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Managing Apex Licenses

The following topics are covered in this section:

When you buy Apex, you purchase some number of floating licenses. Floating licenses allow anyone on your network to use Apex or Summit as long as a license is available. Thus, the number of licenses that you purchase determines the maximum number of users who can use Apex or Summit simultaneously.

For example, if you purchased five Apex licenses and three users are currently using Apex, then two more users can use Apex.


How Licenses Work

Licenses are controlled by a license manager (FLEXlm software delivered as part of Apex) that runs on a license server (one of your workstations). The license manager monitors license access, simultaneous usage, idle time, and so on.

When you start Apex or Summit, you are initially unlicensed. If a license is available, the license manager gives you a license and you retain it as long as you keep using Apex or Summit. When you exit, your license is returned to the license manager and becomes available for another user.

If no license is available, you are unable to use Apex or Summit until a license is returned by another user.


The License Manager

Apex uses the Flexible License Manager, FLEXlm, from Globetrotter Software, Inc. Apex and Summit require FLEXlm. The license manager includes the following components:

Once the daemons and license file are in place, all that remains is to start the license daemon, which in turn will start the vendor daemons, each time the license server boots. The license daemon can be conveniently started from:

Digital Unix:
/sbin/init.d/SlmRational.sh
HP-UX:
/sbin/init.d/SlmRational.sh
IRIX:
/etc/init.d/SlmRational.sh
AIX:
/etc/inittab
Solaris:
/etc/rc2.d/SlmRational.sh

Apex provides installation scripts to guide you through this setup. They are described in Installation Quick Start.


License Manager Commands

To verify that your license manager is operational, you can enter these commands on your license server to see if its daemons are running:

or

Their output should include lines similar to the following (your pathnames will vary):

The license manager supports several system-administration commands.

Command
Description
lmdiag
Allows you to diagnose problems when you cannot checkout a license.
lmdown
Shuts down license and vendor daemons
lmhostid
Reports license manager host ID of workstation
lmremove
Returns specific licenses to license pool (for example, after a workstation crashes)
lmreread
Rereads license file, starts new vendor daemons
lmstat
Reports status on daemons and feature usage
exinstal
Reports on licenses in license file you specify on the command line.

For more information on these commands, you can view the FLEXlm on-line documentation from any Apex window by selecting the Help > Manuals > Rational Apex Manuals > FLEXlm End User Manual menu.These commands are documented in the License Administration Tools chapter.


The License File

The default Rational license file is rational_dir/config/license.dat or server_name.dat. As you install Rational products, you can merge the Rational license data into another license file that you have already set up for another product.

When users start Apex or Summit, apexinit and summitinit automatically define the environment variable LM_LICENSE_FILE for them. FLEXlm uses this variable to locate the license file.

Format

The license file is a text file that you can edit with any text editor. Your license file will contain lines similar to:

In general, one or three server lines are followed by one or more vendor daemon lines, which are followed by one or more feature or increment lines. Each server line contains, in order, the:

Each vendor daemon line contains, in order, the:

Each feature and increment line contains, in order, the:

The tokens on each line can be separated by any amount of white space (spaces or tabs). You can edit only four kinds of tokens in the license file:

All other tokens are included as input to the encryption algorithm that produces the encryption codes on the FEATURE lines.

Options

You can customize license access by:

1 . Creating an options file for the rational daemon

2 . Adding the pathname of the options file as the fourth field on the DAEMON line for the rational daemon

An options file allows you to:

For Apex, lines in the options file have this format:

The following table shows several examples:

Objective:
Example line(s) added to your options file:
To make sure a key developer named Ace never has to wait for a license
RESERVE 1 USER ace
To allow access from only one workstation named loner
INCLUDE HOST loner
To disallow access to three stooges
GROUP stooges <larry curly moe>
EXCLUDE GROUP stooges


Obtaining Licenses

Even if you already have existing Rational licenses, you will need new license codes to move to the current version from versions earlier than Apex 4.0.0.

If you are installing Rational Apex for the first time, or are adding licenses, contact Rational to obtain the encryption code for your Apex installation.

Please be prepared to supply your product order reference number, the host and host ID of your license, the number of licensed users, and the version number of Apex. The get_license_info installation script will help you gather them. The information gathered is put in the LICENSE_INFORMATION file.

Rational Software Corporation will provide your encryption code and its expiration date. The code will be a 12 or 20-digit hexadecimal string--for example: 4B868981DB6D7295573E. The date will be in a dd-mmm-yyyy format--for example: 31-dec-2001. The day can be expressed as one or two digits and the year must be expressed as four digits--for example: 1-jan-2005. An exception to this is when the year is expressed as 00. This indicates a permanent license--one that will not expire. The expiration date can also be expressed as the keyword permanent.


Rational Software Corporation 
http://www.rational.com
support@rational.com
techpubs@rational.com
Copyright © 1993-2002, Rational Software Corporation. All rights reserved.
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