Specify license manager location non-graphically

This page explains how to specify the location, port number, and computer name or IP, of your license server without using the graphical Ansys Optics license configuration utility. This may be required for machines without a graphical interface or when setting system-wide license server configuration.

You can specify the hostname of your license in server two ways, with an environment variable or with a License.ini file.

Notes

• If both the License.ini file and the environment variable are set, the License.ini file takes precedence.
• If both the user and system wide License.ini files are set, the user's License.ini file will take precedence. 

Setting an Environment Variable

• This method using the environment variable is supported starting with Ansys Optics 2021 R2.
• For prior releases that are still accessing the legacy Lumerical FlexNet license manager, configure the "License.ini" file as shown below. The older versions do not support this method.  

ANSYSLMD_LICENSE_FILE environment variable

Add the environment variable, ANSYSLMD_LICENSE_FILE with the corresponding port and license server hostname or IP address on the machine running Ansys Optics. See adding/modifying environment variables in Windows and Linux for more information.

Configuring the License.ini file

"License.ini" specifies the port and server running the Ansys license manager. This file can be located in the user's home directory (local), or in the installation folder of the version of Ansys Optics on the machine ('system wide'). The 'system-wide' preference files will apply to all users on the machine. See this page for more information of the "preference.ini" files. 

• Create the preference file directory if it does not exist. Folder and filenames are case-sensitive.
  • user's specific folder

    mkdir $HOME/.config/Lumerical/

  • default global folder for the current release (root access required)

    sudo mkdir /opt/lumerical/[[verpath]]/Lumerical/

• Create the "License.ini" file in the "Lumerical" folder that was created above.

  sudo vi License.ini

• Specify the machine hosting the license manager and TCP port number used.
  The file should contain the following lines: (default port shown)  

  [license]
  domain=2
  default=user
  ansysserver\host=1055@[license_server]

Notes:

Replace the "domain" number with:

0 - for Ansys Enterprise product license,

1 - for Legacy Lumerical product license, and

2 - for Ansys Standard product license;

which corresponds to the Ansys Optics Launcher (GUI) license settings as shown below.

Triad license server configuration

Note: The example shown uses default port 1055, and server1, server2, and server3 as the hostnames of the triad license servers. Change the port and the hostname to the port number and hostname of the servers you are using.  

Windows: Separate the Ansys license server information with a comma "," and inside quotes "". 

ansysserver\host="1055@server1,1055@server2,1055@server3"

Linux: Separate the Ansys license servers information with a colon ":".

ansysserver\host=1055@server1:1055@server2:1055@server3 

See also

Selecting the correct license manager option 

How to obtain a floating license (GUI) 

Create or modify environment variables in Windows

Setting environment variable in Linux