Hi all,
I'm really new here, I would really love to start learning Houdini, but I'm facing a problem that is totally blowing my mind.
As soon as I start Houdini I find this error:

ERROR: houdini.pref (90): Syntax error: syntax error, unexpected ‘,’, expecting ‘;’

and then a huge series of aggregated error like this one:

ERROR: /home/fpaglia/houdini15.5/config/Dialogs/15.5.480/VIS/vis_marker.dialog.ui (114): Syntax error: syntax error, unexpected ‘,


It seems that houdini instead of using this method to define floating values “1.000” just uses (at least on my computer) this method “1,000” using the comma instead of the dot.

This error simply does not allow houdini to evaluate correctly the script and lead to errors that are pretty visible in the use of the camera (every time I refresh the view or move a frame forward the camera goes to the center of the axis) and of course in the render viewer where I get this error:

“Unable to evaluate expression (Expression stack error (/obj/ipr_camera/near))

I tried everything,
I reinstalled the system I have a fresh 16.04 LTS ubuntu with Nvidia driver 361
I tried to overwrite the ”setxkbmap" option to swich between the comma and the dot even in the system

I haven’t found any suitable solution for my problem all around the web…
Is there anyone that could kindly help me?
It's a week now I try to solve the problem but couldn't find a way!

Thank you all in advance for your support!
Francesco

I just want to follow up after the problem I got in the Houdini start up.
I tried few possibilities and I found that instead a fresh new installation of Fedora works correctly.

I know this is not a solution but maybe it can remain in the records that a fresh new installation of ubuntu + nvidia driver without any further tweak is not enough to get Houdini Apprentice working properly while on fedora the problem seems not present.

Ciao
Francesco

Hello,

I have the same config : 16.04 LTS Ubuntu with Nvidia driver 361, and had the same problem.
I also had some VEX compilation problems, with the same error message :
Syntax error: syntax error, unexpected ‘,’, expecting ‘;’

To fix the issue, I startup Houdini (15.5) using the following command :

LC_ALL=C /opt/hfs15*/bin/houdinifx

Then, I still have some errors at startup (ERROR: /home/mh/houdini15.5/config/Dialogs/15.5.565/VIS/vis_marker.dialog.ui (415): EndDefinition: Nesting error; stackPointer=1), but it looks like all is running fine in Houdini.
VEX compilation problems gone.

Hope that helps anyone wanting to stick to Houdini in Ubuntu!

Best,

Michael