Different operating system header

Running on a different OS

Note

The helga pipeline is developed/maintained foremost on the windows platform. However there might be the need sometimes to switch to a different operating system like Linux. For these cases you can find a quick guide here how to start the DCCs in the correct environment, but keep in mind, that support for operating systems other than windows at the moment is very experimental.

Warning

This guide and method are considered temporary and might become deprecated once there is time for a refactoring of the HelgaLauncher tool that is used under windows.


Tested on

  • CentOS7
    • Houdini: Yes
    • Nuke: No
    • Maya: Untested

Step by step guide

Please note that this guide is geared towards TDs or people that are a little familiar with git or Python, since there is. a little effort involved in making it run outside of how it is ment to be run. 6 little steps to take on your own risk :D

  1. Temporary clone the helga git repo

    Clone the helga repo to a temporary location. Just navigate to some temp folder and execute this snippet in your git enabled shell:

    git clone https://github.com/timmwagener/helga.git helga
    

    This should create a folder named helga at your current path and clone the helga repository in it.

  2. Helga folder structure

    Now in your temporary helga repo navigate to helga/general/setup/direct_access/supplementary_material/folder_structure. There you will find a zip file called helga.zip, that contains the helga folder structure. Extract this zip to where you want the helga pipeline and project to be located. PS: The helga folder structure is based on the Maya project structure which might be unfamiliar to non Maya users.

  3. The real clone - work repository

    Now its time to do the real clone of the helga repo and fit it into the new folder structure. Navigate to your_root/Production/scripts/work and execute

    git clone https://github.com/timmwagener/helga.git helga
    

    there again. This is the repo you will keep up-to-date and maintain and always copy into sandbox or deploy when you want to publish changes to production.

  4. Start procedure for Houdini, Maya & Nuke

    Now its time to adjust the startup module for your dccs (Supported are Maya 2014, Nuke 8.x and Houdini 13.0.xxx). Please go to Production/scripts/sandbox/helga/helga/general/setup/direct_access/yaml where you will find a file called pipeline_base_data.yaml. Open it with a text editor, for example sublime text or notepad and adjust the following values:

    1. PIPELINE_BASE_PATH: “path/to/where/Production/and/Organization/folders/are/under”
    2. PIPELINE_FLAVOUR: “deploy” <– Pick either sandbox or deploy. This is the folder name where the script environment you want to use is under.
    3. MAYA_EXE: “path/to/maya.exe”
    4. NUKE_EXE: “path/to/Nuke8.0.exe”
    5. HOUDINI_EXE: “path/to/houdinifx.exe” (or houdini.exe)

    Save and you are good.

  5. Pipeline repo production copies - sandbox and deploy

    Those two fellas could also be named experimental and stable, beta or gold......you get the idea. Just go and copy the whole helga folder, in which you just did modifications, and __init__.py file from work into sandbox and deploy.

  6. Finally

    Test if the application runs correctly. Navigate to deploy|sandbox/helga/helga/general/setup/direct_access and type the following in a python enabled shell:

    #Houdini:
    python -c 'import direct_access;reload(direct_access);direct_access.run("houdini")'
    #Maya:
    python -c 'import direct_access;reload(direct_access);direct_access.run("maya")'
    #Nuke:
    python -c 'import direct_access;reload(direct_access);direct_access.run("nuke")'
    

    If everything went well, your DCC should start within the helga pipeline environment (either sandbox or deploy)


Hopefully that was not too confusing ;) Please remember that you now have the pathes and setup in place, the structure if you will, but you still need a lot of content like .otls for example. In your own production you would of course populate the pipeline with your own scripts, plugins, digital assets, gizmos etc.

Good luck :D