Serving 9.x AND 10.x licenses

[curtvprice]

We (like many others I'm sure) would like to serve 9.x AND 10.x licenses for a while. Can they be served from the same license manager, or do we have to run parallel license managers at once using different ports?

[badri7]

The 10.x licenses and license manager will support 9.x Desktop and Workstation software. The 9.x and 10.x license managers cannot be installed on the same machine.

[curtvprice]

The 10.x licenses and license manager will support 9.x Desktop and Workstation software. The 9.x and 10.x license managers cannot be installed on the same machine.

Badri, this sounds fantastic, however it is not working for us. (We're using 9.3.1sp1 client, 10.0 PR1 license server).

When I use the 9.3.1 license manager and point to the 10.x license serve,r I get this message:

The computer you chose is not a valid license server or is running and older version of the License Manager.

Are we going to need new 10.x-style 9.x keycodes to do this?

[BillyBuerger]

I'm using our V10 licenses from my 9.3.1 SP1 PC right now. I'm trying to remember if I had problems with it at first. I almost want to say I had to manually set the server in Regedit initially. Although I can change it now and don't get any errors. So I might just be remembering something else. The Availability section says there are none available. But it still correctly retrieves a license when I open ArcMap.

Your error sounds more like it's not able to access the license server at all. Have you tried from a separate PC running Arc10 to see if it's an access problem versus a license problem? Can you ping the server? Is the firewall correctly opened up?

[curtvprice]

Thanks for sharing your experience - I think this was a firewall issue. I have tested 9.3.1 client on the same machine as a 10.x license server and it works - just like Billy reports - with Desktop Admin's Availability report saying zero licenses available, without any extensions listed.

UPDATE: I learned a fix for this will be included in ArcGIS 9.3.1 SP 2 -- so Desktop Administrator will "see" license availablity on a 10.x license server. Yay!

If you're on a 9.3.1 machine, there is a workaround to check availbility, even if the the 9.3.1 client can't talk to the new license server: get a copy of the new 10.x lmutil and run

lmutil -a -c @my_arc10_license_server

and you get the details:

lmutil - Copyright (c) 1989-2008 Acresso Software Inc. All Rights Reserved.
Flexible License Manager status on Tue 5/11/2010 11:08
License server status: 27000@localhost
    License file(s) on localhost: D:\ArcGIS\License10.0\bin\service.txt:
 localhost: license server UP v11.6

Vendor daemon status (on igskmccwws039):
    ARCGIS: UP v11.6

Feature usage info:

Users of ACT:  (Total of 1 license issued;  Total of 0 licenses in use)
Users of ARC/INFO:  (Total of 6 licenses issued;  Total of 0 licenses in use)
Users of ArcScan:  (Total of 6 licenses issued;  Total of 0 licenses in use)
Users of GeoStats:  (Total of 6 licenses issued;  Total of 0 licenses in use)
Users of Grid:  (Total of 6 licenses issued;  Total of 0 licenses in use)
Users of Maplex:  (Total of 6 licenses issued;  Total of 0 licenses in use)
Users of Network:  (Total of 6 licenses issued;  Total of 0 licenses in use)
Users of Publisher:  (Total of 6 licenses issued;  Total of 0 licenses in use)
Users of Schematics:  (Total of 6 licenses issued;  Total of 0 licenses in use)
Users of TIN:  (Total of 6 licenses issued;  Total of 0 licenses in use)

[BillyBuerger]

Glad to hear it's working. I've been playing around with the new lmutil myself. Hopefully they'll give some documentation on the changes as I'm having troubles getting lmremove to work and think that this ACT thing has something to do with it. But I haven't been able to find anything about it.

[acdonnelly]

The 10.x licenses and license manager will support 9.x Desktop and Workstation software. The 9.x and 10.x license managers cannot be installed on the same machine.

I have users pointing to a 10.x license server with 9.3.1 machines, and they seem to run fine but there is no server info in the Desktop Administrator. Are there any other issues besides this we need to worry about with this scenario, as long as 9.3.1 runs OK? They have indicated having issues with 9.3.1 SP2, so they don't want to update to that to fix this issue.

Just want to make double-sure. Thank you! Amy

[vsfoote]

The new ArcGIS 10.x LM serves license authorizations to ArcGIS 9.x clients.

No issues other than an ArcGIS 9.3.1 client can not be served Bing Maps/Virtual Earth license authorizations via an ArcGIS 10.x LM, so if continued 9.3.1 use of Bing Maps is an issue--retain an ArcGIS 9.x LM as an alternate license pool.

Once installed, the ArcGIS 9.3.1 SP2 does resolve Desktop Administrator issues when polling the ArcGIS 10.x LM. But as you mention some folks have had problems with the download and installation. But, that was not our experience and may just have been load on ESRI's download servers when the patches were first released.

Stuart

[kps4]

I also need to serve up both 9.3 and 10 licenses from the 10 License Manager. But according to ESRI's web HELP v10 it says - "License files at version 9 or earlier will not work with this new version of the License Manager. You will need to first authorize licenses on the license server using the new authorization information sent via e-mail by ESRI Customer Service before starting the license service."

I have all my 9x license files but how do I go about getting new license files for my 9.3 software that work with the 10 License Manager?

The customer care portal seems to only generate version 10 licenses.

Any help would be appreciated!

[kps4]

Figured this out myself.....But for those of you who want a simply summary on how to do this...here goes:

First, make sure your Esri Global ID account is associated with your customer number.

Go to Esri's new customer care portal - https://customers.esri.com/

Generate one provisioning file (email/download) with all the concurrent use software you want served up by the license manager. This will be a .prvs file. (For example 3 ArcInfo, 2 ArcView, 1 3D analyst - whatever you're paying maintenance on will show up on your Authorization Summary).

Next, uninstall your 9.3 License Manager.

Next, install the 10 License Manager from your ArcGIS Desktop CD. At the end of the install you will have the option to authorize your software (as normal). In the authorization wizard - Select the option 'I have received an authorization file from ESRI and am now ready to finish the authorization process'.

Browse to the saved provisioning file.

Select 'Authorize with ESRI now over the Internet'. (Select the website or email option if your machine does not have an internet connection.)

Review the pre-populated information and enter any additional information required. Next, you will see the authorization numbers entered for the desktop products and extensions - as well as the number of licenses you have of each product.

Click Finish and you're done! Your 9.3 clients will be able to read the 10 License Manager no problem.

A side note on provisioning files...I think many people will be easily confused and think that a provisioning file is a license file. However, it is not. All the provisioning file is is a text file that prepopulates user information and product registration numbers into the License Authorization Wizard. It saves you from having hand enter your contact info and reg numbers. This is certainly helpful if you have lots of software or single-use installs. If you choose the "Authorize by email option" - you can still obtain actual license files as many people are accustomed to doing.

The major difference at Version 10 is that Esri is tracking when you authorize a piece of software via the Customer Care Portal. Every time you authorize a piece of software, the number of available authorizations decreases. This obviously prevents people from illegally installing one copy of the software on multiple machines.

Anyway...hope this helps someone.

[danielri]

I have been working the v10 license issue also, two items of note:

1. when setting up a v10 license server in Windows XP and 7 you continue to have the Windows Firewall issue, where you need to edit the services.txt file (i.e., at v9 would be .lic files) and lock the vendor daemon to a static port (see http://resources.arcgis.com/content/...leShow&d=26134). Note there is a v10 version of this HowTo, but that one is not as detailed).

2. Where Have All The Licenses Gone v1.1 available from ArcScripts still works with ArcGIS 10. To make it work with v10 you need to replace the lmutil.exe file provided with the ArcScripts download with the v11.6.1.0 lmutil file provided with the v10 ArcGIS license manager.

Enjoy,

[vsfoote]

With recent release of a Bing Maps authorization/entitlement capability for ArcGIS 10 LM (
http://resources.arcgis.com/content/...leShow&d=38096 ) older ArcGIS 9.x LM instances can now safely be replaced.

ArcGIS 10 LM continues to use Flexera's lmgrd FlexNet Publisher component but at this release adds the TrustedStorage license token repository as a replacement of License File based entitlements. The authorization exchanges between the License Manager and ESRI's License Authorization server as well as the License Manager and the ArcGIS 10 client systems are passed as TrustedStorage tokens. Otherwise the FlexNet license entitlements are unchanged for ArcGIS 9.x client exchanges.

There are general issues of FlexNet library compatibility and at ArcGIS 10 ESRI released the LM with FlexNet Publisher 11.6.1 components. Unfortunately, a number of utilities offered in the community supported ArcScripts arena use earlier releases of FlexLM lmutil.exe which must now be modified to match at least the 11.6.1 release to properly query the lmgrd service.

That is why folks have had problems with Julie Skuba's "Where have all the licenses gone" VB.net script ( http://arcscripts.esri.com/details.asp?dbid=14222 ) which bundles a very old v8.1b release of Flexera's (then Globetrotter) lmutils.exe utility.

As a general suggestion, and as recommended by Flexera for its FlexNet Publisher implementers, all lmgrd license server daemons should be maintained at the latest FlexNet release, currently 11.9 available from Flexera's download site ( http://www.globes.com/support/fnp_ut...s_download.htm ). This practice is especially helpful if you run FlexNet Publisher based license servers for multiple vendors from the same server system. And while updating the license server components, one should also download and make use of the latest lmutils release. Both programs can be directly swapped into the directories holding the older versions. Note: Before updating the components, first stop the license server and it is a good idea to rename and keep the 11.6.1 versions so you can role them back if ever need be.

Flexera provides a PDF FlexNet License Administration guide on their site that is a very helpful reference.

Finally, ESRI's LSAdmin.exe GUI can only manipulate the ArcGIS 10 LM and since ESRI no longer delivers the lmtools Windows GUI interface--it is worth downloading the current release of that as well. Except for authorizing the TrustedStorage license pools, the lmtools GUI will fully control the ArcGIS 10 LM and is essential if you have additional FlexNet Publisher based license servers resident on the same Windows system.