Preferences Window – An explanation of all the Options

This is an overview of the Options Menu and it describes what each option does.

To open the Options menu you can press the keyboard shortcut on Windows (Ctrl + ,) or MacOS (Cmd + ,) or use the menu system (File -> Options in Windows and Render Boss -> Preferences in MacOS).

The menu is very similar in both Windows and MacOS, and the options function the same way. However, due to the MacOS version being newer, it has fewer options at the moment. We are working hard to bring match the features in both platforms in the near future.

General Tab

Preferences

Start on Tray / Start Hidden: When this option is enabled, Render Boss will start hidden in the tray in Windows, or the menu bar in MacOS. 

Minimize to tray: When this option is enabled, clicking the minimize button (‘_’) on the main window of Render Boss will close Render Boss into the Windows tray. 

Close to tray: When this option is enabled, clicking the close button (‘X’) on the main window of Render Boss will keep Render Boss active in the Windows tray. 

Run on Startup: When this option is enabled, Render Boss will start with the operating system. This is ideal for machines in a render farm, so that the machine is ready to render right after it boots.

Play Sounds: Enables or disables the sounds Error or Success sounds that play at the end of each render.

Accept Commands

This section denotes the type of incoming remote commands that this machine can accept from other machines.

Actions: When enabled, this machine can receive actions such as Turn On/Off Auto-Start, Stop Render, etc. 

Notifications: When enabled, this machine can receive notifications. For example, when a render is sent to another machine, that machine will usually send notifications back when it finishes.

Settings: When enabled, this machine can receive Settings copied from a different machine.

System: When enabled, this machine can receive actions that affect the System such as Restart Machine and Turn Off the machine.

Updates: When enabled, this machine can receive a command to check for updates.

Reports

Generate Reports: When enabled, this machine will automatically generate Render Reports as web pages.

Custom Reports Folder: When enabled, the reports will be placed in the custom folder specified. Otherwise they will be placed in the default location, which is inside the Work Folder.

Automatic Reports

Errors and Crashes: When Render Boss crashes, it automatically gathers the technical information of the crash. When this option is enabled, the crash report will be sent to us. This helps us tremendously to find the bug quickly and accurately. You can choose if you want the report to be sent anonymously, or if you want to be informed when the bug is fixed, in which case your email will also be included in the report, but only for that purpose.

Telemetry: When enabled, Render Boss will occasionally collect anonymous data to make more accurate predictions on future renders and improve the model of how different effects affect render times at different resolutions and with different amount of threads, etc.

We will never send any project files or assets. If you’d like to know more about what data is sent, you can check the Data Policy.

Updates

Update Automatically: When enabled, Render Boss will periodically check for updates available. When an update is available it will automatically download it and install it when Render Boss is idle.

Update Track: You can select which track you want for updates. The Stable track, which only checks for stable updates that have been tested more thoroughly. The Beta track will check for Beta updates, which are available more often and might contain new features or more recent bug fixes. However, the Beta versions have not been tested as thoroughly, so there might also unexpected bugs.

Render Tab

Work Folder

Here you can change the Work Folder, which is a folder that Render Boss utilizes to facilitate the communication between machines. If you’re rendering on a single machine, we recommend you leave these options in their default setting.

For renders with multiple machines we recommend you take a look at this article/video first. 

Local Server / Synchronized Folder: Here you can specify if the Work Folder exists in a Local Server or a Synchronized Folder for cloud-syncing services such as Dropbox, Google Drive, etc. 

For more information about this, you can check out this article/video.

Clear List: Clears the list of recently-used Work Folders.

Reset: Resets the Work Folder to its default setting. The default folder will not work with multi-machine renders.

Render Settings

Render as Render-Only node: This tells Adobe

Automatically fix detected missing frames:

Remove Jobs after successful render: 

Pushbullet Notifications

This section lets you send notifications to your mobile phone after a render (or all the renders) are finished.

For more info about this section, check out this article.

Temp. File Policy (all machines)

This option lets you specify how Render Boss treats the temporary image files that are created with each multi-threaded / multi-machine render.

After Effects Installation

This option allows you to specify the folder where your After Effects installation is located. We recommend leaving this option on its default settings unless you’re having issues where Render Boss is not finding After Effects, or you are receiving a AE Could not execute error.

Execute after each render

This option allows you to specify a file to execute after each render. For example, a bat or cmd script with certain.