SHFS is a shared Houdini file system. It’s an analogue to HFS that is shared between all Houdini installs on your computer. It is intended to hold data files that do not change from version to version, which means you only download it once, not daily. This will reduce the size of Houdini installs by being able to share common files between multiple versions. This allows Houdini to ship with larger and higher resolution files, as well as machine learning models.

The following is the default path for SHFS:

Some SHFS files are optional, which means they are not installed when Houdini is installed. When Houdini needs to download an optional file, it may open the Houdini Installer in order to install the file. This will happen if the SHFS path is not writable by the current user, which is common if SHFS is installed outside your home directory.

You can elect to install optional SHFS files at install time rather than having them downloaded on demand. This setting can be found in the “SHFS” tab of the install options, or for scipted installs use the --shfs-install-optionals option.

You have three options for SHFS ownership, when installing Houdini using the installer GUI.

1. Set SHFS directory owner to current user:

   The SHFS directory will be owned by the current user. This user can write files to the directory without admin rights, but other users will need admin rights to write SHFS files.

2. Set SHFS directory owner to administrator:

   The SHFS directory will be owned by the administrator account (root on Linux and MacOS, Administrators on Windows). All users will need admin rights to write SHFS files.

3. Set SHFS directory to custom owner:

   The SHFS directory will be owned by the named account. That account will be able to write files without needing admin rights, all other users will need admin rights.

Because SHFS is shared between all versions of Houdini, it is not uninstalled when you uninstall Houdini. To remove SHFS files that are no longer needed:

Using the Houdini Installer graphical interface, choose “Clean up SHFS Files”.

Using the houdini_installer command line program, run houdini_installer clean-shfs.

• In the About Houdini dialog, note the value of the environment variable SHFS. It should be the default value for your platform, unless you are trying to configure a custom SHFS path.

• Check that the path is a directory and has files inside it. If the files are missing or empty, either you installed SHFS somewhere else, or the install failed.

• Open the Houdini Installer, check that SHFS path in the Preferences menu is set to the path noted above, then choose “Validate SHFS Files”. This will scan the SHFS directory and verify that the files match what is expected. You will need an active internet connection to download any files that are missing or corrupted.