[claus]

I tried network rendering some years ago but gave up because I could not make it work. Today I upgraded an old license to get started again and to my horror it still does not work. I've been going through all the documentation and I simply don't understand it. This is what I do:

start Render Node on machine 1
start Node, Monitor and Manager on machine 2
Launch a cooperative render from machine 2, using local folder for output. Everything seems to be running...

but preview fails and final merge fail with this message:

[21/February/2012 13:01:40] ERROR: Temporary files have been saved in the manager temp folder and can be merged manually. Temp folder:/var/folders/ty/lcn5bsjx1fv0hklzr95y8jjm0000gn/T/mxnetwork/manager/job_4/

Any ideas are much appreciated.

Claus

[Bubbaloo]

using local folder for output.

There is the problem. You must set output to a folder both computers can write to.

[claus]

Excuse my ignorance, what kind of folder would that be? I have two Macbook Pro's, how do I set up a folder on one machine both can write to?

I can't even use a single machine to render, when I try to preview I get a message:

"Can't display image"

and when rendering on a single node I get:

"MXI output file is not a network path"

and

"ERROR: Can't write MXI output in: afp:/Clauses MacBook Pro.local/Claus/default.mxi"

[feynman]

@claus I'm using a folder in a Dropbox folder all nodes share for that purpose; after initial worries it actually works very well.

[claus]

Sorry all,

my mximerge was V. 2.6.0. After upgrade everything works.

Thanks for your replies.

Claus

[Mihai]

You must set output to a folder both computers can write to.

Actually it's only the Manager that writes the final output, so the output paths must be reachable/writable by the computer which is running the Manager.

Network always expects output paths in UNC format (\\computername\myfolder\myrender.mxi). The major difference whether you are running Manager on an OSX or Win computer is that on OSX, Network has to do some path conversion to convert that UNC path to a path that OSX understands. In most cases the conversion will work and there are no problems. Otherwise you can write the path as a local OSX path (ie Volumes/myfolder/myrender.mxi), Network will warn it's not a network path but you can ignore it. As long as that folder is valid on the computer that Manager is running on, it will be able to save the output there. If it can't, check the Manager log and it will tell you that it saved the final output in its temp folder and you can get it from there.

It's also in the vast majority of cases more efficient to have Send Dependencies checked. More info on why:
http://support.nextlimit.com/display/ma ... ork+render (specifically Step 5)

[Bubbaloo]

As long as that folder is valid on the computer that Manager is running on, it will be able to save the output there.

That makes sense.