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This is the documentation for an older version of Qube. The latest version of the documentation can be found here: Qube

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Below are instructions on your first steps submitting Maya jobs with Qube!

 

Step 1 (First Time Only)

You will need to install the Maya jobtype

Installation:

Maya requires the "Maya jobtype" to be installed 

If you are not familiar with the installation process please see  Installation Guide & Installation Layout

You will need to select "Maya Jobtype" during the installation process 

Alternatively:

If you only wish to use the "batch maya jobs" you can install the InApp plugins via the Qube! WranglerView.

File > Install App UI > Install Maya App UI

Step 2

Once installed you should be able to locate the "Qube!" menu in Maya

InApp Location: 

File menu > Qube! 

Step 3

With a scene loaded in Maya choose "Submit Render Job..." or "Submit Batch Render..." depending on your requirements

This will present a pre filled submission UI


Step 4

Ensure sections marked in red have the correct details

Click submit

For further details on the submission UI look in the right panel

Troubleshooting

If you find you are getting errors here are some useful links for troubleshooting

Troubleshooting Flowcharts 


Below Is an expandable view of the "Maya Job..." Jobtype Submission UI

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Not all sections need to be filled in in order to render only the fields marked in red are required


Please click on the text below the section of interest

 

 Qube Job Basics

Name

Tooltip - Name of the job

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

Priority

Tooltip - Numeric priority (

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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

Tooltip -

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Instances are the amount of times you would like to spawn a session of your application

Example:

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 simultaneously consuming all slots/cores

if you set

"Instances" to 1

"Reservations" to "host.processors=1+"

Qube will open 1 session of Maya on the worker consuming all slots/cores ("host.processors=1+" is used for all slots/cores)

more on Instances & Reservations

 Qube Frame Range

Range

Tooltip - Frame range for the job (e.g 1-100, or 1-100x3, or 1,3,7,10)

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Most jobs require a frame range in which to execute on the worker's 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 the range 1 to 100 in chunks of 3

"1,3,7,10" will only render the selected frames 1,3,7,10

rangeOrdering

Tooltip - Order to render the items. (Ascending=1,2,3,4,5...,Descending=10,9,8...,Binary=first,middle,last...)

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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" Explanation needed

 Preview Frames Submission

Use Preview Frames

Tooltip - Submit high-priority preview frames for this job

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Enabling preview frames will create 2 jobs:

A primary dependent job with a higher priority that will render the selected frames first

and a secondary job with lower priority that will render the remaining frames

This will return the selected frames faster so that you can troubleshoot your renders

Frame Numbers

Tooltip - Preview frames list for the job. Leave blank to use default (1st, last, middle) frames (e.g 1,2,10)

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Choose the frames that you wish to render first.

If left blank "Default" is selected which renders the first frame , the last frame and the middle frame in that order.

You can select the frames by adding comma separated frame numbers e.g 1,2,10,15,75

Preview Priority

Tooltip - Preview Frame Priority

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Choose the priority for the primary job.

Preview Subjobs

Tooltip - Number of subjobs to use for the preview frames

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Choose the instances/subjobs for the primary job.

 Render App Auto-Threads & Uses the Entire Worker

New in 6.4-4

For applications that do not support setting the number of threads, this section is not visible.

 
Render on all cores
Tooltip - 
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Min Free Slots
Tooltip -
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 Render App Uses a Specific Number of Threads

Slots = Threads

Tooltip -

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Specific Thread Count

Tooltip -

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 Scene and Directories

Scenefile

Tooltip - Path to Maya scene (required)

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

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

Project dir

Tooltip - Path to Maya project directory

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Browse or enter manually the location of the project directory

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

 Cameras/Layers/Lights

Cameras

Tooltip - List of cameras to render (space-separated)

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Choose from pre polutated and or enter manually cameras to override scene settings

Layers

Tooltip - List of layers to render (space-separated)

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Choose from pre polutated and or enter manually layers to override scene settings

EnableDefaultLight

Tooltip - Enable Default Light

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Choose from drop down to override scene settings


 Renderer

Renderer

Tooltip - Renderer Override

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Choose from drop down to override scene settings

Render Threads

Tooltip - each subjob should use. Set to -1 to sync with host.processors, 0 to use all cores on the worker

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Enter the numeric value to override scene settings

Further explaination needed

Ignore Errors

Tooltip - Ignore Render-time Errors: ignore error messages that are generated during render-time that would otherwise cause frame failure

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Tick box to enable ignore errors

Distributed Rendering

Tooltip - Enable Distributed Rendering (mental ray satellite OR V-Ray DR)

Maya Executable

Tooltip - Specify path to the maya executable file (mayabatch.exe for Windows), if you want to override the auto-detected default. (optional)

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Browse or enter manually the location of Maya executable on the workers

Important : Always double check the location of the workers executable being aware that if you are submitting cross platform the path will be different.


 Image File Output

Render dir

Tooltip - Path to Maya output render directory

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Browse or manually enter the location of the output image file you wish to generate

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

File Name Prefix

Tooltip - Image file name prefix override

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Explaination needed

Frame/Anim Ext

Tooltip -

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Choose from drop down to override scene settings

Frame Padding

Tooltip - Number of digits for frame number, e.g. 4 means name.XXXX.ext

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Enter the numeric value to override scene settings

Renumber StartFrame

Tooltip - The starting output image filename extension value.

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Enter the numeric value to override scene settings

Renumber ByFrame

Tooltip - The output image filename extension step ('by' or increment) value

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Enter the numeric value to override scene settings

File Extension

Tooltip - File extension name override. The string added at the end of the file name

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Enter the file extension value to override scene settings


 Image Size

Image Width (pixels)

Tooltip - Image width

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Enter the numeric value to override scene settings

Image Height (pixels)

Tooltip - Image height

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Enter the numeric value to override scene settings

Maintain Aspect Ratio

Tooltip - Maintain Aspect ratio

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Select required option from drop down

Maintain Ratio

Tooltip - Maintain ratio

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Select required option from drop down

Pixels/Inch

Tooltip - Resolution (Pixels/Inch)

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Enter the numeric value to override scene settings

Device Aspect Ratio

Tooltip - Device Aspect Ratio

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Enter the numeric value to override scene settings

Pixel Aspect Ratio

Tooltip - Pixel Aspect Ratio

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Enter the numeric value to override scene settings


 Mel Scripts

preRenderMel

Tooltip - The mel string to be executed before a scene is rendered

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Enter the script string

postRenderMel

Tooltip - The mel string to be executed after a scene is rendered

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Enter the script string

preRenderLayerMel

Tooltip - The mel string to be executed before a render layer is rendered

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Enter the script string

postRenderLayerMel

Tooltip - The mel string to be executed after a render layer is rendered

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Enter the script string

preRenderFrameMel

Tooltip - The mel string to be executed before a frame is rendered

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Enter the script string

postRenderFrameMel

Tooltip - The mel string to be executed after a frame is rendered

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Enter the script string

 Qube Job Tags

Qube Job Tags

New in Qube 6.5

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see page Job Tags

 Qube Worker Selection

Hosts

Tooltip - Explicit list of Worker hostnames to run the job on (comma-separated)

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Click browse to choose from a list of workers that you want to run the job on

Groups

Tooltip - Explicit list of Worker groups to run the job on (comma-separated)

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Click browse to choose from a list of groups that you want to run the job on

Omit Hosts

Tooltip - Explicit list of Worker hostnames to NOT run the job on (comma-separated)

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Click browse to choose from a list of workers that you do NOT want to run the job on  

Omit Groups

Tooltip - Explicit list of Worker groups to NOT run the job on (comma-separated)

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Click browse to choose from a list of groups that you NOT want to run the job on

Priority Cluster

Tooltip - Worker cluster that the job has elevated priority to run on

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Click browse to choose from a list of Priority Clusters

 

Clusters are a way of distributing jobs across the farm with the ability to expand and shrink based on the submitted priority cluster

Example:

  • A job submitted to /root/ will run on all machines with /root/ assigned as a cluster. 

    • At a standard priority


  • A job submitted to /root/a will run on all machines with /root/a assigned as a cluster

    • At a higher priority than /root/ meaning that the job will pre-empt a job with the priority cluster

Host Order

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

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Click browse to choose from a list of Host Order Options

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

Tooltip - Worker requirements needed to be met for job to run on that Worker (comma-separated, expression-based)

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Click browse to choose from a list of Host Order Options

Requirements is a way to tell the workers that this job needs specific requirements to be met in order to run

drop-down menu items:

  • "winnt" this will fill the field with "host.os=winnt" which means only run on Windows based workers

  • "linux" this will fill the field with "host.os=linux" which means only run on Linux based workers

  • "osx" this will fill the field with "host.os=osx" which means only run on OSX based workers

The above is not the limit of what "Requirements" can do see a list below of other alterable variants:

  • "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

Reservations

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

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Click browse to choose from a list of Reservation Options

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

The above is not the limit of what "Reservations" can do see a list below of other alterable variants:


Restrictions

Tooltip - Restrict job to run only on specified clusters ("||"-separated) [+ means all below, * means at that level]

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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

Example:

  • submit a job that will run only in /farm:

    "qbsub -cluster /root -restriction /root"


  • submit a job that will prefer to run in /farm/nuke, but could run in any host in /farm or in the first level below /farm

    "qbsub -cluster /root/a -restriction '/root or /root/*'"


  • submit a job that will prefer to run in /farm/nuke/workstations, but could run in any host at any level at /farm or below

    "qbsub -cluster /root/a/workstations -restriction '/root or /root/+' hostname"

See Also

 Qube Advanced Job Control

Flags

Tooltip - List of submission flag strings (comma separated)

 

Click browse to choose required job flags

Flag

Decimal Value

Hex Value

Description

auto_mount

80x8

Require automatic drive mounts on worker.

auto_wrangling

163840x4000

Enable auto-wrangling for this job.

convert_path1310720x20000Automatically convert paths on worker at runtime. New in 6.4-2

disable_auto_complete

81920x2000

Normally subjobs are automatically completed by the system when a job runs out of available agenda items. Setting this flag disables that.

disable_cpu_limit

40960x1000

Normally, if a job is submitted with the number of subjobs greater than there are agenda items, Qube automatically shrinks the number of subjobs to be equal to the number of agenda items. Setting this flag disables that.

disable_windows_job_object

20480x800

Disable Windows' process management mechanism called the "Job Object" that Qube normally uses to manage job processes-- some applications already use it internally, and job objects don't nest within another well, causing jobs to crash unexpectedly.

elite

5120x200

Submit job as an elite job, which will be started immediately regardless of how busy the farm is. Elite jobs are also protected from preemption. Must be admin.

export_environment

160x10

Use environment variables set in the submission environment, when running the job on the workers.

expand

32-x20

Automatically expand job to use as many subjobs as there are agenda items (limited by the total job slots in the farm).

grid

40x4

Make all subjobs start at once (useful for implementation of parallel jobs, such as satellite renders).

host_list

2560x100

Run job on all candidate hosts, as filtered by other options (such as "hosts" or "groups").

mail

10240x400

Send e-mail when job is done.

migrate_on_frame_retry

655360x10000

When an agenda item (frame) fails but is retried automatically because the retrywork option is set, setting this flag causes the subjob to be migrated to another worker host, preventing the frame from running on the same host.

p_agenda

327680x8000

Enable p-agenda for this job, so that some frames are processed at a higher priority.

uninterruptible

10x1

Prevent job from being preempted.

 

Dependency

Tooltip - Wait for specified jobs to complete before starting this job (comma-separated)

Click Add to create dependant jobs

you can link jobs states to each other by several factors

"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 job has been killed

"done" means start this job if the job is killed/failed/complete


Email (job complete)

Tooltip - Send email on job completion (success or failure)

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Sends mail to the designated user based on the status of the job being complete

Email (failed frames)

Tooltip - Send email on job completion (success or failure)

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Sends mail to the designated user based on the status of the job being failed

Blocked

Tooltip - Set initial state of job to "blocked"

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Enable this tickbox to ensure after submission this job is in a blocked state

Stderr->Stdout

Tooltip - Redirect and consolidate the job stderr stream to the stdout stream

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Enable this if you would like to combine you logs

Job Label

Tooltip - Optional label to identify the job. Must be a unique within a Job Process Group (pgrp).

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Legacy method of labelling jobs see Job Tags

Job Kind

Tooltip - Arbitrary typing information that can be used to identify the job. Common usage: it can be used to restrict only 1 of this "kind" of job from running on a worker at the same time by setting the job\'s requirements to include "not (job.kind in host.duty.kind)"

Process Group

Tooltip - Job Process Group (pgrp) for logically organizing dependent jobs. Defaults to the jobid. Combination of "label" and "Process Group" (pgrp) must be unique for a job.

Retry Frame/Instance

Tooltip - Number of times to retry a failed frame/job instance. Value of -1 means use the default for the studio.

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Set this to retry any failed frames or instances automatically

Retry Work Delay

Tooltip - Number of seconds to wait before automatically retrying a failed frame/work.

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Set this to create a delay in second between the frame/instance retries

Subjob Timeout

Tooltip - Kill the subjob process if running for the specified time (in seconds).  Value of -1 means disabled.

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Use this if the acceptable instance/subjob spawn time is known.

Frame Timeout

Tooltip - Kill the agenda/frame if running for the specified time (in seconds).  Value of -1 means disabled.

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Use this if the acceptable frame time is known.

 Qube Job Environment

Cwd

Tooltip - Current Working Directory to use when running the job

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Explanation needed

Environment Variables

Tooltip - Environment variables override when running a job

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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

Tooltip - Submit a job as a specific user. Default is current user. Format <optionladomain>\<username> (advanced --requires impersonate user permissions)

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You can specify which user you would like to submit the job as

This is useful for troubleshooting a job that may fail sent from a specific user

Example:

Setting "qube\josh" would attempt to submit the job with the domain "qube" and the user "josh"

Note: "impersonate user" permissions need to be set on the user submitting this job

 Qube Actions

GenerateMovie

Tooltip - Add linked job to generate movie from output images

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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

 Qube Notes

Account

Tooltip - Arbitrary accounting or project data (user-specified)

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This can be used for creating tags for your job

The created tags can be searched in the "Performance Charts" Tab

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

Tooltip - Freeform text for making notes on this job

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Add text about the job for future reference. Viewable in the Qube UI

 

 

 

 

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