FLEXlm Frequently Asked Questions

• Q1. Hostids
  • Q1.1 How do I get the system hostid?
  • Q1.2 On HP700 the hostid seems to be blank. Why?
  • Q1.3 At some HP sites lmhostid gives an ethernet hostid, and at others a uname -i hostid. Why?
  • Q1.4 For some applications, the hostid on some SGI systems seems to be wrong. Why?
  • Q1.5 On NT, I'm getting a 0 hostid (or FFFFFFFF)--how do I fix this?
• Q2. License File Locations
  • Q2.1 My application can't seem to find the license file. What do I do?
  • Q2.2 lmstat doesn't report all the features in my license file. Why?
  • Q2.3 I've received FLEXlm license files from 2 different companies. Do I have to combine them?
  • Q2.4 I want to combine license files. How do I do it?
  • Q2.5 When is it recommended to combine license files?
• Q3. License File Contents
  • Q3.1 What are the components of a license file?
  • Q3.2 What does a demo license look like?
  • Q3.3 Is there any way to steal licenses by duplicating lines, etc.?
  • Q3.4 Does FLEXlm handle dates in the year 2000 and beyond?
• Q4. FLEXlm Versions
  • Q4.1 I have products from several companies at various FLEXlm version levels. Do I have to worry about how these versions work together?
  • Q4.2 I've received a new copy of a product from a vendor, and it uses a new version of FLEXlm. Is my old license file still valid?
  • Q4.3 I've received a new license file, and the format is different from the old one I had from the same vendor? Why? Are they compatible?
  • Q4.4 How do versions of FLEXlm differ?
• Q5. Using FLEXlm
  • Q5.1 How do I install a FLEXlm license file?
  • Q5.2 How do I start the FLEXlm license server?
  • Q5.3 I'm having trouble starting the license server in the Unix system bootup files. How can I get this to work?
  • Q5.4 My server refuses to start. I get the message `No licenses to serve'.
  • Q5.5 Does FLEXlm work across the internet?
  • Q5.6 Does FLEXlm work with Internet firewalls?
  • Q5.7 If my client dies, does the server free the license?
  • Q5.8 What happens when the license server dies?
  • Q5.9 I'm getting the error `encryption code in license file is inconsistent'. What does this mean?
  • Q5.10 How do you tell if a port is already in use?
  • Q5.11 How do you start lmgrd on NT?
  • Q5.12 On Solaris 2.4, why does it take 4 minutes to restart lmgrd?
  • Q5.13 Does FLEXlm require root permissions?
  • Q5.14 Is it ok to run lmgrd as `root' (Unix only)?
• Q6. How FLEXlm Works.
  • Q6.1 What prevents me from changing a license file?
  • Q6.2 What goes into a license-key?
  • Q6.3 How hard is it to guess a license-key?
  • Q6.4 So, does that mean that FLEXlm is unbreakable.
  • Q6.5 How fast does a checkout occur?
  • Q6.6 Does FLEXlm licensing impose a heavy load on the network.
  • Q6.7 Does FLEXlm work with NFS?
  • Q6.8 Does FLEXlm work with ATM, ISDN, Token-Ring, etc.
  • Q6.9 Does FLEXlm work with subnets, fully-qualified names, multiple domains, etc.?
  • Q6.10 Does FLEXlm work with NIS and DNS?
  • Q6.11 Is the FLEXlm `display' the same as an X-Display?
  • Q6.12 We're using FLEXlm over a wide-area network. What can we do to improve performance?
• Q7. Redundant Servers
  • Q7.1 What are FLEXlm redundant servers?
  • Q7.2 How do I start up redundant servers? Is there a time-limit for starting all the servers?
  • Q7.3 Why is a quorum of 2 servers required?
  • Q7.4 When are redundant servers recommended?
  • Q7.5 When are redundant servers discouraged?
  • Q7.6 Is it OK to NFS-mount license files when using redundant servers?
  • Q7.7 How can the colon-separated list in $LM_LICENSE_FILE be used for redundancy?
  • Q7.8 Are there any drawbacks to using the colon-separated list for redundancy?
  • Q7.9 When is it recommended to use colon-separated list for redundancy rather than true redundant servers?
  • Q7.10 I'm seeing the error messages `Mismatch Communications...' and lmgrd exits. Is there a fix?
• Q8. Common Debug Log errors
  • Q8.1 Retrying socket bind
  • Q8.2 License manager: can't initialize: Cannot find license file
  • Q8.3 Invalid license key (inconsistent encryption code for `f1')
  • Q8.4 MULTIPLE `vendor-daemon-name' servers running.
  • Q8.5 Vendor daemon can't talk to lmgrd
  • Q8.6 Vendor daemon died with status n...Since this is an unknown status, lmgrd will attempt to re-start the vendor daemon.
• Q9. Common Application Startup Problems
  • Q9.1 Cannot find license file
  • Q9.2 No such feature exists
  • Q9.3 Cannot connect to license server
  • Q9.4 License server does not support this feature
• Q10. FLEXlm utilities (lmutil - lmstat, etc.)
  • Q10.1 How do I tell who's currently using a feature?
  • Q10.2 How do I see historical usage of a feature?
  • Q10.3 How do I tell what version of FLEXlm I'm using?
  • Q10.4 lmstat sometimes skips features, why?
  • Q10.5 How do I tell if I've typed in the license file correctly?
  • Q10.6 Q8.5 I'm getting `Cannot Connect' errors. How do I determine what's wrong?
  • Q10.7 lmremove doesn't seem to work: after freeing a license, it becomes checked out shortly after. Why?
  • Q10.8 How do I prevent users at my site from being able to use lmdown?
  • Q10.9 If I can't use lmdown, how do I shutdown the servers?
  • Q10.10 When I run lmdown on redundant servers, it doesn't seem to work. Why?
• Q11. End-User Options File
  • Q11.1 How do I enable the Options file?
  • Q11.2 Why doesn't TIMEOUT work?
  • Q11.3 Is the Options GROUP the same as a Unix group (/etc/groups)?
  • Q11.4 I need to have more users in a GROUP - how can I get around the 240 character limitation?
  • Q11.5 I need a GROUP of hosts, not users.
  • Q11.6 What is REPORTLOG for?
• Q12. WINDOWS/PC Related Questions
  • Q12.1 What is the Latest Version of PC Drivers?
  • Q12.2 What Platforms does the PC Run on?
  • Q12.3 What is WINSOCKX.DLL
  • Q12.4 Why do I need to include NWlink IPX/SPX on NT and Win 95?
  • Q12.5 Will the Server run on Windows 95?
  Index

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