Question about Timeout and Farm

[momocampo]

Hello Steinar,

I have some questions if you can help me please.

First , with Hold node, is it possible to use "wait for files" without timeout specify? ( wait for file until file arrives, can be several hours or days).

Second is about Farm, there isn't possible to configure farm (since 0.9.0 version). I think it's because there is a rest service now but my question is how use several computers to help FFAStrans to process all his workflows?

Thank you very much.

Cheers.

B.

[admin]

Hi Benjamin,

Ii don't thing there is any limit to how many seconds the node can wait. Just set a very high amount, like 604800000 should result in sleeping for one week.

The farming works in 0.9.0. I'm running one myself and the rest service has nothing to do with it. To create a farm, you just need to have the FFAStrans folder on a shared network location an run it directly from there. Also, if you run the GUI from that location, you can still install the service on any host, and they will become a part of the farm. You can of course still use it the legacy way by running the GUI on all hosts.

-steinar

[momocampo]

Good evening Steinar,

Great! I understand now and I will try this tomorrow. Thanks too for the first reply about Hold node, I thought use it with very high number of seconds but I wondered if another way was possible.
I think I will have many others questions to know perfectly how this great software works but later maybe

Thanks and regards

B.

[momocampo]

Hello Steinar,

I'm really sorry but I think there is something I don't understand with farm creation. I have a station specially for FFAStrans and I wanted a second one to "help"the first in case where a lot of files to encode. So, The application folder is on desktop of the first station. The windows service is running on the second. I understand that I must configure shared global media cache to a shared location (a NAS in my case).
It's now I think I miss something, how configure ffastrans is host menu in the first station? The application folder (with ffastrans.exe) can be only in local first station or must be shared? etc.
Anyway, really not sure how create a farm, can you help me to understand please?
Thanks a lot.

Cheers.
B.

[admin]

Ok, I will try and explain:

First:

For a farm to work the application folder MUST be on a shared drive. F.ex: \\mynas\share\FFAStrans. So, all hosts that need to be a part of the farm runs \\mynas\share\FFAStrans\FFAStrans.exe. From there you can install the service from the GUI, or just run it as "normal" application that's active only when you run the GUI. So for this to work, ALL hosts MUST have read/write access to the shared \\mynas\share\FFAStrans folder. So setting up a farm should be easy. There is no master host as all hosts are equal.

Second:

When you set up a farm, you must also decide how the host should cooperate on jobs. There are two options in the main host configuration:

• Use local media cache: The host that picks up a file, completes the job on its own. Jobs are NOT distributed.

• Use global shared media cache: Hosts work together to complete ONE job. It does not matter which host pick up the file.

However, the latter has some limitations: The encoding is NOT distributed. The host that executes a processor node, does it on its own. That means, if your workflow splits up into several simultaneous encoding, several hosts can execute the processor nodes in a workflow simultaneously.

Hope this helps.

-steinar

[momocampo]

Hello Steinar,

Thanks for all this explanations but I have some problems anyway
So, I drop FFAStrans folder on a NAS. I configure the first station with shared media cache on the nas and in host menu : use global shared media cache, rest service installed and enable local workflow check (but not possible to change).
Same configuration on second station, I close the 2 gui on each station (widows service is running).
If I submit files, nothing appends. I must execute ffastrans.exe on at last one station for the work begins. If I execute ffastrans on the 2 stations the work is well shared between the 2 stations.

So, In my case I have to run FFAStrans gui on each station, is it normal ? I wish to execute a FFAStrans gui on first station (all the time) and if too many work for the first station, the second helps the first without launch gui, possible?

Thanks a lot Steinar

Cheers
B.

[admin]

When running as as service, you need to configure the proper user to run the service. By default the service is installed using "Local system", which is the default Windows user. So you need to change the credentials of the service user for the FFAStrans service. This is normal when running services and has nothing to do with the service implementation of FFAStrans.

Have you read the documentation? If you press the "?" button in the configuration it is all be explained there.

-steinar

[momocampo]

Hello,
Ok, ok. Of course I 've read the doc and sorry but configure credentials of the service isn't really usual for me More I never used this kind of option.
Sorry to disturbed you with my questions, I just wanted to learn.
Thanks.
Cheers.