3c1871cf0b
Some rewording & reformatting of the 'mission', and extending the 'development/getting started' page.
106 lines
4.1 KiB
Markdown
106 lines
4.1 KiB
Markdown
---
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title: Mission & Design
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weight: 1
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aliases:
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- /design-principles/
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resources:
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- name: components
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src: flamenco_components.png
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title: Flamenco Components
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---
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Flamenco is a lightweight, cross-platform framework to dispatch and schedule rendering jobs for smaller animation studios and individuals at home.
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## Target Audience
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Flamenco is meant for **smaller animation studios and individuals** at home.
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Think of roughly **1-10 artists** using it, and **1-100 computers** attached to
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the farm to execute tasks. [Blender Studio][studio] uses a handful of servers,
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and combines those with various desktop machines when they're not used by the
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artists.
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There is no need to compile or build anything. The Flamenco project distributes
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executables and a Blender add-on for you to install and run ([downloads][downloads]).
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[studio]: https://studio.blender.org/
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[downloads]: {{< ref "/download/" >}}
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## Design Principles
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The following principles guide the design of Flamenco:
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Blender.org Project
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: Flamenco is a true blender.org project. This means that it's Free and Open
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Source, made by the community, lead by Blender HQ. Its development will fall
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under the umbrella of the [Pipline, Assets & IO][PAIO] module.
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[PAIO]: https://projects.blender.org/blender/blender/wiki/Module:%20Pipeline,%20Assets%20&%20I/O
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Minimal Authentication & Organisation
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: Because Flamenco is aimed at small studios and individuals, it won't offer
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much in terms of user authentication, nor the organisation of users into groups.
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[Custom job types][jobtypes] can be used to attach arbitrary metadata to jobs,
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such as the submitter's name, a project identifier, etc.
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[jobtypes]: {{< ref "/usage/job-types" >}}
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Minimize External Components
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: Running Flamenco should be extremely simple. This means that it should depend
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on as few external packages as possible. Apart from the Flamenco components
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themselves, all you need to install is [Blender][blender].
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: The downside of this is that development might take longer, as some things
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that an external service could solve need to be implemented. This trade-off of
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developer time for simplicity of use is considered a good thing, though.
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[blender]: https://www.blender.org/
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No Errors, Guide Users To Success
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: Instead of stopping with a description of what's wrong, like "no database
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configured", Flamenco should show something helpful in which you're guided
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towards a working system.
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Customisable
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: Studio pipeline developers / TDs should be able to customise the behaviour of
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Flamenco. They should be able to create new [job types][jobtypes], and adjust
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existing job types to their needs. For this, Flamenco uses JavaScript to convert
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a job definition like "*render this blend file, frames 1-100*" into individual
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tasks for computers to execute.
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Work offline
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: Like Blender itself, Flamenco should be able to fully work offline. That is,
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work without internet connection. If any future feature should need such a
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connection, that feature should always be optional, and be disabled by default.
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Data Storage
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: Data should be stored as plain files whenever possible. Where a higher level
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of coordination is required, an embedded database can be used; currently
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Flamenco uses [SQLite][sqlite] for this.
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[sqlite]: https://pkg.go.dev/modernc.org/sqlite
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## Supported Platforms
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As the Blender.org project is built on free and Open Source software, Linux is
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the main platform Flamenco is developed against. Windows and MacOS will also be
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supported, but on a best-effort basis with help from the community.
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## Infrastructure
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Setting up a render farm is not as simple as pushing a button, but Flamenco aims
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to keep things as simple as possible.
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What you need to run Flamenco is:
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- One or more computers to do the work, i.e. running **Flamenco Worker**. You'll
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probably also want to install [Blender][blender] there.
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- A computer to run the central software, **Flamenco Manager**. This could be
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one of the above computers, or a dedicated one.
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- A local network with **file sharing** already set up, so that the above
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computers can all reach the same set of files.
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[blender]: https://www.blender.org/
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{{< img name="components" size="small" lazy=false >}}
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