Introduction

Welcome to the documentation for Distributed OrcaFlex (version 8.0f).

Distributed OrcaFlex is a suite of programs that enables a collection of networked, OrcaFlex licensed, computers to run OrcaFlex jobs as background tasks using spare processor time.

Distributed OrcaFlex consists of four separate programs:

a server runs on one machine in the network. The server manages the job list, allocates jobs to the client machines, and relays communication between the clients and viewers. The server program does not require a licence.
a client runs on each machine available to run jobs. This program loads the required OrcaFlex DLL version and runs the jobs at the request of the server. The client program claims an OrcaFlex licence when running jobs.
a viewer can run on any machine on the same network as the other DOF components, it does not require a licence. The viewer program displays the list of jobs and their completion status. The viewer program is also used to submit, pause and cancel jobs and set the availability of Distributed OrcaFlex processing clients.
a console (dofcmd.exe) that performs some of the viewer functions from a console window or batch file. The console program is installed with the viewer program.

This documentation explains how to install and run the Distributed OrcaFlex suite.

The Distributed OrcaFlex client program runs with a low operating system priority to minimise interference with other programs running on the same machine. The user should not notice a significant impact on responsiveness due to Distributed OrcaFlex. By default, the client program will run as many jobs in parallel as there are available processor cores on the computer. However, this number can be reduced at runtime by using the Distributed OrcaFlex viewer or console program. The default maximum number of cores is set through a registry setting.

Introduction

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