Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE: Anyone using Dolby Library with an FTP server

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Posted by Stephen Frazza (Member # 2320) on 11-06-2012, 10:47 AM:

Just wanted to see if anyone was using an FTP server with a Dolby Library.
If so was it making things liking pushing ads or trailers out to all projectors any easier. Were you able to automate it at all.

Any thoughts or experience on this would be appreciated.

Posted by Steve Guttag (Member # 268) on 11-06-2012, 01:23 PM:

I have done it in the past...FTP pushes to the Dolby server (DSL or even DSS) is pretty easy to do. What are you trying to push? Just content from a PC?

Posted by Stephen Frazza (Member # 2320) on 11-06-2012, 01:54 PM:

I wanted to be able to push ads or trailers out from the library to all 12 screens without having to do each screen separately.
When I do it now I put the library on the left side then select all the trailers then push them to all the screens one bye one.
I wanted to be able to do it in one shot. I figured with an ftp server I could write a script to do it.
But if there is another way to do it id like to know how.

Posted by Steve Guttag (Member # 268) on 11-06-2012, 03:53 PM:

Just put them in the Show list like any other trailers/features. If you have a show with an "X" in it for a particular screen on the "Build" screen, right click it and select "Copy Clips" it will pull any missing content from where ever it is easiest/fastest or you can direct it to come from a specific point.

From the FTP standpoint...it seems to be pretty straight forward with any FTP client so I would presume you could write such a script to push to all. I wouldn't use the "Network Content" screen for the sort of movement you've been doing...much easier to do it via the Build screen on specific Shows and you only have to do it once for ALL of the show changes (previews/ads...etc).

Posted by Stephen Frazza (Member # 2320) on 11-07-2012, 07:34 AM:

That would work if we didn't swap screens so much.
We move shows between screens or add it to a screen on the fly on the weekend or busy days all the time. And also our Fri/Sat/Sun layout of what screen something plays on can be totally different for all 3 days. Our screens all have vastly different seating capacity so a kids movie or scary movie will be different places on Fri night as opposed to Sat morning. Or even from Sat morn to Sat night.

So not knowing where everything is going to be means I need everything everywhere so if we make a change to the schedule I don't have to worry about something being x'ed and not playing because it is not on the local drive.

Posted by Chris Slycord (Member # 4239) on 11-07-2012, 02:39 PM:

This is assuming you have ssh and rsync access to the servers:

1) If most of the files on the file server aren't on the individual destinations you could try using tar + ssh

On the file server, run

for x in host1 host2 host3 ; do tar zcvf - SOURCEDIR | ssh user1@$x "(cd DESTDIR; tar zxvf -)" ; done

And with host1 host2 host3, replace them with the correct IP address (and add in however many hosts you want) then replace SOURCEDIR with the directory you want, user1 with actual user name, and DESTDIR with the actual destination directory on the hosts.

2) If a fair number of the files are on both the file server and the destination servers, you can use rsync instead.
On the file server, run
for x in host1 host2 host3 ; do rsync -avz SOURCEDIR user1@$x:DESTDIR ; done

Note: the rsync example would work in the first situation, it just will be a bit slower and the tar+ssh would work for the second situation but it'll be slower (since rsync doesn't transfer your identical files).

Posted by Steve Guttag (Member # 268) on 11-07-2012, 03:46 PM:

Our "Art" houses do just that...they have all content on all servers at all times so indeed shows can be moved at a moments notice. The idea is...you build the show on the DSL100...and then copy-clips to the various theatres and they all have what they need. Unless you have more than 6 screens, the standard 3TB DSS200 should do you...if you have a bigger complex, go to 2TB drives and you'll have something like 5.8TB usable storage...plenty for even a BIG complex.

Posted by Jussi Siponen (Member # 5572) on 11-14-2012, 06:53 AM:

quote: Steve Guttag
go to 2TB drives and you'll have something like 5.8TB usable storage.

Have you tested this? I was told Dolby doesn't support larger than 1TB drives on DSS200... [Confused]

1TB drives should yield enough space to relieve most of the current congestion, but 5.8TB would be awesome!

Posted by Mattias Mattsson (Member # 4308) on 11-14-2012, 06:03 PM:

I have upgraded a DSS100 with four 2TB drives (WD2003FYYS). Works perfectly.

I think it is best to use disks with a sector size of 512 bytes and avoid the new ones with 4K sectors, at least for now. (WD calls this "advanced format drives"). This is because because there can be a massive hit in performance if the data is not aligned properly on 4K-sector drives.

The largest drives you can get with 512 byte sectors is 2TB.

Posted by Jussi Siponen (Member # 5572) on 11-15-2012, 07:27 AM:

quote: Mattias Mattsson
I have upgraded a DSS100 with four 2TB drives (WD2003FYYS). Works perfectly.

In-te-res-ting...

This pretty much flies in the face of what I've been told (i.e. that DSS100 can not be upgraded to larger disc capacity).

Was this something you just did on your own, or with Dolby's blessing?

Posted by Steve Guttag (Member # 268) on 11-15-2012, 06:26 PM:

Dolby only officially supports 500GB drives in the DSS100 because "some" DSS100s may have hardware that will not support larger drives.

I have installed 1TB drives in several DSS100s now and none have exhibited any issues. The cost is such that giving it a try is always worth while and if the drives don't work, odds are there are DSS200s that can consume them.

As for 2TB drives in a DSS200, I (and others) have put in 2TB drives without issue. I have done Hitachi, I've seen others use Seagate and Dolby is using Western Digital on their DSS220 though the DSS220 is going to be more critical due to the software RAID.

At this time, I don't foresee the need for larger than 2TB drives as they will deal with the size requirements of all of my clients, including if they get HFR and 4K.

Over time, the reason for using larger drives may very well come to what is available when the drives are needed down the road.