Render start delayed every time when using online licensing

[LudvikKoutny]

Hi,

ever since V-Ray Next release (I am still using 3.6), I am observing a noticeable delay at the start of every single render as long as I am using online licensing. When I hit render button, the rendering first get stuck on the "transforming vertices" phase for about a second or two, even in a completely empty scene, and only then it starts to render. Right now, the delay is about 1 second, but I had some bad days, where the delay would be over 10 seconds (stuck on transforming vertices) before each render would start, even in the empty scene. The very same thing was happening also when opening render settings dialog, or updating material editor thumbnails. When it was really bad, each of these actions would freeze 3ds Max UI for a few seconds.

If I borrow the licences for offline use, then the delay is completely gone. Transforming vertices phase is so short it's not even visible in an empty scene. I can therefore resolve my problem by borrowing the licence for offline use with auto-renewal, but I do not want to do that, as I had my PC crash already once with the licence borrowed, and I had to contact the support and have them release the borrowed licence. They told me I should make sure it does not happen again, so ever since, I restrain from borrowing the licences too much.

So now I have two choices:
1, Keep the licences online and experience random delays before every render

2, Keep borrowing the licences for auto renew and have to deal with the the tech support again in case I have to perform unexpected system reinstall.

I already contacted Chaosgroup support about this, writing a detailed mail about what I tried to do, including installing latest licence server, but in the mail reply, their suggestion was to install the latest licence server, so I kind of given up on having to deal with that. That's why I am posting here, if anyone has some similar experience and/or solution. What I find disturbing the most is the fact that the online licence is apparently being checked on each render, each interaction with render settings UI, and each material/map interaction. This doesn't feel reliable given that the latency of internet connection may vary a bit. What's further confusing me is that if I run online licensing, I have 3ds Max open and V-Ray working, yet licence manager web UI shows my 3ds Max licence as available, not in use.

[degrobi]

Hi,
I can confirm this issue of delayed render start while using online licensing with Vray (3.6) for Maya. Until now our workarround was restarting the license server. After that, it works for a indefinite while. This is going on for several years now. Until now, my admin tested every update of the license server. Latest version is installed at the moment, issues will pop up eventually after some time.
Yes, auto restarting the license server is a solution for the problem but does not get rid of the cause of the problem. And restarting the license server while a render is ongoing on client side, has caused freezes on the machine which is rendering, which is suboptimal.

Just to make it clear. This is no connectivity issue. It seems to be on license server side, since restarting it helps instantly.
Borrowing licenses is no option in our scenario.

Checking the diagnostic logs of the server in verbose mode, revealed, that there is defenitly something going on several times a second on server side. Even if none of the Render nodes are in use by the IP adresses, which seems very wierd.

Here an abstract of the log, which contains thousands of similar rows like that:

{"clientIP":"xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx:64673","component" :"a pp","ctx.sessionId":"7xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx xx xxxxxx1","message":"/getlic01 request processed","path":"/getlic01/xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx","severity":"de bug","time":"2018-08-09T05:51:52.999516383+02:00"}
{"clientIP":"xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx:64674","component" :"a pp","ctx.sessionId":"3xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx xx xxxxxx7","message":"/getlic01 request received","path":"/getlic01/xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx","severity":"de bug","time":"2018-08-09T05:51:53.051004596+02:00"}
{"component":"dongle_manager","message":"Dongle subsystem handling license request","severity":"debug","time":"2018-08-09T05:51:53.051202693+02:00"}
{"component":"dongle_manager","message":"Dongle subsystem handled license request","severity":"debug","time":"2018-08-09T05:51:53.051752097+02:00"}
{"clientIP":"xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx:64674","component" :"a pp","ctx.sessionId":"3xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx xx xxxxxx7","message":"/getlic01 request processed","path":"/getlic01/xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx","severity":"de bug","time":"2018-08-09T05:51:53.051853625+02:00"}
{"clientIP":"xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx:64675","component" :"a pp","ctx.sessionId":"3xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx xx xxxxxxe7","message":"/getlic01 request received","path":"/getlic01/xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx","severity":"de bug","time":"2018-08-09T05:51:53.11500843+02:00"}
{"component":"dongle_manager","message":"Dongle subsystem handling license request","severity":"debug","time":"2018-08-09T05:51:53.115266629+02:00"}
{"component":"dongle_manager","message":"Dongle subsystem handled license request","severity":"debug","time":"2018-08-09T05:51:53.116362604+02:00"}
{"clientIP":"xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx:64675","component" :"a pp","ctx.sessionId":"3xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx xx xxxxxx7","message":"/getlic01 request processed","path":"/getlic01/xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx","severity":"de bug","time":"2018-08-09T05:51:53.116544241+02:00"}

I'm no admin myself, so I dont know how to interpret this ...


Maybe we missed a setting on server side. I dont know. But I'm really interested in getting this problem out of the way.


Hope the support will look into this.
Thanks in advance!

[mihail_kuzev]

Hello,

Thank you for reporting this!

If that is alright with you can you please make a short video that shows the delay when you work with V-Ray and mail it to support@chaosgroup.com . If possible please include a part when V-Ray is working as expected (borrowed license, or after a fresh restart of the license server) and a part when V-Ray works with delays. It will help us better understand the issue. Also please send us the logs from the license server.

In the meantime we are going to attempt to replicate the issue locally at our side and we will review it with our Developers.

LudvikKoutny - please "borrow" your licenses for offline use while we investigate. If necessary we will release them from our side if you experience another system crash and have to rebuild your system. Please note that in case you have a backup and restore your system from it the "borrowed" licenses should work and in that cases it will not be necessary for us to release them from our side.

degrobi - this is not an expected behavior and we will look further into the issue.

[Sinnige001]

I am the admin from degrobi in the second message.

Just to add a few notes :
We are talking about the floating license server for us. Might be a different issue ? (Although we do get the same behaviour.)
It is not internet related / ping times are low. Bandwidth is NOT an issue.

Box should be more than sufficient. Mac mini 2014 with 1TB HDD running ONLY this license server on a clean install.

It is running on ubuntu 16.04 LTS (console installer/headless)

Logs do get big after some time in debug mode >500MB, now rotated daily, but we are testing (again) with errors only to see if that sorts something out.
Servers are now reset every night, which seem to eleviate the issue, but that is not a good solution for a bug.

Arjan

[mihail_kuzev]

Sinnige001 Thank you for the additional information!

The logs will be to big to be sent over mail. Can you please write an e-mail to support@chaosgroup.com mentioning this forum thread and I will provide you with credentials for our FTP server where you can upload them.