1. Qube
2. Submitting a Maya Job

Submitting a Maya Job

Name
This is the name of the job of the job so it can be easily identified in the Qube! UI.

Priority
Every job in Qube is assigned a numeric priority. Priority 1 is higher than priority 100. This is similar to 1st place, 2nd place, 3rd place, etc. The default priority assigned to a job is 9999.

Instances
This is the number of copies of the application that will run at the same time across the network. The combination of "Instances=1" and "Max Instances=-1" means that this job will take as much of the farm as it can, and all jobs will share evenly across the farm.

Examples:

On a 12 slot(core) machine running Maya if you set
"Instances" to 4
"Reservations" to "host.processors=3"
Qube! will open 4 sessions of Maya on the Worker(s) simultaneously, which may consume all slots/cores on a given Worker.

if you set
"Instances" to 1
"Reservations" to "host.processors=1+"
Qube will open 1 session of Maya on a Worker, consuming all slots/cores ("host.processors=1+" is used for all slots/cores).

Max Instances
If resources are available, Qube! will spawn more than 'Instances' copies of the application, but no more than 'Max Instances'. The default of -1 means there is no maximum. If this is set to 0, then it won't spawn more than 'Instances' copies.

More on Instances & Reservations & SmartShare Studio Defaults

Range  

Frame range for the job (e.g 1-100, or 1-100x3, or 1,3,7,10). Most jobs require a frame range to execute on the Workers. You can set this range in a few different ways :

• "1-100" will just render the range between 1 and 100
• "1-100x3" will render every 3rd frame in the range 1 to 100; 1, 4, 7, ..., 94, 97, 100
• "1,3,7,10" will only render the selected frames 1,3,7,10

rangeOrdering
Order to render the items. (Ascending=1,2,3,4,5...,Descending=10,9,8...,Binary=first,middle,last...) You can set the order in which your frames are rendered. The drop down options are:

• "Ascending" - this will render the frames counting upwards from your start frame
• "Decending" - this will render the frames counting backwards from your end frame
• "Binary" - This will render the first, last, and middle frames of the range, then the middle frame of the first half and the middle frame of the second half, and so on. This is useful for sampling the frames in the sequence to make sure it is rendering correctly.

Use Preview Frames  

Enabling preview frames will create 2 jobs:

• A primary dependent job with a higher priority that will render the selected frames first 
• A secondary job with lower priority that will render the remaining frames. This will return the selected frames faster so that you can check the accuracy of your renders.

Frame Numbers

Choose the frames that you wish to render first. If left blank the default is to render the first frame, the last frame and the middle frame in that order. You can select specific frames by adding comma separated frame numbers e.g 1,2,10,15,75, or a range with, e.g., 1-100x5 (1 to 100, every 5th frame)

Preview Priority

Choose the priority for the preview job. This can be set by the site admin.

Preview Subjobs

Choose the number of instances / subjobs for the preview frames. By default, this is equal to the number of preview frames - that is, it will try to do all the preview frames at the same time.

Note that when you submit a job with preview frames enabled, it will actually submit 2 jobs—one with the preview frames list at a higher priority, and another with the rest of the agenda, at the normal priority (as specified in the job's Priority field). You will get, consequently, 2 job IDs for the submission.

New in 6.4-4
For applications/renderers that do not support using all cores while rendering (or changing that behavior, eg AfterEffects or 3dsMax), this section is not visible.

Render on all Cores
Checking this box means that once this job is assigned to a machine, no more jobs or instances will be assigned to the same machine until this job is complete. You might choose this if your know your render job is very memory intensive and shouldn't run alongside other jobs.

Min Free Slots
This is the number of slots that must be available on a worker in order for the worker to accept the job. For example, if you choose '1', a worker with 7 out of 8 cores already in use will still accept this job. However, if you were to choose '2', the same machine under the same circumstances would not accept the job. 

New in 6.4-4
For applications/renderers that do not support setting a specific number of threads, this section is not visible.

Slots = Threads
If this box is checked, it tells Qube and the application (eg, Maya) to use the specific number of threads listed in the "Specific Thread Count" field. If this is not checked, then the "Specific Thread Count" value is passed only to the application, but Qube is unaware of the number of cores/slots it should reserve. In most cases, you will want to check this box, unless you have Designer licenses, in which case you would only set the numeric value.

Specific Thread Count
This tells the renderer to use a specific number of threads for rendering. The default is one thread, which for any modern renderer will underperform, and when combined with the slots=threads, will swamp most workers by running as many instances as there are slots (eg, a 24 core machine would run 24 instances of the application/renderer). A better value is 8 (assuming you have 8 cores, as most modern machines do) which means that each instance of the job will use 8 threads to render, and, when combined with slots=threads, will reserve 8 slots while doing so.

Scenefile
Path to Maya scene (required). Browse for or enter manually the location of the scene file to be rendered. This is a required field for submission.

Important: Best practice is to ensure the scene file and all of its dependent files such as textures are on network storage accessible by the workers.

Project dir
Path to Maya project directory. If you are submitting from Maya, this will be filled in for you. Otherwise, browse for or enter manually the location of the project directory.

Important: Best practice is to ensure the project directory and all of its dependent files such as textures are on network storage accessible by the workers.

Cameras
List of cameras to use for render (space-separated). Choose from pre-populated list and or enter manually cameras to override scene settings.

Layers
List of layers to render (space-separated). Choose from pre populated and or enter manually layers to override scene settings.

EnableDefaultLight
Choose from drop down to override scene settings.

Renderer
Choose from drop down to override scene settings 

Render Threads
Number of threads each subjob should use. This is set for you if you set the Specific Thread Count above. Set to -1 to use the value of host.processors instead, 0 to use all cores on the Worker (if the renderer supports that).  

Ignore Errors
Tick the box to ignore errors. This ignores error messages that are generated during the render that would otherwise cause frames to fail. 

Distributed Rendering
Enable Distributed Rendering (mental ray satellite OR V-Ray DR). Choose from the drop down to override scene settings. See also Distributed Renders with mental ray or V-Ray

Maya Executable
Browse for or specify the path to the maya executable file (mayabatch.exe for Windows), if you want to override the auto-detected default. In normal circumstances, this field should be left blank.

Important : Be aware that if you are submitting from one OS to another, the path to the executable will be different. Qube! will handle that if you leave this field blank.

Render dir
Path to Maya output render directory. Browse to or manually enter the location of the output image file you wish to generate. You should never have to set this manually.

Important: Best practice is to ensure outputs are written to network storage accessible by the workers.

File Name Prefix
Image file name prefix overrides the Maya scene settings, eg in name.#.ext, name would be changed.

Frame/Anim Ext
Choose from drop down to override the Maya scene settings, and position the frame numbers in the output file name.

Frame Padding
Number of digits for frame number, e.g. using 4 would produce name.0001.ext.

Renumber StartFrame
The starting output image filename extension value. Enter the numeric value to override the Maya scene settings.

Renumber ByFrame
The output image filename extension step ('by' or increment) value. Enter the numeric value to override the Maya scene settings.

File Extension
The string added at the end of the file name. Enter the file extension value to override scene settings.

Image Width (pixels)
Image width. Enter the numeric value to override scene settings

Image Height (pixels)
Image height. Enter the numeric value to override scene settings

Maintain Aspect Ratio
Maintain Aspect ratio. Select required option from drop down

Maintain Ratio
Maintain ratio. Select required option from drop down

Pixels/Inch
Resolution (Pixels/Inch). Enter the numeric value to override scene settings

Device Aspect Ratio
Device Aspect Ratio. Enter the numeric value to override scene settings

Pixel Aspect Ratio
Pixel Aspect Ratio. Enter the numeric value to override scene settings

preRenderMel
The mel string to be executed before a scene is rendered. Enter the script string.

postRenderMel
The mel string to be executed after a scene is rendered. Enter the script string.

preRenderLayerMel
The mel string to be executed before a render layer is rendered. Enter the script string.

postRenderLayerMel
The mel string to be executed after a render layer is rendered. Enter the script string.

preRenderFrameMel
The mel string to be executed before a frame is rendered. Enter the script string.

postRenderFrameMel
The mel string to be executed after a frame is rendered. Enter the script string.

Qube Job Tags
New in Qube 6.5

Note: The Job Tags section of the submission UI will not be visible unless they are turned on in the Preferences in the Wrangler View UI. Job Tags are explained in detail on the Job Tags page.

Hosts

Explicit list of Worker hostnames that will be allowed to run the job (comma-separated).

Groups

Explicit list of Worker groups that will be allowed to run the job (comma-separated). Groups identify machines through some attribute they have, eg, a GPU, an amount of memory, a license to run a particular application, etc. Jobs cannot migrate from one group to another. See worker_groups.

Omit Hosts

Explicit list of Worker hostnames that are not allowed run the job (comma-separated).

Omit Groups

Explicit list of Worker groups that are not allowed to run the job (comma-separated).

Priority Cluster

Clusters are non-overlapping sets of machines. Your job will run at the given priority in the given cluster. If that cluster is full, the job can run in a different cluster, but at lower priority. Clustering

Example: A job submitted to /showB/lighting will run with its given priority in /showB/lighting cluster. If /showB/lighting is full, that job can run in /showB/FX, but at a lower priority. If both /showB/lighting and /showB/FX are full, the job can run in /showA/* at an even lower priority.

Host Order

Order to select Workers for running the job (comma-separated) [+ means ascending, - means descending].

Host Order is a way of telling the job how to select/order workers "+host.processors.avail" means prefer workers which have more slots available "+host.memory.avail" means prefer workers which have more memory available "+host.memory.total" means prefer workers which have more total memory "+host.processor_speed" means prefer workers with higher cpu speeds "+host.cpus" means prefer workers with higher total cpu slots

Requirements

Worker properties needed to be met for job to run on that Worker (comma-separated, expression-based). Click 'Browse' to choose from a list of Host Order Options.

Requirements is a way to tell the workers that this job needs specific properties to be present in order to run. The drop-down menu allows a choice of OS: "winnt" will fill the field with "host.os=winnt" which means only run on Windows based workers "linux" will fill the field with "host.os=linux" which means only run on Linux based workers "osx" will fill the field with "host.os=osx" which means only run on OSX based workers You can also add any other Worker properties via plain text. Some examples:  "host.processors.avail.=4" means only run this job on workers that have 4 or more slots available "host.processors.used=0" means only run this job on workers with 0 slots in use "host.memory.avail=400" means only run this job on workers that have 400 memory available With integer values, you can use any numerical relationships, e.g. =, <, >, <=, >=. This won't work for string values or floating point values. Multiple requirements can also be combined with AND and OR (the symbols && and || will also work). The 'Only 1 of a "kind" of job' checkbox will restrict a Worker to running only one instance with a matching "kind" field (see below). The prime example is After Effects, which will only allow a single instance of AE on a machine. Using this checkbox and the "Kind" field, you can restrict a Worker to only one running copy of After Effects, while still leaving the Worker's other slots available for other "kinds" of jobs.

Reservations

Worker resources to reserve when running job (comma-separated, expression-based).  

Reservations is a way to tell the workers that this job will reserve the specific resources for this job. Menu items: "host.processors" this will fill the field with "host.processors=X" which means reserve X slots on the worker while running this job "host.memory" this will fill the field with "host.memory=X" which means only reserve X memory on the worker while running this job Other options: "host.license.nuke=1" when a Global Resources entry has been made you can reserve any arbitrary named item. New in 6.6: Once you create a global resource, it will show up in this menu (eg global.vray above). See also Job Reservations

Restrictions

Restrict job to run only on specified clusters ("||"-separated) [+ means all below, * means at that level]. Click 'Browse' to choose from a list of Restrictions Options.

Restrictions is a way to tell the workers that this job can only run on specific clusters. You can choose more than one cluster in the list. Examples: Choosing /showA would restrict the job to machines that are only in the /showA cluster, and no other cluster, not even those below /showA. Choosing /showA/* would restrict the job to the cluster(s) below /showA, but not including /showA Choosing /showA/+ would restrict the job to /showA and all the clusters below it.

See Also

• Controlling Host Selection
• How to use qbwrk.conf
• worker_groups
• worker_cluster
• How to use clustering for workers

Flags

List of submission flag strings (comma separated). Click 'Browse' to choose required job flags.

Dependency

Wait for specified jobs to complete before starting this job (comma-separated). Click 'Add' to create dependent jobs.

You can link jobs to each other in several ways: "complete" means only start this job after designated job completes "failed" means only start this job if the designated job fails "killed" means only start this job if the designated job has been killed "done" means start this job if the designated job is killed/failed/complete The second menu chooses between "job" (the entire set of frames) and "work" (typically a frame). So to link frame 1 of one job to frame 1 of a second, job, you would choose "work" in this menu. If you want to wait for all the frames of one job to complete before starting a second, then choose "job". The other option, "subjob", refers to the instance of a job. This is much less common, but means that, for example, the instance of Maya that was running frames has completed. For a complete description on how to define complex dependencies between jobs or frames, please refer to the Callbacks section of the Developers Guide.

Email (job complete)

Send email on job completion (success or failure). Sends mail to the designated user.

Email (failed frames)

Sends mail to the designated user if frames fail.

Blocked

Set initial state of job to "blocked".

Stderr->Stdout

Redirect and consolidate the job stderr stream to the stdout stream. Enable this if you would like to combine your logs into one stream.

Job Label

Optional label to identify the job. Must be unique within a Job Process Group. This is most useful for submitting sets of dependent jobs, where you don't know in advance the job IDs to depend on, but you do know the labels. 

Job Kind

Arbitrary typing information that can be used to identify the job. It is commonly used to make sure only one of this "kind" of job runs on a worker at the same time by setting the job's requirements to include "not (job.kind in host.duty.kind)". See How to restrict a host to only one instance of a given kind of job, but still allow other jobs

Process Group

Job Process Group for logically organizing dependent jobs. Defaults to the jobid. Combination of "label" and "Process Group" must be unique for a job. See Process group labels

Retry Frame/Instance

Number of times to retry a failed frame/job instance. The default value of -1 means don't retry.

Retry Work Delay

Number of seconds between retries.

Subjob Timeout

Kill the subjob process if running for the specified time (in seconds).  Value of -1 means disabled. Use this if the acceptable instance/subjob spawn time is known.

Frame Timeout

Kill the agenda/frame if running for the specified time (in seconds).  Value of -1 means disabled. Use this if you know how long frames should take, so that you can automatically kill those running long.

Job Pre-flight
Some executable (e.g. a script) that will run on the Worker before the job runs. If the pre-flight fails, the job will not run on this Worker, but will be moved to another. Useful for setting up environments, copying required images, checking the existence of fonts on the Worker, etc.

Job Post-flight
An executable that will run on the Worker after the job has finished on that Worker. If this fails, the instance is failed.

Work Pre-flight
Some executable (e.g. a script) that will run on the Worker before the frame/work runs. If this fails, the frame/work will be marked as failed and rendering will be skipped. If there are retries configured, the frame/work will be treated according to those settings.

Work Post-flight
An executable that will run on the Worker after the frame/work runs. If this fails, the frame/work will be marked as failed, even if the render, itself, was succesful. If there are retries configured, the frame/work will be treated according to those settings.

hh:mm M/D/Y
The job is blocked on the Supervisor until this day and time. Click on "Time and Date" to get a calendar and time UI.

Cwd

Current Working Directory to use when running the job.

Environment Variables

Environment variables override when running a job. You can specify key/value pairs of environment variables

This is useful when you might need different settings for your render applications based on different departments or projects.

Impersonate User

You can specify which user you would like to submit the job as. The default is the current user. The format is simply <username>. This is useful for troubleshooting a job that may fail if sent from a specific user.

Example:
Setting "josh" would attempt to submit the job as the user "josh" regardless of your current user ID.

Note: In order to do this, the submitting user must have "impersonate user" permissions.

GenerateMovie

Select this option to create a secondary job that will wait for the render to complete then combine the output files into a movie.

Note: For this to work correctly the "Qube (ImagesToMovie) Job..." has to be setup to use your studios transcoding application.

Account
Arbitrary accounting or project data (user-specified). This can be used for creating tags for your job.

You can add entries by typing in the drop-down window or select already created accounts from the drop-down.

See also Qube! Job Tags

Notes
Freeform text for making notes on this job. Add text about the job for future reference. Viewable in the Qube UI.