Hello.

I have spent countless hours trying to set a simple 2 machine render farm using Hqueue.

On my first PC (RENDR) I have Houdini Indie & Houdini Hqueue client/server. When I use the local host I can see my client in the window (See attached)

On my second PC (RENDR2) I have Houdini Indie Engine & Houdini Hqueue Client/Server. Again, when I visit localhost:5000 on this machine I can see the client.

I am trying to set it up so that RENDR (PC1) can see RENDR2 (PC2) on the localhost:5000 page.

I have disabled the firewall.
I have changed the shared directory to be identical on both machines.
I have configured the Hqueue client and server to login under each machines user/pass
I have changed the HqueueServer path on both machines to:
hqserver.sharedNetwork.path.windows = \\RENDR2\HoudiniShared

I am getting near the point of giving up as I really don't know what else to try as I have followed the instructions provided by SideFX.

Can anyone assist? Thank in advance.

Hello.
Can you resolve your problem? I'm sorry that I have the same problem with you!
If you find the method, Can you share with me? I'm really need help.
My sincerely thanks!

At the expense of making myself look bad, not having read the docs on utilizing HQueue;

I think a MasterClass series on what is involved, what needs to be considered and general how to walk through of how to set up ones own render farm might prove to be very usefull.

byronfillmore
Hello.

I have spent countless hours trying to set a simple 2 machine render farm using Hqueue.

On my first PC (RENDR) I have Houdini Indie & Houdini Hqueue client/server. When I use the local host I can see my client in the window (See attached)

On my second PC (RENDR2) I have Houdini Indie Engine & Houdini Hqueue Client/Server. Again, when I visit localhost:5000 on this machine I can see the client.

I am trying to set it up so that RENDR (PC1) can see RENDR2 (PC2) on the localhost:5000 page.

I have disabled the firewall.
I have changed the shared directory to be identical on both machines.
I have configured the Hqueue client and server to login under each machines user/pass
I have changed the HqueueServer path on both machines to:
hqserver.sharedNetwork.path.windows = \\RENDR2\HoudiniShared

I am getting near the point of giving up as I really don't know what else to try as I have followed the instructions provided by SideFX.

Can anyone assist? Thank in advance.

Hello,

If you installed the HQueue server on two different machines then in essence you've setup two different farms running independently of each other. What you need to do is install the server on only one machine and then point the HQueue Clients on RENDR and RENDR2 to the one server as depicted in this component overview diagram:
http://www.sidefx.com/docs/hqueue16.0/help/overview#components.html [sidefx.com]

So here is what I would try:
- Leave the HQueue server and client installations on RENDR as-is.
- Then uninstall both the HQueue server and client on RENDR2.
- Re-run the installer on RENDR2 and this time choose only to install the HQueue Client.
- When prompted by the installer for an HQueue server address/URL, point it to the server on RENDR. For example, "http://RENDR:5000".
- Complete the installation and you should see both RENDR and RENDR2 appear in the client list (assuming that you have general networking setup between the two machines and that they can connect to each other by their DNS names).

Once you have that working then you need a shared network folder to share files between the two machines. You can either re-use one that you've already created or use the one that the Houdini/HQueue installer created for you. In either case, you will want to register the shared folder with HQueue by setting these variables in the C:/HQueueServer/hqserver.iniserver config file:
The example values above would register the \\myMachine\mySharenetwork folder with HQueue and inform HQueue that H:is typically mapped to that path.

Save the changes to the config file, restart the HQueue Server service and then restart the HQueue Client services.

One last tip is that if you already have Houdini installed in C:/Program Fileson both machines, then I suggest using those local Houdini installs instead of a shared network install. When you get to the point of submitting Houdini jobs to the farm, just change the Target HFS parameter on the HQueue Render/Simulation ROP to C:/Program Files/Side Effects Software/Houdini 16.0.ZZZ. Then submit the jobs as usual.

Cheers,
Rob

if anyone is having issues, here is how i Fixed it (Windows 10)

of course you have to put both server and client on the same network(normal windows network setup)


1: Install server on one machine(optional:you can install a client too)
2: install Client ONLY on second machine.

Leave all options during install at defaults.

3: you can know the server machine ip by opening command prompt, running the following code: IPCONFIG /ALL
4: copy your IPV4 address.
5: go to server machine, go to CHQueueServer
6: open hqserver.ini and do the following:

hqserver.sharedNetwork.host = (Example:197.123.30.97)
hqserver.sharedNetwork.path.linux = %(here)s/shared
hqserver.sharedNetwork.path.windows = \\\(Example:\\197.123.30.97\hq
hqserver.sharedNetwork.path.macosx = %(here)s/HQShared
hqserver.sharedNetwork.mount.linux = /mnt/hq
hqserver.sharedNetwork.mount.windows = H:
hqserver.sharedNetwork.mount.macosx = /Volumes/HQShared

leave everything else at default

7: Go to client machine,
8: go to cHQueueClient
9:Open hqnode
10: use server IP Address from above
11: Save changes

That's it