appropriate
0: INFO: Any stdout that matches the regular expression “V-Ray: Rendering image*” will be handled as appropriate
0: INFO: Any stdout that matches the regular expression “V-Ray: +([0-9]+)%” will be handled as appropriate
0: INFO: Any stdout that matches the regular expression “V-Ray: +([0-9]+) %” will be handled as appropriate
0: INFO: Any stdout that matches the regular expression “([0-9]+) % completed” will be handled as appropriate
0: INFO: Any stdout that matches the regular expression “V-Ray: Updating frame at time ([0-9]+)” will be handled as appropriate
0: INFO: Any stdout that matches the regular expression “V-Ray: Render complete” will be handled as appropriate
0: INFO: Any stdout that matches the regular expression “[PROGRESS] ([0-9]+) percent” will be handled as appropriate
0: INFO: Any stdout that matches the regular expression “([0-9]+)%” will be handled as appropriate
0: INFO: Any popup windows with titles matching the regular expression “.entry point.” will be ignored
0: INFO: Any popup windows with titles matching the regular expression “.Entry Point.” will be ignored
0: INFO: Any popup windows with titles matching the regular expression “.Render history settings.” will be ignored
0: INFO: About: Maya Cmd Plugin for Deadline
0: Plugin rendering frame(s): 9
0: INFO: Stdout Handling Enabled: True
0: INFO: Popup Handling Enabled: True
0: INFO: Using Process Tree: True
0: INFO: Hiding DOS Window: True
0: INFO: Creating New Console: False
0: INFO: Not enforcing a build of Maya
0: INFO: Render Executable: “C:\Program Files\Autodesk\Maya2012\bin\Render.exe”
0: INFO: Rendering to local drive, will copy files and folders to final location after render is complete
0: INFO: Rendering with Maya version 2012.0
0: INFO: Rendering all layers - using the renderer(s) set in the Maya render settings.
0: INFO: Render Argument: -r file -s 9 -e 9 -b 1 -rd “C:\Windows\system32\config\systemprofile\AppData\Local\Thinkbox\Deadline\slave\jobsData\mayaOutput_tempow3dr0” -proj share directory \XXXXXXXXX\XXXXXXXXX" “C:\Windows\system32\config\systemprofile\AppData\Local\Thinkbox\Deadline\slave\jobsData\testing2012.mb”
0: INFO: Startup Directory: “C:\Program Files\Autodesk\Maya2012\bin”
0: INFO: Process Priority: BelowNormal
0: INFO: Process is now running
0: STDOUT: Starting “C:\Program Files\Autodesk\Maya2012\bin\mayabatch.exe”
0: WARNING: Detected popup dialog “Error”.
0: WARNING: ---- dump of dialog ----
0: WARNING: Button: OK
0: WARNING: Button: Cancel
0: WARNING: Static:
0: WARNING: Static: Unable to locate valid MAYA_APP_DIR. Please specify a writable directory where Maya can store user data.
0: WARNING: ---- end dump of dialog ----
RenderPluginException
at Deadline.Plugins.Plugin.RenderTask(Int32 startFrame, Int32 endFrame)
at Deadline.Slaves.SlaveRenderThread.RenderCurrentTask(TaskLogWriter tlw)
Thanks! It looks like you’re running the slave as the local system user, and Maya doesn’t like this because it can’t store user data under this account. Can you try running Deadline as the non-system user to see if that helps?
Cheers,
Thanks Russel I will tried that, but just so I understand correctly, you mean :
just creating another, non admin login for all the slave machines; running the slaves on that instead.
Thanks again.
Bin
Exactly! I would test it on one machine first though to make sure it helps before doing it across all machines. 
Cheers,
Thanks for your help Russel.
I can’t get the Deadline client to run from a non admin user. Do I have to un-install the client and install again in the new user?
Update:
Still haven’t gotten the Client to run on a non-admin account and also having trouble mounting the directory now as well.
These farm clients are win 7 64.
The repository in on an open internal share.
The new, non-admin users are now asking for login and passwords to this open share.
The old admin user connected to the share without login or password credentials.
Thanks again
Bin
What OS is the share on? I think you need to configure the server to allow anonymous connections, or to not require a password.
Ryan thanks for your post.
It is a ReadyNAS and the share needs no password. Other machines are connecting to it without issue. The admin accounts on this render farm also connect to it without issue, but the non-admin user that I’ve created does not.
Is is possible to change the admin account to work with Maya?. Wish that it was as simple as just running the executable in question as admin.
Thanks
Update:
Just went ahead and created another user and that one connects to the share ok. I will let you know how Deadline is working under that user.
Update:
Deadline is now working on the test non-admin user. Will just have to manually disable the services for deadline on all the machines in the farm and activate them on the non-admin user.
Thanks again.
Bin