Overview
Customers with floating licenses have the ability to control access to Lumerical licenses. For example, licenses can be reserved for particular users or computers. Access rules can be defined by admins using the options file (.opt).
This article applies to all Floating license models.
Typical examples of access control include:
- Reserve a set of licenses for a particular group of users or single user.
e.g. if one user always needs access to MODE, a license can be permanently reserved to this user. - Reserve a set of licenses for a cluster.
e.g. 10 FDTD engine licenses can be permanently reserved for use on a local cluster.
Location of the options file
Windows:
C:\Program Files\Lumerical\Lumerical-FlexLM\licenses\LUMERICL\LUMERICL.opt
Linux:
/opt/lumerical/lumerical-flexlm/licenses/LUMERICL/LUMERICL.opt
macOS:
/opt/lumerical/lumerical-flexlm/licenses/LUMERICL/LUMERICL.opt
Updating the options file
- By default, admin or root access is required to edit this file.
- Restart FlexLM after making changes to the Options file to apply your changes.
- If the option file is configured correctly, you should notice the difference on the FlexNet dashboard. The 'Hosts' link will now show the reserved license as being 'used/checkout' even if there are no actual users using the license and will show the GROUP or USER that the license is reserved to.
- See keywords and examples below for details.
Keywords used in the options file
USER
- Defining a user that for use with an option. This option is case sensitive.
USER username
- Example: Reserve FDTD Solution full license (CAD+Engine) to USER bill
RESERVE 1 FDTD_Solutions_design USER bill
RESERVE 1 FDTD_Solutions_engine USER bill
GROUP
- Define a group of users for use with any options. This option is case sensitive.
GROUP group_name user_list - Example: Define the GROUP 'Researchers' consisting of users tom, jim, and bill and Reserve 1 FDTD Solutions license to the GROUP.
GROUP Researchers tom jim bill
RESERVE 1 FDTD_Solutions_design GROUP Researchers
RESERVE 1 FDTD_Solutions_engine GROUP Researchers
Note: Ensure that a USER only belongs to one (1) user GROUP.
HOST_GROUP
- Define a group of hosts (computers) for use with any options. This option is case sensitive.
HOST_GROUP group_name host_list - Example: Define the HOST_GROUP HPCcluster consisting of nodeOne, nodeTwo, and nodeThree
HOST_GROUP HPCcluster nodeOne nodeTwo nodeThree
Note: Ensure that each HostName only belongs to one (1) HOST_GROUP.
INCLUDE
- Allow a user or predefined group of users/hosts to use a license.
INCLUDE feature type {name | group_name} - Example: Allow the GROUP 'researchers' to use FDTD_Solutions_design license
INCLUDE FDTD_Solutions_design GROUP researchers
INCLUDEALL
- Allow a user or predefined group of users/hosts to use All licenses on the current FlexLM.
INCLUDEALL type {name | group_name} - Example: Allow USER 'jane' to use All licenses on the current FlexLM
INCLUDEALL USER jane
EXCLUDE
- Deny a user or predefined group of users/hosts access to a license.
EXCLUDE feature type {name | group_name} - Example: EXCLUDE any host from the group HPCclusters to use FDTD_Solutions_design license
EXCLUDE FDTD_Solutions_design GROUP HPCclusters
EXCLUDEALL
- Deny a user or predefined group of users/hosts access to All licenses on the current FlexLM. If the type is not defined it will exclude all license for all types (USERS, GROUPS and HOST)
EXCLUDEALL type {name | group_name} - Example: EXCLUDE the machine with HostName 'sky' from checking out any license features on the current FlexLM.
EXCLUDEALL HOST sky
RESERVE
- Reserve licenses for a USER, HOST or GROUP of users or hosts.
RESERVE num_lic feature type {name | group_name} - Example: RESERVE 1 license of FDTD_Solutions_design for USER 'jill'
RESERVE 1 FDTD_Solutions_design USER jill
EXPDATE
- Specify the expiration date of the license to be reserved to predefined user/host or group of users/hosts.
EXPDATE={expiry_date} - Example: RESERVE 1 license of FDTD_Solutions_design with expiry date 31-jan-2017 to GROUP 'grp1'
RESERVE 1 FDTD_Solutions_design:EXPDATE=31-jan-2017 GROUP grp1
NOTE: Ensure that the 'FEATURE' and 'EXPIRY DATE' are as shown on the license details.
NOTICE
- Specify the account name of the license as shown on the license details. (use quotes to define feature and account)
NOTICE={Account Name} - Example: RESERVE 1 license of FDTD_Solutions_design to account name, 'Lumerical Solutions (Lito Yap) [LS-0001]' for GROUP 'lab1'
RESERVE 1 "FDTD_Solutions_design:NOTICE=Lumerical Solutions (Lito Yap) [LS-0001]" GROUP lab1
NOTE: Ensure that the 'FEATURE' and 'NOTICE' are as shown on the license details.
TIMEOUT
- Sets the time after which an inactive license is freed and reclaimed by the vendor daemon.
- Default minimum timeout is 14400 seconds (4 hours)
TIMEOUT feature[:keyword=value] seconds
TIMEOUTALL
- Same as TIMEOUT, but applies to all features.
TIMEOUTALL seconds
Examples
User reservations
The following will reserve one FDTD design license and two FDTD engine licenses for the USER named 'bill'.
RESERVE 1 FDTD_Solutions_design USER bill
RESERVE 2 FDTD_Solutions_engine USER bill
Group reservations
The following option file code will reserve 2 FDTD licenses (both the design and engine components) for a group called, 'ResearchLab' that includes 'bob', 'john' and 'tim'.
# Define the members of each group
GROUP ResearchLab bob john tim
# Define the restrictions/reservations
RESERVE 2 FDTD_Solutions_design GROUP ResearchLab
RESERVE 2 FDTD_Solutions_engine GROUP ResearchLab
Multiple licenses
Reservations for different licenses
Suppose Group A has a license of FDTD that will expire on January 31 and Group B has a license of FDTD that will expire on March 31. The two groups don't want to share licenses, especially after Group A's license expires.
The duplicate product means that there will be duplicate features of FDTD_Solutions_design and FDTD_Solutions_engine. Therefore you have to specify your features using keyword-value pair. The following syntax is used.
featureName:keyword=value
There are many possible keyword combinations that could be used. In this example, the option is to use the EXPDATE keyword (the expiry date of the license). The final options file would look something like this:
# Define the members of each group
GROUP GroupA bob john tim
GROUP GroupB anna suzanne
# Define the restrictions/reservations
RESERVE 1 FDTD_Solutions_design:EXPDATE=31-jan-2013 GROUP GroupA
RESERVE 1 FDTD_Solutions_engine:EXPDATE=31-jan-2013 GROUP GroupA
RESERVE 1 FDTD_Solutions_design:EXPDATE=31-mar-2013 GROUP GroupB
RESERVE 1 FDTD_Solutions_engine:EXPDATE=31-mar-2013 GROUP GroupB
A different keyword-value pair can be used. Like, ISSUED, START or SIGN. These keywords-value pair can be found in the license details.