pluginWin.mel line 316: Unable to dynamically load bifrost and arnold

[DavidVB997]

I have been struggling for probably 3 hours now with this issue.

Arnold and bifrost are not working in maya. the first error i get is: 

// Warning: Arnold renderer not loaded.
The MtoA plug-in needed for this scene is not loaded.
Make sure Autoload is on in the Plug-in Manager.
See this article for more detail.
https://www.autodesk.com/maya-arnold-not-available-error

i then try to activate the mtoa.mll file in the plugin panel and i get: 

// Error: file: C:/Program Files/Autodesk/Maya2025/scripts/others/pluginWin.mel line 316: The file cannot be accessed by the system.
(mtoa)

same with bifrost:

// Error: file: C:/Program Files/Autodesk/Maya2025/scripts/others/pluginWin.mel line 316: The file cannot be accessed by the system.
(bifrostGraph)

I have tried reinstalling 3 times, 2 times a clean uninstall with the steps. i have tried installing the mtoa plugin sepperately, installing arnold sepperately and so on.

I install the program in the default directory.

I have resetted the preferences to default.

I do not understand what i am doing wrong. I have the educational license and have used maya before a while ago.

I am quite tired of the problem now and feel like i am going out of options.

Someone mentioned checking the envirnoment whatever that means?

and do some logging of some sort but i didnt understand that either as the explanation was very short un unfulfilled.

Please help.

David

[Stephen.Blair]

In the script editor, run this MEL:

system( "set" )

That will print the environment variable settings in Maya.

You can copy and paste that text from the script history.

The main thing to look at is the PATH setting. Is there something in there that should not be?

[DavidVB997]

Hey, tahnks for answering:)

Do you want me to copy paste the log in here it is quite long? 

Also not entirely sure what to look at here, someone mentioned this article: 

https://arnoldsupport.com/2016/04/23/mtoa-unable-to-dynamically-load-mtoa-mll-the-specified-procedur...  and to look for any environment variable that has an Arnold or MtoA folder in it.

For example, on Windows, you should not have any MtoA bin folders in PATH.

when i search then for arnold or Mtoa in the search field of the script i get another warning saying it didnt find the specified string

[Stephen.Blair]

you can save it in a text file, and then attach that 

[DavidVB997]

Okey here is the saved script from the system(set)

[Stephen.Blair]

Thanks.

I don't see any problems with the environment.

Looking back at the original post, I see "The file cannot be accessed by the system.". That could be some kind of permissions problem.

For example:
Solved: Unable to dynamically load: The file cannot be accessed by the system. - Autodesk Community ...

[DavidVB997]

So i  looked at the link you provided, i tried running the 

• chkdsk in the folder of the plug-ins and just through (windows key + R)
• I reinstalled mtoa outside the progams folder and inside it
• and i tried runnning with admin windows acount but i only have 1 acount it seems and that is my own, it says i am administrator. I even went into the security settings of each file and folder and set the security to full control for my user.
• I tried turning off firewall and tried also, it didnt work.
• I  still get with both byfrost and arnold: (this example is just the bifrost output)

- // Error: file: C:/Program Files/Autodesk/Maya2025/scripts/others/pluginWin.mel line 316: Unable to dynamically load : C:/Program Files/Autodesk/Bifrost/Maya2025/2.11.0.0/bifrost/plug-ins/bifrostGraph.mll
// The file cannot be accessed by the system.
// Error: file: C:/Program Files/Autodesk/Maya2025/scripts/others/pluginWin.mel line 316: The file cannot be accessed by the system.
// (bifrostGraph)

I read someone with the same problem reset their pc but that would be a very last resorst as all programs would be removed...

- I have also tried running maya as admin ofcourse, kind ou of otions again

[Stephen.Blair]

Then I suggest getting a Process Monitor log (see here: Getting a Process Monitor log for mtoa)
Then zip it up and share it somehow (Dropbox or something). I will take a look: specifically, I will look for what files "cannot be accessed by the system"

[DavidVB997]

Okay so I followed the exact steps in the video and managed to get a log, i placed it in my google drive and made the link public and readable to everyone. Here is the link to my drive folder:

https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1GOJYtRm3SiZcQnOwi6Pk029A5otNUZoE?usp=sharing

I am pretty okay with computer stuff so if i need to do anything else just let me know, thanks for helping me, I hope yoiu can find something in there that can solve the problem.

[Stephen.Blair]

What I see is that maya stops looking for ai.dll (that's the actual Arnold renderer) after it tries to load C:\Users\david\AppData/Local\Microsoft\WindowsApps\python.exe\ai.dll

Everything else in the PATH after that "python.exe" entry is ignored.

So I have to wonder if that's the problem.

On the left in this screenshot is the PATH value in maya.exe (with extra linebreaks for readability).
On the right is the Process Monitor log, filtered to show every attempt to access ai.dll:

[DavidVB997]

So i removed the python.exe from the system environments variables and now im not sure where to look. it didnt fix the problem but the python.exe is at least gone. 

I have submitted a new log into the drive which i created the same way after deleting the python.exe path from the environment variables. I also installed https://github.com/lucasg/Dependencies

to check if there are any dependencies missing on the mtoa.mll file but i came up empty handed, i went into the mtoa file and ran the -chain command and searched for NOT FOUND, although I am not entirely certain that did the job correctly.

Anyway i published a now log file called "Logfile two" in the drive, please let me know if you find anything new. 

I will also put this screenshot in there when i searched for ai.dll this is what came up, im not sure what to look for as there are so incredibly many lines. I am not sure where the process starts to go wrong.

Hope you can find something new. Thanks again.

[DavidVB997 · Accepted solution]

I GOT IT!

So i forgot to remove the python.exe paths from the System variables and had only removed them from the user variables, I also just removed duplicates and a weird %PATH% in there which i have no idea where it came from. so also in the logfile two it did actually find another python.exe so that made me find out.

Thank you so much for your help.

The solution was removing all the Paths that ended with python.exe from the environment variables user and system. Apparently it doesnt like it when the paths end in a .exe and it messes up the process. Also Chat-Gpt mentioned that i should remove the %PATH% so i did that too something about not getting old paths back in there.

Thank you again:) It was not mayas fault.