ComfyUI API Submission & TrueNAS Upload Pattern

Problem

Submitting complex workflow JSONs via shell heredocs often fails due to quote escaping issues. Additionally, smbclient is NOT installed on the ComfyUI LXC (10.0.0.202), so TrueNAS uploads must be done from the Hermes host.

Solution: File-Based API Submission

Step 1: Write Workflow to File

cat > /tmp/submit_ltx_render.sh << 'EOF'
#!/bin/bash
curl -s -X POST http://10.0.0.202:8188/prompt \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{
    "prompt": {
      "35": {"class_type": "UNETLoader", "inputs": {"unet_name": "ltx-2.3-22b-distilled_transformer_only_fp8_scaled.safetensors", "weight_dtype": "default"}},
      "131": {"class_type": "LTXDirector", "inputs": {
        "model": ["200", 0],
        "clip": ["12", 0],
        "audio_vae": ["8", 0],
        "start_second": 0,
        "end_second": 5.0,
        "duration_seconds": 5.0,
        "start_frame": 0,
        "end_frame": 120,
        "duration_frames": 120,
        "timeline_data": "{\"mainTrackEnabled\": true, \"audioTrackEnabled\": false, \"motionTrackEnabled\": false, \"global_prompt\": \"<PROMPT>\", \"segments\": [{\"type\": \"image\", \"start\": 0.0, \"length\": 120, \"prompt\": \"<DETAILED_PROMPT>\", \"imageFile\": \"<START_FRAME>\", \"guide_strength\": 1.0, \"audioFile\": \"\", \"end\": 5.0}]}",
        "guide_strength": 1.0
      }},
      "200": {"class_type": "LTX2LoraLoaderAdvanced", "inputs": {"lora_name": "ltx-2.3-22b-distilled-lora-1.1_fro90_ceil72_condsafe.safetensors", "model": ["35", 0], "strength_model": 1.0, "video": 1.0, "video_to_audio": 0.0, "audio": 0.0, "audio_to_video": 0.0, "other": 0.0}}
      // ... rest of workflow nodes
    }
  }'
EOF
chmod +x /tmp/submit_ltx_render.sh

Step 2: Submit and Capture Prompt ID

RESULT=$(bash /tmp/submit_ltx_render.sh)
PROMPT_ID=$(echo "$RESULT" | python3 -c "import json,sys; print(json.load(sys.stdin)['prompt_id'])")
echo "Submitted: $PROMPT_ID"

Step 3: Poll for Completion

while true; do
  STATUS=$(curl -s "http://10.0.0.202:8188/history/$PROMPT_ID")
  echo "$STATUS" | grep -q '"status_str":"success"' && echo "COMPLETE" && break
  echo "$STATUS" | grep -q '"status_str":"error"' && echo "ERROR" && echo "$STATUS" && break
  echo "Running..."
  sleep 10
done

Step 4: Verify Output

# Check duration
ffprobe -v error -show_entries format=duration -of default=noprint_wrappers=1:nokey=1 ~/comfy-ui/output/<filename>.mp4

# Check frames
ffprobe -v error -select_streams v:0 -show_entries stream=nb_frames -of default=noprint_wrappers=1:nokey=1 ~/comfy-ui/output/<filename>.mp4

# Check resolution
ffprobe -v error -select_streams v:0 -show_entries stream=width,height -of default=noprint_wrappers=1:nokey=1 ~/comfy-ui/output/<filename>.mp4

TrueNAS Upload (From Hermes Host)

Prerequisites

smbclient is NOT on .202 (LXC)
Copy files to Hermes host first (10.0.0.42)
Upload from Hermes host using smbclient

Upload Command

# Copy from LXC to Hermes host
sshpass -p 'passw0rd' scp [email protected]:~/comfy-ui/output/<filename>.mp4 ~/comfy-ui/output/

# Upload to TrueNAS
smbclient //10.0.0.117/proxmoxBackup -U n8n -c "cd ai_vid_stock_material\\\\outputs; put <local_filename>.mp4"

Alternative: Mount and Copy

# Mount TrueNAS share (if cifs kernel module available)
sudo mount -t cifs //10.0.0.117/proxmoxBackup/ai_vid_stock_material/outputs /mnt/truenas_outputs -o user=n8n,vers=3.0

# Copy file
cp <local_filename>.mp4 /mnt/truenas_outputs/

# Unmount
sudo umount /mnt/truenas_outputs

Verification Checklist

Prompt ID captured from API response
Queue status shows queue_running: [] and queue_pending: []
History shows "status_str":"success"
ffprobe confirms expected duration (5s = 121 frames at 24fps, 10s = 241 frames)
ffprobe confirms resolution (768×512 for 6-fix baseline)
File uploaded to TrueNAS at //10.0.0.117/proxmoxBackup/ai_vid_stock_material/outputs/
Filename follows naming convention: LTX_YYYY-MM-DD_<what>_<sampler>_<duration>.mp4

Common Errors

"no_prompt" Error

Cause: Submitted bare workflow JSON instead of {\"prompt\": <workflow>} envelope
Fix: Wrap workflow in {"prompt": ...} before sending to /prompt endpoint

"tree connect failed: NT_STATUS_BAD_NETWORK_NAME"

Cause: Wrong SMB path or missing credentials
Fix: Use //10.0.0.117/proxmoxBackup (not the full path), then cd into subdirectory

Quote Escaping Failures

Cause: Inline JSON with quotes breaks shell parsing
Fix: Write JSON to file first, then read with -d @/path/to/file.json

VRAM Stuck at Idle

Cause: Job never started (error during parsing)
Fix: Check curl -s http://localhost:8188/queue for empty queue_running, then check curl -s http://localhost:8188/history/<prompt_id> for error messages

/tmp/submit_ltx_render.sh — Example submission script
~/comfy-ui/output/ — ComfyUI output directory on .202
//10.0.0.117/proxmoxBackup/ai_vid_stock_material/outputs/ — TrueNAS destination

5.0 KiB Raw Blame History Unescape Escape