Resolving a Problem Connecting to the Backburner Manager



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The Backburner Manager, on Linux or Windows systems, is the link between the Render Clients who submit jobs and the Render Nodes that process these jobs. If the Backburner Manager is not available, jobs cannot be submitted to or processed by the Distributed Queueing System. Not being able to connect to the Backburner Manager causes problems for both Render Clients and nodes, but Render Clients usually discover the problem. For example, if you submitted a job to the while the Manager was down, an error appears in your application.

The most common reasons for not being able to connect to the Backburner Manager are: an incorrect IP address or an IP address that connects to the wrong Backburner Manager, a Backburner Manager that is not running or is hung, or communication problems between the Backburner Manager and the Render Nodes.

To resolve a problem connecting to the Backburner Manager:

  1. Ensure you are connecting to the correct Backburner Manager, using its correct IP address, as follows.

    Connect the application directly to the Backburner Manager workstation by trying the following:

    • If you use the Auto-Connect functionality, disable the Use First Available option and/or remove the subnet mask for the Distributed Queueing System. You are prompted to enter the name or IP address of the Backburner Manager workstation when you try to submit a job to the Distributed Queueing System.

    • Disable any settings or preferences that automatically connect to the Backburner Manager.

    If the application cannot connect to the Backburner Manager, continue to the next step.

  2. Verify that the Backburner Manager is running.

    If it is not running or appears to be inactive on the workstation, restart the Manager for the network. See Starting the Backburner Manager for Windows.

    Note: If you are running Backburner Manager as a Windows Service, display the Services control panel, and verify that the Manager service is running. If the service is not running, highlight it and click Start.

    If restarting the Manager does not fix the problem, continue to the next step.

  3. Ensure the Render Nodes can ping the Backburner Manager. For help with the ping command, see Verifying Communication Between Two Hosts.

    If the Render Nodes can successfully ping the Backburner Manager, continue to the next step.

  4. If a firewall (such as Zone Labs ZoneAlarm) is running on Distributed Queueing System components, review the firewall settings for each network component to ensure the following:

    • The Backburner application(s) are allowed to access the network.

    • The ports used by the Backburner Manager and Backburner Monitor to communicate are not blocked by the firewall. By default, these ports are 3233 and 3234.

  5. Configure the log files to report detailed information about TCP/IP packets, as follows.

    Enable the Log Debug and Log Debug Extended options in the preferences for the Manager and all Render Nodes running Backburner Server, and then restart the Backburner Manager and Backburner Server workstations.

    Examine the TCP/IP information in the log files to determine why the Backburner Manager workstation and Render Nodes are not communicating.

  6. Examine the backburner.xml file to ensure that the subnet mask defined for the Backburner Manager is correct and matches the subnet mask defined for the Render Node's TCP/IP settings. See Editing the backburner.xml File.

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